Thursday 31st January, 2013

Research into more than 550 busnesses and over 1,300 employees has shown that the majority of SMB organisations firmly believed the responsibility for setting budgets, controlling payments and determining the company’s financial strategy lies with senior management. However, the same survey highlighted the fact that 1 in 3 senior managers felt unprepared to take on the role according to Basware’s SMB Finance research.

This research aims to inform SMBs of the challenges they face in growth, as well as educating business owners on the productivity levels of their employees as ‘small business processes’ reach breaking point. The findings also help businesses to understand the investment needed in people, processes and technologies as they move from ‘small’ to ‘medium’ and beyond.

The findings suggest that, with financial responsibility being handed down from owners to senior managers, a much greater understanding of the role is needed if they are to complete it successfully – 45% of senior managers have yet to receive formal financial training. Similarly, those higher up the organisation ladder are unprepared to take on this responsibility – 57% of board members are untrained. The issue does not appear to be restricted to locality, with 28% in Europe and 33% in US wanting greater understanding of how to manage company money.

Conversely, with little structure in place within micro-businesses, business owners are much less likely to hold other members of their organisation responsible for finances. 56% of microbusiness owners state that nobody else within their company is expected to engage with financial processes, with board members (27%) and senior managers (17%) occasionally being trusted with finances.

Andrew Jesse, VP at Basware UK comments: “In a tough economic climate, often competing against larger organisations, SMBs have to make tough decisions about the control of finances within their organisation as they pursue growth. The SMB Finance research suggests that, regardless of their locality and size, all SMBs need to take a hard look at the effectiveness of their finance function, which has a big role in the overall effectiveness of their company, if they are to achieve their aims for expansion. Currently, financial expertise is missingwhere it really counts, and these existing discrepancies highlight a need for greater sensitivity to financial needs, processes and focus on how employees are expected to take control of a role they are not trained to.”