Entrepreneurs CFOThree pages, ten minutes

The first page is what came in and what went out, grouped the way you talk about the company, not the way a software menu talks. If you sell two things, both things are visible. If one of them is busy and thin, you can see that without a second meeting. The second page is what you own and what you owe, short enough that a missing line feels obvious.

The third page is cash. Not a slogan about cash. The balance, what has to leave in the next few weeks, and what you are waiting on from customers. Three numbers get circled when they need a question. A circle is an invitation, not a grade. You should be able to finish the stack in about ten minutes and still have time to argue with one line.

Thirty pages train you to skim. Skimming is how a founder keeps running on last quarter. We would rather you read three pages slowly. The rest of the detail stays in the file for the day someone asks. It does not get printed just because the software can print it.

A circle means we could not explain the line in one plain sentence, or the line moved in a way the week did not. A spike in one product. A bill that landed twice. A draw that looks like a cost. You should not have to discover those by reading every row. The circle is the row we already pulled out.

We do not circle a number to make the page look examined. A page full of marks is another way of hiding. A calm month gets a calm page, with the circles left off. You are allowed to finish early. The point of the ten minutes is that they are enough, including on a month when nothing dramatic happened.

On the video call we start with the circles and then we read the quiet lines only if you want them. You keep the pen. We do not narrate your company back to you in words you would not use. If a label is ours and not yours, we change the label. The page should sound like the shop, the studio, or the crew you actually run.

These pages are not a report that tells an outsider the figures were examined. A lender who wants that cover needs a firm that can sign it. We can still hand you statements a person can follow, built from months that tied to the bank, with no attached report. The difference is the whole limit, and it is written once on the disclosures page.

They are also not a forecast dressed up as history. History is the closed month. A look ahead is labeled as a look ahead, and it stays on the cash page where a hope cannot be confused with a deposit that already cleared.

A statement you read alone at midnight tends to become a mood. A statement you read with someone who closed the month tends to become a decision. We book that reading on purpose. A 30-minute call is usually enough when the pages are short.

Bring the decision you are trying to make. A price, a hire, your own pay, a piece of equipment. Bring one decision. We will either read it off these three pages or tell you another month has to tie first.

The same pages are what the return is built from later. You should recognize them in the spring. If the return introduces a number the monthly pages never showed, something was skipped, and we would rather catch that in October than explain it in April.