Specialist Recruitment Agency: Introducing KPIs and making financial information easy to understand

Appointments Bi-Language is a privately owned specialist recruitment agency in Covent Garden, set up by Nicole Debson and Marie Eichler in 1991 and now employing more than 20 staff.

Until we became involved, the company’s accounting services were provided remotely by an accountant who was about to retire. The owners were conscious that they needed to replace this resource but also wanted to review the internal reporting procedures to give them better control of their business than they had enjoyed with the previous management accounts - which were essentially statutory in layout, containing no key performance indicators and without budget comparison.

FD Solutions were introduced to Nicole and Marie by BDO and Keith Lidgate was appointed in May 2004 to carry out the review, producing a budget and reporting format which – to quote one of the owners – “made financial information about the company interesting for the first time ever!”

We assisted the company in production of the budget and regular management accounts for a number of months, and guided them in recruiting an accounts manager in order to make the process more cost effective.

Keith is still involved with the company on an ad hoc basis, assisting the new sole-charge accounts manager where appropriate, and keeping a watching brief on his progress for the owners. His detailed involvement lasted for approximately a year and involved on average two days work a month, much of which was carried out at the client’s offices but some of which he was able to perform remotely.