Partner Article

Award Winning Financial Management Company Rebrands!

This award winning company tells the world as it rebrands and announces the launch of its new website, how it has always differentiated itself from a normal accountancy practice and how its unique solution of giving businesses access to full time finance professionals at part time cost has helped a multitude of clients become more successful at what they do.

EFM is not an accountancy practice. It does not do tax or audit but what it does do, it does extremely well. EFM voted Rising Stars Small/ Medium Sized Business of the Year and FSB Finalist in the FSB Enterprising Business Award 2013 provides top level financial expertise including Non Exec Directors, CFOs and Finance Directors ‘on tap’ to suit individual business needs, size and aspirations.

Initially set up as e-financial management many years ago, EFM’s beliefs still remain the same. Firstly, that businesses should benefit from first class financial expertise and secondly, that access to the best financial expertise should not be prohibitive. Business success and profitability has always and will always depend on sound financial management and planning. With this knowledge, the founding directors were bent on finding and reaching small and medium sized businesses that are usually unable to afford this necessary expertise on a full time basis, hence may become susceptible to failure.

As an insourced and outsourced financial management provider, EFM gets involved in situations where there are gaps in skills existing within the business. This may occur at startup, during a merger and acquisition, in preparation for a flotation, when seeking to raise finance or in need of a turnaround or an exit strategy.

While the team consists mainly of Chartered Accountants with decades of experience in some of the most successful and ambitious companies, their focus is on providing practical commercial input into the client’s business. The Finance Directors focus is on providing high calibre, affordable, professional expertise on a flexible part- time, insourced or outsourced basis. This can range from 1 day a month to interim full time project work or other options, depending on the needs of the business.

While the range of services provided by the Finance Director can be quite varied, their involvement would usually be around providing advice on business and financial strategy, introducing and improving monthly reporting, helping management teams understand and use their financials effectively, helping to create forecast models and budgets as well as improving cashflow

Our people get involved in the clients business as this is vital if true value is to be derived from the relationship as they work hard to learn about the business, the culture, the processes and its goals and then find ways to improve performance, plan for growth and manage or mitigate financial risks.

The overall purpose of the Finance Director is to help companies better manage cashflow, plan for growth and manage/ mitigate financial risks.

From experience garnered over so many years, EFM Finance Directors can take a holistic view of a company’s financial situation , spot red flags and recommend ways to improve performance through solid financial management and planning. With our advice and recommendations, our clients understand what products and services are making them money, where costs can be cut and how to spend their money on the more productive activities.

Though a number of EFM’s clients have been large corporates or subsidiaries of large companies, its focus is on the SME market which is more susceptible to a harsh economic climate, helping it deal effectively with their vital finance function in a smart and innovative way.

Its newly launched site at www.efm.uk.com which has been redesigned to meet the changing needs of its clients and team, showcases work done for SMEs and larger sized clients including reducing excessive levels of stock held by a multimillion pound company experiencing cashflow problems, dealing with the conflict between international entrepreneurship and pre-existing external structures within an online gaming business as well as managing the impact of “reverse charge” and helping a major company dispose of non-core activities as it sought to raise capital and concentrate on the commercial development of its systems and products

EFM covers every existing sector from manufacturing and health to venture capital and professional services. Due to the ease of transferability of these vital skills, they can be applied to any other business requiring support.

For larger companies that already have an in-house employed Finance Director, an increase in demand for services, tight deadlines or an impending change may require that additional resource be brought into the business and EFM provides this temporary solution to enable the client to run efficiently without having to employ someone on a permanent basis. Working with EFM means that client payroll costs become flexible and unnecessary payroll costs such as NI, taxes, health and benefit plans are reduced or eliminated. Issues relating to holiday and sickness cover are also removed and the resource paid for is for an expert at the job in hand.

Where a team of Finance Directors is required, the range of skills can be easily flexed to suit changing requirements and it is this cost effective approach that appeals to clients.

According to MD Gary Jesson, EFM has experienced rapid growth over recent years as switched on business owners and management teams recognise and take advantage of the multiple benefits our insourced and outsourced benefits bring to a business.

The company now has about 30 locations around the country and is still growing. The main difference between the old and new EFM logo is the subliminal message within the image. Although retaining an element of the original logo to keep it recognizable, the new logo cleverly uses a chart to inspire thoughts of efficiency and growth and which is what we always aim to achieve.

The idea behind the new site and its functionality came from interactive sessions with various stakeholders including clients and team members and some of the new features include:

• Downloadable guides to help start, grow, manage or exit a business
• The online calculator to find out the cost of employing and the ability to compare with an insourced or outsourced solution.
• A new business Healthcheck tool to find out how healthy a business is and the chance to book a FREE face to face session with a top level Non Exec Director or Finance Director
• The online financial glossary / jargon buster to help visitors understand finance terminology.
• Exciting information for accountants thinking of starting their own business and lots more.

Visit the new site at www.efm.uk.com to experience these new features now! For more information contacts us on 0845 1299900 or email clientcare@efm.uk.com .

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by The EFM Financial Management News .