Our VP of Finance was our very first bookkeeper. She lives our core values and has been with us for eight years. She understands the basics of our books and wants the seat, but we are preparing for an exit in three years. The seat now requires sophisticated M&A preparation, complex tax strategy, and forward-looking financial modeling. She simply does not have the capacity to operate at this level, and our financial reporting is falling behind. How do we handle this GWC call?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

This is a classic right-person-wrong-seat scenario that business owners struggle with because of loyalty. The hard truth is that loyalty cannot buy you the capacity required to scale or prepare for a clean exit. If your finance seat now requires strategic modeling, cash flow forecasting, and M&A diligence, and your current leader cannot deliver that, she does not GWC the seat.

To resolve this, you must separate the human being from the seat on your Accountability Chart. First, map out the exact five roles this elevated finance seat requires. If she lacks the capacity for those roles, you must move her out of that seat.

Because she is a core values match, you should look for a different seat where she does GWC the roles. This might look like a controller or senior accounting manager seat that sits under a new, fractional or full-time Chief Financial Officer.

If a suitable seat does not exist, or if she refuses to take a step back, you must make the hard choice to transition her out of the company. Keeping someone in a seat they cannot handle is not kind; it is a drag on your business and unfair to her. Use your next Level 10 Meeting to IDS this issue and make a clear decision. Your priority is building a structure that can scale.