To avoid a surprise a monthly budget tracker with a pen and cash bills and coins

There is such thing as a bad surprise

You will not achieve your goals if you don’t make them a monthly habit.

Not quarterly. Not annually. Monthly.

If you are surprised when your tax accountant tells you how much money you made last year when they’re preparing your taxes, you’re doing business wrong.

How much you make…

How much you spend…

How much cash is in the bank… 💰

…Should NEVER be a surprise! 😲

Savvy business owners who grow to 6- and 7-figures look at their numbers every single month – both what happened last month and their forecast for next month – so there is no surprise.

But what should you actually DO every month?

1. Do your bookkeeping. Make sure your numbers are accurate and reconciled.

2. Review your Profit & Loss statement and key metrics.

3. Update your projections for the rest of the year.

Have you ever been surprised by the numbers in your biz? Grab our Profit Playbook to build your own plan and never be surprised again! http://100degreesconsulting.com/profit/

If your Profit Playbook is helpful, please share on Instagram and tag me @stephanie.skry

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5 Ways to Maximize Your Money Before December 31

Lists are kind of my thing. If there are more than two of anything, I will make a list. So December, with its shopping lists, gift guides, and year-end planning to-dos galore, is my favorite time of year.

Speaking of year-end planning, I wanted to share a few things that you can do as a leader to potentially save on taxes and maximize your money, friends!

Many of our clients had a really strong 2020, meaning a large net income. That’s amazing and worthy of celebration, but also comes with a potentially larger tax bill. I like to look at my taxes with gratitude (it means it was a great year!) but I also want to maximize my money because abundance leads to more abundance! 

Here are some ideas to maximize your money:

  1. Max out your retirement accounts. I’ve had a SEP IRA for a couple years now and always aim to max it out as early in the year as possible – this particular account lets you contribute 25% of your salary which is awesome. It’s a deductible expense for your business AND tax deferred savings for your future. I know it sounds intimidating, but it took me about 10 minutes to open and contribute to an account. My SEP IRA is at Vanguard.
  2. Donate to your favorite charity. My biggest challenge in donating to charities is choosing which one! I’ve worked with nonprofits for over a decade so it feels nearly impossible to choose just one worthy cause. Charity Navigator and Guidestar are great places to start researching nonprofits if you aren’t sure where exactly to donate. Charitable donations are also tax deductible, so win-win (just check with your CPA on any limits).
  3. Pay all your bills. If you’re looking at significant net income (that’s the money you have left over after all expenses), that also might mean a significant tax bill. To reduce that amount, pay your bills! Examples: you owe your coach a few more installments of your annual coaching program or your second payment for your website design is coming up in January. Pay them all now to increase your 2020 expenses and reduce your tax bill.
  4. Make any large purchases. Okay, listen very carefully. I am, IN NO WAY, advocating purchasing things you don’t need just to reduce your tax bill. However, if you have the cash in the bank (after setting aside your 3 month reserve), and there are major purchases you were going to make in January anyway, buy them now to reduce your net income and tax bill.
  5. Delay your income. Again, this is a strategy for those business owners who have significant net income at the end of the year. If you were planning on billing a client at the end of December, perhaps send your invoice in early January instead, so the revenue is collected next year. In a sense, this is “kicking the can down the road” but who knows what the next 12 months will hold, so why not take the benefit now.

Did you have a year of abundance? Which money maximizing strategies are you using in the next two weeks? 

If you want to get on our calendar to maximize your money all year long, schedule a time to chat here >>> 

If you aren’t sure which finance pro you need on your team, and the terms bookkeeper, CFO, and CPA are confusing, take our quiz here >>>

 

Note: This is not tax advice. Please talk to your CPA for specifics on how this applies to your business and personal tax situation.

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Five Steps to Building Nonprofit Financial Sustainability

You’ve heard the statistic that half of all new businesses fail within the first five years, right? While I haven’t seen the same statistic about nonprofits, I’d venture a guess that it’s a similar number. In fact, the Nonprofit Times released a study in early 2018 that claimed “most charities are teetering on financial peril”.

Financial peril. Intense words to sit with.

So let’s think about that. Fifty percent of organizations, created to do more good in the world and serve those in need, are disappearing, dissolving, or closing up shop on a regular basis which means that whatever need they were created to fill is still out there. That means 8% of organizations are currently operating in the red and 30% are on the verge. We’re talking about spending more than you’re bringing in and not having enough cash to pay your bills.

The question is WHY? Perhaps there wasn’t a strong enough need for the product or service, leadership was not aligned on long-term planning, they weren’t able to bring in enough revenue to cover expenses, there were too many other organizations or companies doing the same thing, or they weren’t providing enough value to the people they were serving.

The bigger question is HOW do we avoid financial peril and ultimately failure? How do we ensure that nonprofit organizations, created to drive positive change in the world, are financially sustainable so they can continue helping and serving, year after year?

I’ve found a solution and I am thrilled to share it with you because it’s an industry game-changer.

But first, even if your organization manages to pay its bills and make payroll every month, do you have a long-term cash management plan? Do you have a reserve of 3-6 months of operating expenses? Do you lose sleep at night (or at least worry occasionally) that your nonprofit seems like a cash-sucking monster and your fundraising just can’t keep up?

I thought so. Keep reading.

As an entrepreneur who’s always interested in improving myself and my business, I recently devoured Profit First, a book by Mike Michalowicz. He has worked with hundreds of business owners who are slaves to their businesses, miserable, and not making any money. His solution to the problem of business owners not making any money is reframing the traditional thinking of Revenue – Expenses = Profit. Instead of taking whatever is left over as profit, he encourages business owners to take their profit first, so Revenue – Profit = Expenses. In other words, bring in the money, set aside a percentage for profit, and use the remainder for expenses.

You’ve probably heard of Parkinson’s Law: work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. In other words, if you have 8 hours to complete a task, it will take you 8 hours. If you have 2 hours to complete the same task, it will take you 2 hours. The productivity gurus out there LOVE this (give yourselves deadlines, people!).

Well, Michalowicz says the same thing about money. If you have $20,000 to spend on operating expenses, you will spend $20,000. If you have $50,000, you will absolutely spend $50,000. This becomes a major problem when you don’t take your profit first, because you will have spent that $50,000 before you can set aside your profit, and before you know it, you have nothing left over.

Michalowicz then goes into exactly HOW to take your profit first and it involves setting up a bunch of bank accounts, reviewing your numbers twice a month, and separating your cash according to a handful of formulas he provides. According to his case studies, this method WORKS.

Now that you have the major premise of the book, it really makes logical sense, right?

But what about nonprofits? Nonprofits don’t make a profit. The Executive Director isn’t personally pocketing a portion of grants each month (at least I REALLY hope not!). And what about restricted funding? You can’t just hack off a portion of a grant and set it aside, right?

You’re right that nonprofits aren’t looking to make a profit, but what they ARE looking for is FINANCIAL SUSTAINABILITY. And the key to financial sustainability is a healthy cash reserve to support the organization in times of need, a positive net income, liquidity, and solvency. Way too many organizations are creating break even budgets, which means you bring in exactly the amount of money you need to cover expenses but, assuming that you manage to raise all those funds, there is absolutely nothing left over for future reserves because you’ve allocated every last penny to expenses.

Does this sound familiar?

Most nonprofit organizations I know are entrenched in the scarcity mindset and believe that there is a limited amount of resources out there and there’s a limit to how much they can fundraise. Now, to an extent this is true because there are only so many hours in a day, but we tend to place more limits on ourselves than we need to.

So if an organization’s expenses are $1M, we budget that we will raise $1M because that’s all we think we can do and all we think we’ll need. If you haven’t figured it out yet, this is incredibly short-sighted and essentially the equivalent of living paycheck-to-paycheck.

I am going to walk you through today how to implement the Profit First strategy into your nonprofit to build long-term financial sustainability.

Let’s dive in!

1. Budget strategy Most organizations get their budgeting process wrong. They try and figure out how much money they can realistically fundraise this year, then lay out their expenses that take every last penny. I encourage leaders to shift their thinking and budget your expenses FIRST. Tell the story in your budget of exactly what you need to accomplish your mission thoughtfully and efficiently without trying to scrape by on fumes.

Once you have your expenses for the year laid out (and don’t be afraid of the big, bad overhead monster!), back into your revenue number. How much money will you need to raise in order to meet these expenses and set aside some funds for a reserve? We’ll talk more about a reserve next.

To figure out your reserve goal, take your total annual expense budget and divide by 12. For example, if you annual expenses are $2M, your monthly expenses would be $166,667. For your first year of budgeting in this way, include a surplus of just 1%, so on this $2M expense budget, plan to fundraise $2,020,000. Make sense?

Watch our free masterclass to learn how to raise more money by sharing your financials.>>>

2. Reserve building Our goal in building a reserve is to have 3-6 months of operating expenses in the bank to support the organization in times of shortfall or emergency. In the example above, our monthly expenses were $166,667, so a 3-6 month reserve should be $500k – $1M.

This number may sound downright terrifying, and I agree, it’s a BIG goal especially for an organization that coasts into payroll every two weeks on fumes. But we’re not going to get there in a month or even two months. This is a long-term process that will lead to long-term sustainability.

Because you’ve made it this far reading through the post, I know you’re in it to win it, so the first step you need to take is to create a separate bank account. We simply cannot create a reserve with cash sitting in our checking account. This special reserve fund needs its very own account.

Now that the reserve fund has a place to live, we need to start putting money in there and we are going to start small. Each month, once the financials have been completed by your bookkeeper, accountant, or finance team, we are going to move 1% of our unrestricted income into the reserve account.

For example, let’s say in March you brought in $225,000 (great job!). $75,000 was a grant restricted to a particular program but the remaining $150,000 was unrestricted income, mostly from your annual event. Once you have closed the books for March, you’re going to move 1% of that $150k, or $1,500, into your reserve account. That’s it. $1,500.

And so on and so forth. On a $2M budget, this will eventually add up to $20,000 sitting in your reserve account. It’s not enough for an entire month of expenses YET, but maybe it’s enough to cover a whole payroll!

Once we’re in a good routine of setting aside 1% of our monthly unrestricted income, we can increase the percentage to build up that reserve just a little bit faster.

3. Clean up liabilities Just like we know that consumer debt is a major hindrance to personal financial freedom, having any long-term liabilities, or debts, on your nonprofit’s balance sheet will keep you from long-term financial sustainability too. Maybe you have a credit card but you haven’t been paying it in full on a monthly basis or perhaps your organization utilizes a line of credit from your bank.

We want to get this paid off so we can build our reserve and the path to financial health much quicker! Again we go back to the budget process. If we know we need to pay down a handful of liabilities, we need to bump up our fundraising goal for this year to cover those expenses.

Do you struggle to understand what your financials really mean? Watch our free masterclass >>>

4. Fundraising Now that I’ve told you a few times that we need to increase our fundraising, you’re probably wondering how the heck you’re going to raise even MORE money next year when you felt challenged and strapped this year!

First of all, I hear you and I salute you. I’m not a fundraiser but I’ve seen just how much work goes into raising every single dollar for your organization, and at the end of the day, I truly think it’s the hardest job at nonprofits. Go you! You are making a difference with the work you do every single day and it’s because of YOU that we can operate and create positive change in the world.

Now, I may not have all the answers, but I do have a few questions. Do you know the percentage of revenue that you bring in that’s unrestricted vs. temporarily restricted? Does the scale tip heavily in one direction or the other? Obviously, unrestricted funding is the magical unicorn that we all want to increase in our organization. What about grants? Are you sure to include a portion of administrative overhead to every single grant to cover your operating costs? It’s a missed opportunity if not!

5. Cash flow rhythm And finally, this is where the CFO in me comes in. As the leader of your organization, you need to get into a monthly rhythm with your accountant (or bookkeeper or CFO) to review the financials, transfer the 1% into your reserve account, and forecast your cash flow for the next 12 months.

Most organizations I know have an income statement and a balance sheet that they review on a monthly basis, but they skip one of the most important pieces of financial management that will literally make or break your organization.

Your cash flow forecast!

Your cash flow forecast is not a report that Quickbooks will spit out. It requires a bit of manual manipulation and a moderate level of Excel proficiency. This report and analysis will show you the inflows and outflows of cash into and out of your bank account, and your ending balance by month, so you can see exactly where cash gets tight and make decisions NOW to avoid a cash crunch LATER.

If you don’t have a cash flow forecast template, I have a simple one here that you can download and fill out for your organization. Then, your bookkeeper or accountant can update the actuals on a monthly basis and you can forecast out the remainder of the year, again, being easily able to spot problem months and make changes now.


So, there you have it. I’ve laid out five simple steps to building a reserve and financial sustainability at your organization, using the Profit First methodology. It’s a slow but consistent process that will eventually lead to a stronger balance sheet, more “profitable” financials, which will ultimately make you irresistible to funders. Funders will see that you take your resources seriously and are in the game for the long-haul. What donor doesn’t want to see that?

Do you feel stumped or overwhelmed by everything I’ve just laid out? I promise it’s not complicated, but it might be helpful to hop on a phone call to walk through it specifically to your organization. I’ve opened a handful of spots on my calendar here if you want to claim one so we can walk through this process together!

Now go build FINANCIAL SUSTAINABILITY!

 

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Five Steps to Closing Your Monthly Books

One question I ask when getting to know a new organization is: What does your monthly close process look like? I often get the answer: What’s that? [Insert wide-eyed emoji here].Many organizations I speak with don’t have an official monthly close process. They generally make sure all the month’s transactions are in the books and then run reports when it’s time for a board meeting. Or maybe they close the books on a quarterly basis instead, again, aligned with a board meeting or quarterly tax payments.While these aren’t necessary red flags, I know that we can do better! Monthly financial reports give you almost real time visibility into your organization, allowing you to be more agile and nimble, and make better decisions in the moment. You remain more organized by getting everything into the books immediately, rather than waiting to make entries months later and deal with messy numbers clean-up later. Finally, your books are going to be much more accurate with real time entry.This is why I work to implement a strong monthly close process for each organization I work with. You don’t need a big accounting team or several extra work days to make this happen.

Check it out.

The basics of a monthly close process: Deadline: 10 business days after the end of the month (Example: November books are to be closed by December 14th – and then no changes to November are allowed) Process & Actions:

1. Enter all expenses

  • Petty cash
  • Credit card
  • Payroll
  • Depreciation
  • In-kind
  • Expense reports

2. Enter all revenue

  • Pledges
  • Cash receipts
  • Donations
  • Sales

3. Reconcile all cash accounts

    • Do your book balances tie with your bank statement balances?

4. Run your reports and analyze

      • Balance sheet – compare last year to this year, check for any major variances. What’s happening to cause the big variances?
      • Income statement – compare last year to this year, check for any major variances. What’s happening to cause the big variances?
      • Budget vs actual – compare month actuals vs. budget and YTD actuals vs. budget
      • General ledger – eyeball the details and make sure all looks correct
      • A/R Aging – what account receivable do you have outstanding? Make another effort to collect!
      • Cash flow – how much cash is in the bank? When does it look like cash is getting low?

5. Bonus points: Forecast the rest of the year

      • After you close each month and review your reports, create a spreadsheet and fill in your projections for cash, revenue, and expenses for each month for the rest of the year.
      • How far off are you from your budget? Do you see any major gaps in revenue or cash? Any months that are heavy in expenses? Why?
      • This exercise will do wonders to help you see around the corner for your business.

Okay, so there were a LOT of finance-y words above that might make you feel overwhelmed. Am I still speaking a foreign language? Does Excel make you cringe? No problem!

Reach out and I’ll walk you through getting your financial house in order, step by step. You WILL become the master of your financial domain!

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How to Create a Nonprofit Budget: The 6 most frequently asked questions

If your fiscal year is the calendar year, October is the start of Q4 and when you should begin crafting your next year’s budget. Your budget is the road map to accomplishing your mission, growing your organization, and making a bigger impact, and without a detailed budget you will be lost.

To help you get started, I’ve put together a list of frequently asked questions about budgeting.

First, grab our Budget Checklist to ensure your organization is on track to make the biggest impact this year with a solid road-map!

Big Picture Budget Questions:

  1. Do you have to have a break even budget? No! There is no nonprofit law that says you MUST have a break even budget or someone will revoke your 501(c)(3) status. It is generally understood (and the IRS says) that nonprofits exist to execute their mission, so your primary goal is not to generate massive profits that will pad someone’s pocket, but there are some important exceptions.
  2. Can you budget for a surplus? Yes! As nonprofits, we are not out to make a profit that will be put into shareholders’ or CEO’s pockets, but we can budget a surplus and oftentimes, we SHOULD budget for a surplus. If we need to build up cash reserves to have at least six months of expenses in the bank to ensure sustainability, or we want to start a new program next year and need the extra cash flow, these are great reasons to budget for a surplus. This is one area where nonprofits should operate more like businesses, so be prepared to share your goals and intentions with your board and stakeholders.
  3. Can you budget for a deficit? Again, yes, but with a few caveats. It’s certainly not a practice I would encourage on an annual basis if the reason you’re budgeting a deficit is simply because you are unable to bring in enough revenue to sustain your programs. That would be a cause for concern and a reason to take a deeper dive into the numbers. However, if you booked multi year revenue in one year and the expenses will catch up the following year, budgeting a deficit is perfectly okay. Again, do the analysis and ensure that your revenue stream is enough to keep the organization going without that bump in revenue, so you’re not just draining your cash.

Logistics of Preparing Your Budget:

  1. When should you complete your budget? Ideally, you would have the budget approved and input into the accounting software by the first day of your fiscal year, so you can immediately begin reporting budget versus actuals to ensure you’re staying on track. Start by getting input and buy-in from your team, then approval from the board. Here is a great timeline to get you started!
  2. How do you project next year’s budget? A great start is to look at this year’s actual numbers – both revenue and expenses – plus projections. So if you’re preparing your budget in October, look at January through September YTD numbers, PLUS October through December projections, to get a total estimate for the whole year. Then go from there. Maybe you know you will be expanding a program or adding a new staff member – add it in! Avoid contingency or “miscellaneous” line items and be as accurate and realistic as possible. Don’t forget to budget revenue too!
  3. How do I analyze my budget draft? Once you’ve compiled your first draft of the budget, it’s time to step back and give it a thorough once-over. Add in variance amounts and percentages so you can see your projected growth or budget decrease. Do you have the resources to grow by as much as you’ve projected? Maybe we scale back and progressively grow over multiple years instead.

Budgeting season is a great time to step back and review your numbers from 30,000 feet. Does your budget align with your strategic plan? Do you have a solid plan in place to accomplish your goals? Dig deep – do you really need to budget that much for office supplies?

I love budgeting, my friends, and you can too. You will be amazed at how a well-made road-map next year will transform your organization by attracting more dollars and enhancing your mission impact.

Ready to dive in? Grab your Budget Checklist here to ensure that you’re on track for next fiscal year!

#budget #CFO #nonprofit #finance #consultant #strategicplan #strategy #planning #budgeting #mission #projections

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What You Must Know About CFOs

I told someone the other day that I am a CFO and they giggled and asked, “Umm, what’s that?”

So I thought I would explain all of the ins and outs of exactly what a CFO – that’s CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER – is and does.

Don’t know if you need a CFO? Take our Finance Professional Quiz to find out if you need someone filling this CRITICAL role and then keep reading! >>

WHO is a CFO?

Me! I’m a Chief Financial Officer. This means that I’m responsible for everything related to the numbers. Analysis and reporting, budgeting, strategic planning. Many times it also means HR, IT, and administrative operations. A bookkeeper or accountant enters your daily transactions and looks at the past, while your CFO uses that information and helps you look toward the future, or “see around the corner”, to make better decisions for your organization.

HOW do I know if I need one?

Do you know your numbers? Is your profit margin or net income where it should be? Do you have a budget that you use to track revenue and expenses each month? How’s your cash flow?

If you can’t answer each of these questions with absolute certainty based on the black and white numbers, you probably need a CFO.

A CFO will change your business and the way you think about numbers. If she is the only finance person at your organization, aside from a bookkeeper, she will be your second set of eyes on the numbers and will make sure revenue and expenses are categorized accurately, so you have solid financial statements. She’ll look for cost savings and generate efficiencies. Your CFO is basically your numbers fairy godmother.

BUT what if I can’t afford another full-time position?

Totally understandable, and unless your revenues are in the multi-millions, you probably don’t even need a full-time CFO.

So a part-time CFO is your solution. Lucky for you, the freelance workforce is exploding! Oh, and I can help you too. Part-time CFOs are cost effective and offer an outside perspective that delivers invaluable input and insight to strategic decisions.

WHAT can I expect from a part-time, virtual CFO?

The first thing they will do is ask for a ton of information and do a deep dive into your numbers – they’ll need access to the accounting system, recent financial reports, and contact with your CEO and bookkeeper. This will help your CFO understand your business inflows and outflows, and she’ll be able to use this information to help you make strategic decisions down the line.

They may work on an hourly basis or monthly retainer (we at 100 Degrees Consulting prefer retainer!) and will likely prefer to work together for a minimum of three months. You will get the most of your relationship once your CFO has had a chance to understand your business and get to know the team. Plus you’ll get the benefit of a full quarterly analysis.

Take our Finance Professional Quiz to find out if you need someone filling this CRITICAL role in your organization, then get on your way to better decision-making!

So what do you think? Are you in control of your numbers, or is it time to bring in the big guns and get an outsider’s expertise?

 

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Does your budget reflect your values?

For those organizations whose fiscal year is the calendar year, you’re probably knee deep in budget prep for 2016. If you’re not, you should be! Budget season is one of my favorite times of year. It’s a wonderful time to look back on YTD financials and analyze what’s going well, where we’re over/under-spending and shape a budget strategy for the next year. We get to do market studies, cost-benefit analyses and tons of other number-crunching activities that only us finance-lovers enjoy. Then we get to wrap it up in a pretty package for the CEO and Board. It is ALMOST like the holidays!

While we know that budget prep is often all about the details, it’s our job to step back and look at the big picture and answer this question:

Does your budget reflect your values?

Is it aligned with the strategic plan? Your strategic plan is your road map to achieve your mission over the next 1-5 years. Do you all have one? (I hope everyone out there is emphatically nodding yes!) This should be the document you reference whenever you need a gut check – Is this new project the right thing to do right now? Should we apply for this grant? Maybe we should create a new program? That’s not to say there isn’t room for flexibility – oftentimes opportunities come up that are a perfect fit for the organization and simply can’t wait until the next round of strategic planning – but it helps us avoid mission creep and distraction.

Your budget needs to reflect this plan. If we don’t have money this year to start a new program, then we should wait for funding, rather than jeopardize the health of our current programs. If we’re planning to grow our adult education initiative, have we budgeted the appropriate funds to do so? Think of the strategic plan and the budget as inseparable BFFs.

Does it include enough infrastructure support? I know what you’re all thinking: Is she talking about…overhead? GASP! Yes, I am! Overhead, or infrastructure as I prefer to call it, is vital to the success of your programs. The structure of the current 990 and the mentality of most of the nonprofit world (including donors) is: spend money on programs, not on overhead. But let’s think about what “overhead” includes: financial reporting, auditing, professional development, technology, fundraising, program evaluation, and tools. Irresponsible, frivolous expenses? Not by any stretch of the imagination! I’m often disappointed with organizations that boast 5% overhead rates and their staff haven’t seen a new computer or training class in a decade. I’m simultaneously disappointed at those who fund private jets and lavish employee retreats, but good news – there is a happy medium!

Ensure that you have proper financial oversight and that your staff have sufficient technology and professional development opportunities to do their job efficiently. A happy and healthy organization means an even greater impact on those you serve – and that’s a powerful story to tell your donors.

Now that we’ve got the big picture out of the way, let’s talk details. If you’re lucky enough to be in the trenches of budget preparation, here is a handy budget checklist to keep you on track:

5 months before FY end

  • Begin composing your strategic plan. Engage employees at all levels across the organization for input through all-staff roundtable sessions, surveys or departmental meetings. This stage is crucial preparation and engagement time for the organization – the amount of effort you put in now will directly reflect employee engagement and buy-in next year.
  • Draft your budget template and make it insightful – be sure to include last year’s budget, this year’s projections and a column for the new year’s budget.
  • Ensure budget line items correspond with your chart of accounts – make any adjustments now.

4 months before FY end

  • Finalize the strategic plan draft and distribute to department heads.
  • Distribute budget templates to department heads with clear instructions on filling out.

3 months before FY end

  • Schedule meetings with the department heads to review their budgets.
  • Dig deep and look at the big picture – What’s our cost per program? Cost per client served? Is this level of growth sustainable? Do we have a fundraising plan to support the expense budget?

2 months before FY end

  • Finalize the budget.
  • Get Board approval. The timeline can vary based on your board meeting schedule but please, please, please get board approval on your strategic plan and budget. The level of detail you provide can vary based on what your board wants to see but at a bare minimum, I suggest high-level detail by department (programs, development, finance, etc).

1 month before FY end

  • Begin preparing to close the books.
  • Set up your monthly budget and get it into the accounting system.
  • Distribute the budget to all department heads and communicate it to all employees.

January 1

    • Happy New Year! Let’s execute!