Organizing Your Finances for Success with Lyla Ellens
Every month, we host Hatch, a monthly mastermind where entrepreneurs in the Ann Arbor and greater Washtenaw area can bring ideas or problems they are working on to a roundtable and brainstorm with other smart minds. We have loved seeing the supportive community everyone created over this past year as they shared resources, perspectives, and connections.
Hatch is a free monthly mastermind for entrepreneurs to brainstorm ideas and problems with other smart minds at Cahoots Coworking in downtown Ann Arbor.
In November, we welcomed special guest Lyla Ellens with The CFO Group join us to present a ten-minute tip at the top of the hour on how to get your finances organized for success early on. As a principal providing strategic finance, accounting and business operations to growing companies, Lyla shared three tips for getting business documents and accounting methods organized to avoid missing opportunities in the future:
Here are three things every entrepreneur that is preparing to apply for investments or a loan should have on hand:
Data Room: A data room is a folder structure that you can give access to others, through a system such as Google Drive or Dropbox. This folder should include all corporate finance documents, including formation agreements, board meeting minutes, Human Resources documents, organization charts, financial statements, and any other key documents. everything you need to get investment, loans, etc. Tip: Be sure to include your final executed documents!
Cap Table: A cap table is a detailed summary of all the ownership equity in your company, and shows your business structure and who owns what.
Financial Model: A financial model is a distilled business plan. For investors, they know business models aren’t going to be 100% accurate, but they are looking to make sure founders know what levers they can pull for their business.
Lyla Ellens is a principal providing strategic finance, accounting and business operations to growing companies at The CFO Group.
After Lyla’s presentation, our group of entrepreneurs shared specific issues they were working on and the rest of the group shared resources and ideas. Want to join our group and get support? Sign up to join our list and we’ll send you monthly reminders for Hatch + other resources in Cahoots for entrepreneurs.
