Episode 51 - Michael King: The FP&A’s Guide to Winning in the Fractional CFO Galaxy
Show Notes
“I am definitely starting to see more people with an FP&A background becoming fractional CFOs.”
Michael King, founder of The CFO Accelerator, coaches hundreds of fractional CFOs and accountants in building “6 and 7-figure advisory firms”.
King arrives on the bustling fractional CFO scene at a time when demand for part-time finance chiefs working for several companies is higher than ever. In King’s words in the next decade a small business having a fractional CFO will be just as common as bringing in a bookkeeper as hiring fractional CFOs becomes the “cost of doing business” at small and medium-sized enterprises. And according to King, those with an FP&A background have a significant advantage.
“FP&A really gets people ready for those CFO technical skills. So when I think about FP&A, I'm thinking about things like forecast projections, budgets and models, and data management, alongside communications across functional divisions within a business. And that's a huge part of what a fractional CFO has to understand”.
Covered in this episode
King’s path from being a navy nuclear engineer to a fractional CFO leader
The essential skills you need to be a fractional CFO
When should an SMB choose a fractional CFO
Why budgeting and forecasting are “everything”
The key to using the fractional CFO position to connect the strategic goals of a business
Why people in finance must learn to love sales
When to move away from a fractional CFO and appoint a full time finance chief
Why cash flow is always “the first” and most important metric for any fractional CFO service
Why you only need a small number of clients to “make a killing” as a fractional CFO
How the Fractional CFO space will explode in the next decade “regardless of the economic picture”
Fractional CFOs need to be “operating as far away from the decimal as possible” to be successful
The process of adopting kids as the thing few people know about Michael
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