Happy women’s day!
Today everyone is celebrating women in their lives! Yes they are integral part of family, relations, bonding but when it comes to ‘money decisions’ or ‘financial planning’, they are often sidelined.
Financial planning lessons for women entrepreneurs:
A woman, whether working or not, if working then salaried or a professional or a business woman, she must handle money & personal finances well.
Today we are seeing lot many start -ups are coming in. Many young women are either starting it alone or partnering with others. Many professionals & businesswomen are running their businesses & professions since long.
Along with proficiency, knowledge of the core subject, marketing skills a women should be ‘financially aware’.
So here are some points for women entrepreneurs on how can they manage their money & finances-
Be Financially aware:
It has no option! A woman needs to know about cashflows, banking operations, loans facilities, accounting, investments, basic features of investment instruments, required insurances for her & her business too.
This should not be outsourced or she should not be dependent on anybody else to handle this.
When she understand it well, no one can misguide her. She takes lot of efforts to create & run her venture, so her money must be utilized & invested well for her.
Please start reading newspapers, relevant blogs, listen to podcasts, watch Youtube videos. Ask relevant questions if you do not understand anything.
Don’t shy away from getting knowledge on finance.
IF you can start your venture, you can definitely handle your finances.
Don’t start with too much debt:
When any woman starts her venture, she takes many calculative risks. For any business sor a professional activity, capital is required.
Today, there are many government policies, especially for women, which provide easy loans to start a business.
But you should not take too much amount of loan before starting it.
This can bother you initially as income flows fluctuate & it takes time to reach your ‘break -even’ point.
Keep your cash flows separate:
When you start a business, from starting point, keep your ‘business ‘ & ‘personal cashflows’ separate from each other.
This can be quite a task to keep & maintain it the same way along.
But it is necessary because-
- Your can keep a track of your income
- Business operating costs, working capital requirements can be easily assessed
- It helps in income tax filing & auditing
- You can easily judge the progress of your business
- When you need any money for your business, you can think of different sources & your personal cash flows & investments will not be hampered.
Outsource if required:
Apart from finance, core business activity, if there is anything you can not devote your sufficient time to, then you can choose to outsource that activity.
It can be cost efficient as well.
Review your investments & profits regularly:
When you start generating income, its important to invest your income suitably. When you invest you should not only invest in right & suitable instruments, but also review your investments regularly.
It will keep you aware & you can make suitable changes where required.
Keeping a track of profits, will help you to plan your future course of action about your business.
Create your emergency fund:
When you are starting a business, you are already taking professional risk. Market dynamics will keep on changing & so can your business performance.
To keep you & business away from any setbacks in tough times, you should have your emergency fund.
For your personal finance, you should have emergency fund equivalent to 2 years of your monthly expenses.
Which means for e.g, if your monthly expenses are Rs 50,000 then your emergency fund should be Rs 12 lakhs.
When it comes to your business emergency fund, you also should have emergency fund likewise.
Someone said it right, “Woman’s money is her best protection”!
Every woman is a ‘money manager’ by nature, you just need to nourish that skill!
-Priyadarshini Mulye
ARTHA FinPlan