Advice for CEOs

Rely on yourself. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps. This is good, old-fashioned advice. But it doesn’t always apply to the need that all middle market companies share to finance their growth. Very few companies can finance expansion by internally generated profits alone.

You own and run a growing business. You enjoy the independence and life style of a business owner, at least most of the time.

In the first part of this article, I addressed steps to obtain capital for growth: optimizing cash flow from operations and presenting a high quality documentation package that portrays your financial history and strengths. With these as a foundation, consider several additional steps.

Most business owners get into business because they are passionate about their product or service and want to serve what they see as an unmet need in the market. Most want to focus on their products or customers. But instead they find themselves spending many sleepless nights worried about cash. Entrepreneurial companies with financing needs in the $200,000 to $2 million range often find themselves in the “Capital Gap” – where needs are too great to be financed with personal funds, while bank or commercial financing alternatives are complicated, expensive or unavailable. If you are caught in this “Capital Gap” here are five key actions to take to find funds to grow your business.

Part 1 of this article discussed the importance of starting now to define your 2013 plan—focused on a few key priorities. I would like to now take up how to make regular reviews of actual results against the plan part of your company’s regular routine.

Feeling overwhelmed about all your goals for 2013? Here’s a solution for you: focus on the truly important things to see real results for your company. Identify your three most important priorities and focus your management team. If you really focus, you will see better results, better alignment, higher morale, and lower stress for the CEO!