“Planning and budgeting.” Quick, when you hear that phrase, what springs to mind? Perhaps you envision firing up trusty old Microsoft Excel? Then you open up last year’s budget workbook, change the column headers to next year, increase revenue and expenses by some historical growth percentage, and — poof! — you’re done.
The thing is, this sort of basic forecasting is a poor substitute for proper planning, and you can really only make a good plan (and budget) with a driver-based financial model. “Drivers” are the specific actions you intend to take as a business owner that will increase revenue and/or expenses, such as selling new services and hiring more employees, not arbitrary month-over-month percentage changes.
Last week I presented a webinar with Jirav CEO Martin Zynch about exactly that. Did you miss it? I have some good news — you can now watch the recording on-demand and follow along as I build out a basic driver-based financial model for an accounting firm that plans to significantly grow their practice with new service offerings and subscription billing options
Whether you’re new to financial modeling or you’re doing it now in Excel, I hope you’ll watch to learn the best practices to do better planning for your own firm and your clients.
Ready to get started planning with Jirav?
