Episode 36- Increasing Revenue with Timothy Wingate Jr

In this episode of "Small Business, Big Moves,". Thomas Bennett is joined by guest Timothy Wingate Jr. to explore creative strategies and innovative approaches that have propelled small businesses to new heights. Discover the steps to increasing revenue.

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Small Business Big Moves is a podcast where innovation meets entrepreneurship. Join Tom Bennett as he explores all things  business growth! From business funding and business tax credits to conversations with leaders who have grown successful and innovative businesses! 

Transcript

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Welcome to small business, big moves, a podcast where innovation meets entrepreneurship. I'm your host, Tom Bennett, and we'll discuss all things business growth from business funding and business tax credits to conversations with leaders who have grown successful and innovative businesses. Welcome to the show. Today's guest will be Timothy Wingate. Timothy, I'll let you introduce yourself. Hey, I'm Timothy Wingate Jr. You know owner of G plus F business and financial consulting. We're a construction accounting firm focused on serving the back office of construction accounting construction companies. And so we want to help them increase their revenue by 15 percent every year. And we do that just by supporting all their back office staff with their bookkeeping needs receipts, you know, accounting tax needs advisory, all those different types of services so that's kind of me in a nutshell. Definitely a lot of powerful tools that business owners need. So I'm excited to have you on here. I know we'll jump right into it too, but I wanted you to kind of give us a little background on really where you started and how you got into what you're doing now. Yeah. So my father has been in construction all his life. And so being around a construction industry, it taught me that I didn't want to work in construction, actually in the field. So I, I really enjoy, you know, using my mind and, and an intellect to streamline the back office flow and realize that there was a great need for that to be happening inside the construction industry. So. Now that's what we do. We, we, we contract with different construction companies around the country to help support their, you know, back office needs and to really connect the back office to the field. So that way we can get information sharing between the field and the back office seamlessly. So we could help the business owner make decisions. Faster and quicker as it relates to their, their company. Awesome. Good stuff. Yeah. And kind of piggybacking off that, if you can dig into that a little more, really how you guys are able to help bridge that communication gap between the field and the back office, I know that's something that it's been pretty powerful to your clients. Yeah. So a lot of it starts with just organization, really getting the right tools, softwares integrated into their operations. And so we help implement those different softwares and tools, and we have a proving, a proven setup, so we know that these, these are the tools that are going to work, and these are the things that are going to help streamline your, your company and business, and they're looking to just get organized, because these guys are out in the field all the time, and they don't have time to really sit behind a desk to vet softwares, to vet how to integrate these things, how to make all these tools work so they really lean on us to be a guide for them to help them just mesh all these things together and make sense of it and show them why they need it, how is it going to work, and how it's going to save them time and money. Absolutely. And then kind of piggybacking off that, I know you touched on the starting with organization. Obviously that's a huge area. But then off that too, like with organizing their finances and really understanding cashflow. I know that's kind of a broad conversation, but we also both know it's something that a lot of small business, medium sized businesses struggle with. So walk us through that a little bit as well, how you're able to help Yeah, the main thing is We try to identify what are the areas in their company that bottlenecks and prevents them from being able to collect, you know, cash from the clients. A lot of that starts with completing projects on time reaching certain milestones on time. It also just, sometimes they just get behind on invoicing. You know, just so busy in the field, can't really put together the invoice to send it out to a client to get paid. And then also it's the follow up, you know how quickly can you follow up on those invoices that were sent out? The other thing is, are they in position to, to get a loan? To, to kind of, especially with commercial. Contractors, they, they, they really are looking to get those loans to carry them through those, those times where they're not able to collect as fast from their, their clients, because they, they're waiting, you know, sometimes 45 days, 60 days to get paid from a pay app. So we help them to put themselves in position to get a loan or a line of credit or to get bonding and to also. Show them how to effectively, you know, do things in a way that speeds up the collection process. So when it comes to sending invoices on time, when it's saying that, Hey, the reason why we can't get here is because the guys out in the field are not doing what they need to do efficiently. So that way you can actually close that part of the contract out and actually send out a payout So just a lot of little things like that. And then just Even as evaluating performance, employee performance, because those things can prevent you from having, you know a good cashflow because of employees underperforming, then you will see that they're probably eating more of your time. And so you're paying them more because they're not getting jobs done in an efficient manner. And now you're, you're, you're losing profit. Every time they're clocking in a little bit extra for this particular job, just because they're just underperforming. So sometimes it's not just a financial thing, it's also an operational thing. For sure. Yeah, I know that's huge. And I know you covered a few two valuable things there too, but I know we see it all the time with Construction companies, right? I know there's a lot of lenders out there that they don't often tend to construction company, lend to construction companies or maybe have more of a challenge with that. But like you said, those lines of credit getting them business funding that way, or we do a lot with like AR factoring as well. Because like, to your point, if they're waiting 35, 30, 45, 60 days They may already be going on to a next job or have a team doing something there and it's being able to find that excess capital to do that. So is that something you guys are discussing like throughout your conversations with them or like the importance of that or? Yeah, we always that's always a top topic. In our strategic meetings that we have monthly. It's just how to position a company in, in, in a way that banks would want to lend to them, or any lender want to, to do business with them. And so it start off by having the financials and having accurate financials so that way we can determine how far off we are or if we're ready, you know? But if you don't have the strong financial data to evaluate, it's hard to determine. If you would be a good candidate for a particular loan product or a lending product. So that's where you start. You start with your numbers and getting those and getting those really tight. You know what? I love what I said earlier, but I love what you guys have going on, right? Because we I know we do a few things kind of similar across paths that way, but just what you guys are doing with helping these construction businesses really grow, or like you said, make themselves bankable, right? It's something that a lot of businesses aren't aware of, or they may try to apply for a loan and then realize that I'm still a ways out from doing this. So that you guys are kind of proactively. Working with them on that, I think, is a huge value you're giving your clients. Thank you. Awesome. And then kind of going back a little bit, I know there's I know we covered obviously some of the organization, communication gap, right? Organizing their finances. What are the two of the main things that some of your clients that you work with that the business owners need to understand most in their business? Absolutely. One, it needs to understand where the business is going, because it's hard for us to advise on if, if the numbers are good or bad, if we don't know where the business is going, you know, so if they want to, you know, hire 10 employees down the road, then we need to make sure that we are positioned or we're doing things now to get us a position to be able to hire those 10 employees. So it starts off with that vision of just knowing where are we going so that everyone knows how to help, you know, whether it's their accountant, their attorney, their you know, consultant in the construction industry, you know, any, anything. Anybody who's a part of the team needs to know how to help them, but we only can know that if they have a clear vision of where they're going or where they want to go. And then the other thing is, of course, you, you got to. Have your, your, your, your financials in order. You got to have strong financials. I mean, that's, that's your, that's your diagnostic. That's the, that's the thing that you evaluate first to say, okay, can we do this or are we even doing what we set out to do from a financial standpoint? Because you may have a great product, great service, but if you're not charging the right price, you're not making the right margins, you you know, you're, you're just. You just have that. That's just what it is. You just have a great product of service, but you're not being profitable with that. So you can't grow a company with that. In other words, you're just just creating more work for yourself. And really, the job owns you instead of you on a job, you know, so that's those are the two things that I would say we need to focus on is focusing on first clear vision. Second, financial services. I love that. Yeah. And then another thing I wanted to cover too was really some streamlined systems that a, that a business can put in place to get a better understanding of the health of the business. Definitely got to have an accounting system, you definitely need to develop or create some KPIs that you can monitor that tells you how well your, your, your company is doing, you know, KPIs. Of course, there are some industry standard type of KPIs, but then there's things that you can make up that are unique to your company and, and that drives your decision making for your, for your, for your particular company. So those, those are really, really, you know, I mean, there's a lot of tools and software things, of course, anything to get things done faster to get you information faster. It's what you want to put in place. What we do is like I said we we set up the back office like we set up. You know, their receipt capture system, their accounts payable system, their accounts are receivable system and their private management system. So making sure that all these things talk to each other and talk to each other in the right way. So that way, information doesn't get duplicated, overstated, understated. That's very important. So those tools look different in different industries. You know, I know what it looks like for construction, but it's gonna look very different for. You know an e commerce business but either way you need tools that help you get things done faster And more efficiently so you can make decisions a lot quicker and faster. Absolutely Yeah, and I appreciate that and then We touched on it earlier with with the margins right and making sure that business owners understand that but what can a business owner? do today to improve their margins on jobs or opportunities that they have Yeah, the one thing is do you can get just get more efficient at doing the job, you know, making sure that you have the best guys on the team in the right seats, doing the right thing, because you need to monitor that you monitor make sure that Hey, at least I know we can, we're doing the job at the right speed that we get to get the right product at the end of the job. So now once that's satisfied, now we can start to take a look at, you know, Okay, are we making the right margins? If we're not making the right margins, are we marking up, you know, labor, materials, equipment at the, at the right markups to get us the right margin? So those are things that we want to look at. And then from a company wide perspective, now it's like, okay, the jobs are making the right margins. We have the right guys doing the right things in the field to get the production that we need. Now, from a company standpoint, Are we yielding the right margins to grow the company? You know one indicator is, can we save money? If you can't save money, that's a, that's like a red flag. Like if I can't put anything away and not touch it for months, that's a red flag. Another thing we look at is current ratio, you know, so how many times can you take your, the money out of your bank account and pay off current liabilities? Is it one time? Is it less than that? Is it two, three, four, five, you know, so we want to be able to see how liquid you are and that gives us another indicator of how well the company is performing and, and you know, what, what the future may look like for you. Hope that answers the question. Yeah, no, definitely. I appreciate that. And then digging into that a little more, how can a business determine if they have the correct margins to, like you said, cover operating expenses, and then make sure that they can submit or win more profitable bids just, it goes back again to your goals, you know, you, if you can't meet any of the goals that you set out for the company, then that's probably an indicator that you don't have the right margins. You know, you're not making the right amount of money to, to obtain those goals. So, either the goals need to be adjusted, or your price needs to be adjusted. Or, you know, your, your workers in the field need to be, become more efficient. Or maybe you need to hire the right person. Or maybe you need to get rid of the wrong person, you know? So, just a lot of little things come into play. It's not a one size fits all. You know one answer that that solves this equation. There's a lot of things to consider. That makes up the equation to, to yield the right outcome that you're looking for. Definitely. And then we touched on it a minute ago too, but obviously you and I both know the importance of having the right team or having, having the right resources. Right. And then when, as a business grows, how can they get a clear picture on whether or not it's the right time or the best time to hire someone else, or like to your point earlier to maybe they have to get rid of that person that's underperforming. Yeah, I think number one is do you have enough savings to hire this person or enough upcoming work to bring on this person? You know, that's a huge indicator. Like if you don't have the cash flow coming up, you know, to, to pay this person's salary, you don't need to hire anyone. You know, if you don't have their salary in the bank, you don't need to hire them. So those are the things, those are like quick, quick indicators. Yeah, I think that's how you decide whether you hire somebody in that forest. Getting rid of the wrong person, you need to come up with performance indicators for that person. And you need to do a performance evaluation because the worst thing, the worst thing that you can do to an employee and employees, you know, they don't like it. It's when they don't know if they're doing a good job for you or not. And they need to know that by clear instruction or clear performance indicators that say, okay, you know, Tim wants me to do X, Y, and Z. And he said, if I do X, Y, and Z. Then I'm doing a great job. So you need to come up with the X, Y and Z for that person to monitor engage their own performance. So that way, when you come and do your performance evaluation, they can more than likely agree when you just when you tell them that they're underperforming. And then you give them some some action items to take before the next evaluation to, to prepare them for either evaluation. This is what you're going to do to stay, or if you can't do this, then you're just making a choice for me to get, you know, to remove you from this organization because I got to win, you know, and I got to win with the right people. Absolutely. I love a lot of what you just said there, right? And it's just how valuable those KPIs are, right? Because at the end of the day, no one should be caught off guard when they're when you're sitting down with them, letting them know, hey, this might not be a fit. And they should have an understanding of why, obviously, they're not stepping up and doing what they should be doing. I love what one of my mentors said is I never never fired someone. They fired themselves and I was just, just the messenger. But like you said too, and then then it's easy to go back and say, okay, we have these five KPIs, you're hitting three of them. These are the two we got to improve on and maybe put them on like an action plan or something. And then if it can't be improved, then obviously it's not a, not a fit for the business. Correct. Correct. Yeah, and I know we I know we threw a lot of, a lot at him to give him a lot of value and I know you could keep doing that all day, but anything that we might have left out or didn't cover that you want to leave them with? Nah, just say, you know, like I tell everybody, don't, don't really do yourself the, the, the injustice of not writing down a vision for your company. You know, you, you have to write out that vision, set it out so people can know how to help you. It's, it's really hard for people to help you. You don't even know where you're going. I love it. No, it's true. You can't, you can't help other people or have people help you if you can't help yourself. So I agree 100%. You got to start with that first and take it serious. But yeah, no, I appreciate the time today. That's going to be a Wrap on this episode of small business, big moves. If you like this or know someone that got value out of it, what we ask is you share this with them And like and review the podcast and you can find me on all social media at thomas bennett And we look forward to seeing you on the next episode