As disruption continues to hit with increasing speed and impact, business leaders are finding the problems facing their organizations to be more complex than ever before. Today’s business challenges go well beyond compliance issues; leaders are juggling radical changes in behavior from both buyers and talent, while navigating business models that have become more global and much more virtual.

After two years of grappling with changing restrictions and obstacles on their own, an increasingly advantageous strategy for business leaders is to leverage advisory services teams to help them achieve sustainable growth and create a competitive advantage.

Advisory firms help business owners develop and implement projects to achieve their forecasts by providing objective strategic and financial guidance. As leaders bring in coordinated advisory resources to their business, they are gaining access to a variety of expertise under one roof that can collectively identify issues or opportunities and implement creative and cost-effective solutions on demand.

Looking at situations through the unique lens of each advisory expert’s knowledge provides a more holistic view for decision-making and best practices. Collaborative and impartial insight backed by data creates a think-tank approach, resulting in clearer visions, workable strategies and innovations that enable growth and enhance the bottom line.

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Advisory services are our clients’ top priority as they recover financially from the pandemic and look toward the future. We show clients how to grow faster and help them make timely decisions to react in the marketplace, and that’s been of great value in this rapidly changing environment. In a complex environment, it helps to have someone who can identify issues or opportunities and implement solutions on-demand. We scale up resources to support internal teams. Then as they grow, we help transition those capabilities in-house.
Jeff Drummonds, LBMC CEO
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Some clients want it all, and they’ll find it at LBMC. Very few organizations offer the full breadth of services we do. We design full-service solutions. Our clients want accelerated growth, and they need the ability to scale up and create efficiencies within their processes. We solve their needs across the board, from predicting compliance and regulatory issues to navigating how to grow more efficiently, how to staff appropriately, and how to use technology to take care of their business and clients.
Suzanne Reed, LBMC CMO

Business leaders are focused on creating value, navigating growth, and managing risk for their organizations and these three key drivers are steering the demand for advisory services in 2022.

1. Create value

As leaders strive to achieve higher profits and optimal performance, an advisory firm can be a significant asset in helping them get there, especially for a company wanting to return value to its stakeholders or attract additional investment.

Advisory teams with growth and innovation experts are helping leaders develop and implement plans for evaluating current operational models. Then these teams create growth road maps that include a determination of that next new product or service.

An advisory services team that includes data analytics experts is uniquely equipped to facilitate collaboration. These experts not only give insights into how operations are running but also provide critical perspectives into a company’s data on profitability, sales and operations. Data insight teams help businesses first collect mounds of data from various systems and processes, and then glean useful information from the data on streamlining operations or helping leaders better understand their buyers’ journeys and needs. Done properly, data analytics capabilities provide organizations with reliable insights to increase profitability, manage risks and improve performance.

In addition, litigation and valuation experts on an advisory service team can assess compliance with various obligations and help a company navigate increased financial reporting challenges as well as assess the value of a business.

2. Navigate growth

Today, leaders are looking for ways to remain relevant and get ahead of competitors. Whether they take advantage of opportunities to expand organically or seek to acquire, they are turning to advisory teams for perspectives on growth decision-making and implementation.

Organizations planning to grow need comprehensive expertise to navigate acquisitions. If you are seeking to acquire, advisory services teams provide a range of experts, including transaction advisory expertise, to pilot a company through a merger from start to finish. These teams help identify potential pitfalls or opportunities and ensure that the transaction maximizes value for all parties.

For example, LBMC’s advisory services team recently worked with an organization that typically invests in health care companies. The organization wanted to expand into investments of physician practices and engaged the advisory services team to assist with both pre- and post-close activities.

Our experts performed financial and IT diligence, billing and coding diligence, and health care data analytics before the transaction closed. The insights provided during this process helped to validate certain assumptions the buyer was making, provide critical perspectives on the purchase price of the entity, as well as identify some after-closing initiatives that would result in immediate additional value for the buyer. After closing, the team completed valuation calculations and an IT security compliance assessment. Throughout the process, the advisory experts also provided regulatory compliance consulting services, including credentialing, ongoing monitoring and coding auditing activities, and compliance plan development.

Through this partnership, the physician owners and the investing organization were able to focus their attention on operations during the transaction, instead of stretching their resources navigating a new acquisition type. As a result, both parties in the transaction were able to realize the best-possible outcomes.

3. Manage information and risk

One critical aspect to sustainable growth is avoiding obstacles that consume valuable time and resources or that impact efficiency. By identifying and managing possible setbacks like future regulatory deficiencies or cyber threats, a company can prevent disruptions before they start.

Managing cyber risks and information security is vital in today’s environment, and cyber risk experts on advisory services teams help businesses implement technology solutions and processes to fortify their infrastructure against future attacks. By identifying and securing information and categorizing cyber risk, organizations protect not only their systems and data but their reputation.

Optimizing existing investments, developing strategies to create value, planning for growth and proactively managing risks are key challenges facing business leaders in 2022. Collaborating with partners who have a dynamic expertise and a track record of success can help businesses avoid potential pitfalls and bring opportunities to light, enabling organizations to make better-informed decisions and surge ahead of their competitors.

Mark Burnette is the head of LBMC’s Advisory Services team, which features national experts in data analytics, cyber risk services, transaction advising, healthcare consulting, growth and innovation, and litigation and valuation.

Originally posted in Nashville Business Journal