- Informations: CEO
- Organisation: Vectorealism
- Country:
- My advice / My idea: I think there’s one simple tip that can fit both profit and loss forecasting process: they don’t have to be exorbitant! When you start a new cultural project there’s a lot of things you can do with little money or almost for free. In the same way, don’t exaggerate revenues to force a profit: there are probably different ways of reaching your goal. Choose a very simple budgeting or business planning tool (a 5x5 Excel sheet could fit even a huge idea), concentrate on the essential and try not to overestimate both revenues and costs: the risk would be to get demoralized. Last but not least: try to think about your approach to taking risks. It could be useful to build different scenarios depending on your riskacceptance level.
- My expertise about the subject: Beyond the experience with my company I’ve been involved in several business planning sessions, startup competitions and calls that required detailed financial planning. Ah, I almost forgot: in secondary school I also studied accountancy! This was 25 years ago, but basic principles didn’t change a lot.
- My potential limits as a mentor: Finance and accounting are not the love of my life. Just like a lot of creative people, I consider dealing with money and numbers a potential party-pooper, and I look at Excel sheets with suspicion and fear.
- What expertise I’d like to find among the network, to complete mine?: I’d really love to find someone capable of doing Excel VB-macros and forecast reports with beautiful charts like the ones of the big-4! But I can deal with just meeting smart and experienced people who love to get things done in a sustainable and possibly profitable way.
- My dedicated supporting documents:
- Why it's relevant? How to use it?:
“proiezione per Vitti.xlsx” (literally, projection for a guy called Vittorio) is the real file we shared with the top-level Italian angel investor who gave us money in 2015. Looks naive now, doesn't it? But at that time, it worked.
Moral is: you don’t always need complex financial models, just focus on your project and creativity!
“Laser Breakeven Price.xls” is another “historical relic” we used when we started our business. It is straight, simple and completely inaccurate, but at that time gave us the right motivation to invest our money.
