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Most SMEs think they have a finance function.
In reality?
They have bookkeeping on steroids: chasing invoices, reconciling bank statements, and running reports that no one reads.
Meanwhile, large corporations treat finance as a strategic weapon. A function that drives growth, optimizes capital, and ensures long-term success
The difference? Where they operate on the Finance activities pyramid.
SMEs are stuck at the bottom:
Level 1: Transactions → Basic tasks like invoicing, payments, payroll, and reconciliations.
Level 2: Record Keeping → Keeping books in order, maintaining ledgers, and ensuring financial data is captured.
Level 3: Reporting & Compliance → Preparing financial statements, tax filings, and ensuring regulatory adherence.
Large corporations climb higher:
Level 4: FP&A → Where finance shifts from looking backward to looking forward: forecasting, scenario planning, and financial modeling to support decision-making.Level
5: Strategic Finance (CFO) → Finance becomes a growth engine, influencing capital allocation, M&A, risk management, and long-term business strategy.
This is why large corporations make smarter investments, scale faster, and sustain profitability, because they’ve built finance as a forward-looking, decision-driving powerhouse.
Most SMEs never move beyond Level 3 because they see finance as a cost center, not a value driver. But the companies that break this cycle?
They stop playing defense and start playing to win.
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