Our services at SME Strategies cover the things you would expect from chartered accountants such as accountancy, forecasting, management accounts, tax planning and fund raising. But we are different from many of our competitors in getting deeply involved in our clients’ businesses often taking on the finance director role. This allows us to give our clients more by way of key business support & FD services in Walthamstow.
John Eaton, Sean Hackemann and David Eaton, Founders of SME Strategies
We specialise in planning for business growth (all plans can be condensed onto one sheet of A4 and are not long unread documents!) and strategic support. This naturally leads to a range of other disciplines such as business development, growing the team, succession planning, marketing, branding, networking, websites, innovation, risk management, HR and trouble shooting amongst others. We bring in other experts where needed. David is a founder member of WealthBeing and an active member of the Forum of the Built Environment in both East Anglia and London. We have a range of free resources to share.
Our Walthamstow practice is headed up by David Eaton and is based at Central Working City a five minute walk from Liverpool Street station.
We work on individual projects or with clients over 3 or 6 or more months. We also run training workshops, facilitate away days and give talks. We encourage our clients to think big and then achieve their vision and we are experienced business mentors.
We have built SME Strategies around the cornerstones of Consultancy, Empowerment and Accountancy as we believe this adds greatest the value to our clients and marks us out as different. We know we punch above our weight and provide cost effective support.
We care for our clients’ businesses as our own and we align ourselves with their objectives. We aim to give unrivalled practical business advice and hands-on support to our owner managed businesses. Every project is led by one of our directors. We get results for our clients and equip them with the skills they need to run successful businesses. We are experienced professionals who love our work and helping our clients win.
Let’s work together – Click here to see our range of services
We will offer a FREE Strategy Hour to any owner managed business in Walthamstow (usually face to face but sometimes by Skype if preferred).
For an informal chat call David Eaton on 07841 215182 or drop him an email at david.eaton@smestrategies.co.uk
Recent projects:
Our recent projects have been in a range of disciplines such as specialist retail, online retail, health, insurance, housebuilding, not for profit re-branding, a coffee shop chain, non dom tax and other sectors. One recent project involved helping a client transition his business from a specialist AV contractor to an AV consultancy firm.
A few things said about us:
“David’s analytical mind, combined with his skills in innovation, enables him to effectively diagnose and offer unique solutions to complex business problems, always exceeding client expectations.”
Yevi Ilangakoon, Innovation Adviser, Research and Enterprise, University of Greenwich
“I have had the privilege of working with David in a professional capacity for over 10 years. During our work together I have witnessed at first hand his skills as a business owner, dedication to his clients and ability to problem-solve complex issues and obstacles with new ideas.”
Lawrence Crichton, Commercial Insurance Account Executive, The Lark Group.
“Sean really impressed me. He was the FD for my business during a year of rapid growth. During this time he brought our finance function in-house from a third party accountancy and put in place strong controls and processes allowing our team to get a better understanding of the business and make more informed decisions. Sean was responsible for a range of areas including tax, corporate finance, and bookkeeping/accounting. One of the things I like most about working with Sean is that he always has a positive and proactive attitude to any challenge put in front of him and adapts quickly to the needs of the business. I can strongly recommend Sean to anyone looking for reliable, professional, and smart support on any aspect of finance.”
Eirik Holth, Co-Founder & Co-CEO of Black Sheep Coffee.
“I have had the pleasure of knowing John for a number of years and have seen the impact he has had on those organisations that he has supported in both executive and non-executive roles. John’s pragmatic and hands on approach helps to guide small and medium sized organisations through difficult, complex situations and enables them to operate more effectively. John is also an excellent communicator and is able to successfully manage the demands of multiple stakeholders simultaneously. Because of John’s passion for the organisations that he works with his clients receive a huge amount of value from John’s input and insight.”
Daniel Maycock, Risk Assurance Director at RSM UK.
“During the year that I have been working with David, I have seen the breadth of his problem solving skills as applied to finance, marketing and people. David is creative, customer focused and a pleasure to work with.”
Nigel Temple, Founder of The Marketing Compass
Our services explained in more depth:
CONSULTANCY
The strategy of our network starts from a simple premise – “You” and then “Where you want to go?” David takes the lead on consultancy. We work at the human level with hopes and fears of our clients and then broaden that to the organisation to identify with clients what needs to be achieved.
Through a deep-rooted understanding of our clients’ issues and the environments in which they operate, we help organisations rethink how they do business so they can develop their markets, build staff engagement, enable change, drive productivity, manage risk, improve decision-making, strengthen communication and encourage innovation.
For some of our SME owner manager clients, they are achieving their goals and so their question is “Where to next?” They know they are good but believe they could be even better. Sometimes they know what needs to be done, sometimes not. Perhaps they are missing a piece of the jigsaw. We aim to identify the missing pieces to help our clients work smarter and grow faster.
EMPOWERMENT
We unashamedly include a people focus which we call empowerment. We believe tremendous value lies in getting this right. It makes both for individual wellbeing and also for the bottom line impact which can be transformational.
Each of the directors mentors enterprise owners and senior managers. One of the areas we are often asked to work with are helping managers to become leaders. We also develop leadership teams and help SME directors to work more creatively and effectively together which of itself can drive up profitability. David is a mentor for Virgin Start-up which apart from the excellent resources offered by Virgin Start-Up, provides access into the Virgin network of other highly skilled and well connected business people who are also mentors.
We help our clients engage more actively with their staff and this can dramatically improve staff effectiveness and productivity. Satisfied and engaged staff have much lower rates of staff turnover.
We are a founding partner of WealthBeing, a social enterprise company, which guides entrepreneurs in setting up and running a successful business and provides mentoring to support them on their journey.
ACCOUNTANCY
The SME Strategies Network is passionate about helping SMEs grow and we want to be part of your team. Our skills go beyond what your typical accountants offers.
Sean’s practice takes the lead on accountancy services for the Network. His firm specialises in growth businesses, from start-ups to SMEs with a turnover up to £10m and offers:
• Growth Services – Raising Funds, Financial Modelling, Business Plans
• Review and Analysis – In depth analysis of your Financials
• Change Implementation and Support – Training and Support
• Better Management Information – More accurate Management Information
We offer the full range of business advice and accountancy services and do so in the context of the goals and needs of the business. We do not provide our services in silos but seek to integrate our work to enhance the value we offer our clients. We have specialist R&D tax credit expertise.
The firm also specialise in Xero and Sage One, popular cloud accounting solutions, so you can have access to your numbers, anytime, anywhere.
For more information, download a brochure – SME Web Accountants – intro presentation.
We are delighted to be linked to SME Strategy in Vancouver, Canada with whom we have an active reciprocal association. This gives a welcome international dimension and global perspective to our work for local owner managed businesses.