While most small businesses start very small, like one person at a kitchen table small, they blossom into something much more significant over time. 

In the early days handling social media, marketing finances, and clients seemed easy enough. But as your business gets ready for growth, you will begin to implement the frameworks and people that can help you scale. 

Having the right people around, including small business accountants, is one of the vital steps businesses will take to scale. 

Accountants are one of the few investments and recurring costs that should make it into the minimal cash pot used for scaling. 

Scaling is the action of growing revenue and clients - without increasing costs at the same rate. 

So why does an accountant make it into your scaling plans, and what benefits do they give to your business? 

CFO

Depending on your future plans, you might intend to grow enough to need a CFO - but not want to cover the full-time salary. To that end, it is possible to have an accountant that can offer an on-demand CFO service. This will be within your budget - since you will set the pace, and it can help with the following: 

• Setting financial controls
• Managing the financial processes
• Managing the accounting processes
• Review business plans
• Budgeting
• Deal with investors

Business performance 

Are you doing well? Could you do better? Are there opportunities that you aren't making the most of? 

It can be challenging to answer these questions as a business owner - because you are inclined to say yes even when there are things that could be done to improve your current standing. 

An accountant will be able to act as an accountability person and look at your company's performance. 

Although most business owners will look at the bottom line, a lot happens before that final number is crunched out. 

An accountant can assist in developing performance evaluations to help a company evaluate its actual performance about the goals it has set for itself. The accountant you use will be able to tell you if how you are growing is sustainable and if you can maintain or increase the speed at which you are growing. 

Cost efficiency

When we talk about scaling a business, the costs are one of the places that doesn't grow or grow at a much slower rate. Cost efficiency will mean that everything you are spending is going in the right place, and the fat on costs will be trimmed and vastly improved. 

One of the most significant areas that small businesses need help with is making the most of their tax deductions - and if you don't have an accountant on your side, you will be missing out on some deductions. Not only that but if you are filing your taxes incorrectly, you leave yourself open to a tax inspection and stressful investigations. 

Regulations 

There are many things that change within tax rules and regulations that the average person isn't typically going to be aware of - because it simply isn't their job. 

While all businesses have access to various accounting tools and technology, that doesn't mean that they are utilised to the fullest - or that you are aware of any changes and issues. 

How a small business owner and an accountant use software will be vastly different because the account will look at more than just the numbers. They will help you see future opportunities, any bottlenecks, trends, and issues and give your business a deep health check. 

Business Advice

Accountants understand your business on a deeper level than many other types of advisors. Not only that, but they will have worked with companies like yours and will have a very healthy understanding of potential threats and how to overcome them. 

Having a business advisor that understands your business down to the last dollar and cent and your industry means that you will have the best business advice you could ever need. 

It would be best if you also kept in mind that your accountant will have a vast network of other companies and people that can benefit you. The right accountant might be able to help you connect with key players within your industry - or at the very least exciting parties. 

Sustainable growth

If you don't have a framework that allows your company to grow sustainably, many things can go wrong. Hiring too many people too quickly can mean you make the wrong hires, create an unhappy culture, or have a considerable fluctuation in outgoings. 

An accountant will also be able to help you with saving tools and make sure that you still meet all of your current and future financial obligations. 

As we understand it, growth is always a good thing - but the truth is that business growth comes with a lot of uncertainty. And without the right strategic plan to move forward and build policies and procedures that are sustainable - a growing business can fail just as much as a start-up. 

Workload

Perhaps one of the most critical areas that will benefit business owners is that they can slide the accounting off their desks. Once an accountant takes over, you can breathe a sigh of relief and put all of those freed-up hours somewhere else. 

Your finances will inevitably become more complex as your business grows or scales - whatever path you choose. In most cases, they will be beyond the capabilities of most small business owners. 

And finally, one of the things that the right accountant can give you is an improved cash flow. If you have significant highs and lows, an accountant will be able to make sense of your finances and show you how you can rearrange things to have a smoother cash flow. 

To exist, a firm must create enough cash flow from its operations to meet its expenses, repay investors, and develop the business. A firm must not only generate revenue through its operations, but it must also manage its cash so that it has enough money to cover its current and long-term needs.

Your accountant can also help you make those all-important investments in your business: How Can I Invest To Grow My Business? - Minutehack.