Get to know Daryl LaFountain and some of his financial services opinions? You need a team of smart, reliable people who can help you pursue your goals. But hiring is expensive. Besides a full-time salary, employees have other requirements, such as benefits, bonuses, vacation time and equipment. Furthermore, you will need support for recruitment and for building and managing your compensation plans. Although some of this is unavoidable, you can minimize your financial burden by including contractors in your hiring plans. For example, instead of hiring a full-time marketing director and expecting them to be a jack-of-all-trades, consider hiring a team of freelancers. This will provide you with the expertise you need without the headcount. The same approach can apply to your management team. A fully burdened CFO can cost $300,000-$350,000 annually (sometimes more for “hot” areas like software as a service) and might be more than you need. Hiring a fractional CFO to provide advice and guidance is a more cost-effective option.

Daryl La Fountain‘s tips on improving your business financial situation: Separate Your Business and Personal Finances: One of the best ways to organize your business finances is to separate them from the personal ones. By splitting these things up, it’s much easier and faster to keep track of business expenses for tax purposes and other related uses. Remember, when you mix your business and personal funds, you may lose track of all your finances. This will jeopardize your organization in the long run. Thus, in order to ensure the separation of your personal and business finances, consider opening a distinct bank account. If you have credit cards, it’s best to designate one of them for business expenses. By doing this, you can keep everything organized, especially in terms of the financial aspect of your company.

To make sure that all of your hard-earned money doesn’t vanish, you’ll need to take steps to protect it. Here are some steps to think about, even if you can’t afford them all right now. If you rent, get renter’s insurance to protect the contents of your place from events such as burglary or fire. Read the policy carefully to see what’s covered and what isn’t. Disability income insurance protects your greatest asset—the ability to earn an income—by providing you with a steady income if you ever become unable to work for an extended period of time due to illness or injury. If you want help managing your money, find a fee-only financial planner to provide unbiased advice that’s in your best interest, rather than a commission-based financial advisor, who earns money when you sign up with the investments their company backs. The latter has a potentially divided loyalty (to their company’s bottom line and to you), while the former has no incentive to guide you down a wrong path.

Yup, taxes! Taxes are annoying, but they’re certainly not going away anytime soon. So make sure your long-term income projections include taxes. Not planning for taxes can impact your cash flow in a major way. In addition, you definitely want to look into tax savings investment options and stay up to speed on any relevant tax deductions you can apply to help you save money on tax payments. You can plan to sit with a tax accountant or financial planner to help ensure your plan for taxes is adequate. You should also check out our blog post on how to reduce your taxable income! Estate planning is not something a lot of people like to think about, but it’s essential! It allows you to determine exactly what happens to your assets after you are gone. It involves listing out all your assets, creating a will, and making it accessible to the people who need to have access to it. A financial planner or estate lawyer can help you set things up correctly.

About Daryl La Fountain: Daryl is an energetic professional CFO with a background in politics. Daryl has done fundraising, been a candidate, and worked in politically appointed positions in Pennsylvania and Philadelphia. Daryl has worked for Democratic candidates and nominees in 18 additional states. Reach out to Daryl about Political work if you: Are running for local office and are having trouble with ballot access.