Sooner or later your clients will ask for help making a decision; moving premises, buying a machine, hiring someone expensive. Some business owners won't manage finances at all, some will use their monthly bank statement, a few will manage cash flow using spreadsheets.  Most will struggle to produce information in a form that helps make decisions. Often you'll hear "I don't understand accounting” and that their only experience of financial reports is the annual return produced by the accountant. I’ll leave you to guess how thoroughly most of them go into that document. When this opportunity arises, talk through the reasoning process.  For example the plan might need to support additional rent (and so costs) of x (this requires a brief discussion on fixed costs). Perhaps employee costs up by y (this requires a brief discussion on fixed vs variable costs). Revenue up by z – this requires a brief discussion about productivity, gross margin and sales capacity. Help them fi