Strategic CFO

Building accurate scenarios to drive growth when you are scaling 20x is important to create agility to take small educated risks to drive revenue growth to travel in the right direction 

At TravelLocal (B2C), all financial scenarios were static, top down and not closely tied to operational activity. This meant there was no  ownership of  the numbers at an operational level , no robust budgeting and no reliable forecasting process. 

I worked with the CEO to build scenarios based on potential future cash positions and trading levels dependant on various business opportunities and risks. I made a point of meeting everyone in the business, understanding roles and positions, and gaining deep valuable insight. This developed strong relationships and trust based on clearer explanations. I held 1:1 meetings with the C suite and worked to build accurate, agile business cases to support the growth scenarios. I studied the wider industry, our competitors and where the market was going. 

​

When I left there was a solid understanding and belief in the accuracy of the figures which bred stronger confidence across the organisation. The time wasted reworking scenarios from scratch was put into driving growth. I also introduced RACI to drive efficiency gains, and encouraged an open environment to question, challenge, and listen, and to make quick small decisions so we could learn through low cost low impact gains or mistakes. 

The result was a more confident, agile, proactive, motivated team focussed on the data before anecdotal suggestion. The transparent and diligent process was welcomed and supported by everyone who felt included. This was instrument in achieving a £12 million raise in 2023.