I was recently listening to Nirvana’s Unplugged album. A few of the songs they played were covers of other artists. Towards the end, Kurt Cobain mentions the song they are about to play, “Where Did You Sleep Last Night,” is a Lead Belly song. I went to Spotify to hear the original version and when exploring Lead Belly songs, I realized that a few other songs he wrote were later performed by familiar bands.  This list includes:

1. Midnight Special – Creedance Clearwater Revival

2. Gallows Pole – Led Zeppelin

3. Can’t You Line ‘Em – Aerosmith

Many famous bands started their careers by covering other artists while they refined their own writing skills. Early albums by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and the Allman Brothers contained many songs originally written by other artists. 

What does this have to do with business? There is no need to reinvent the wheel while building something.  Many companies try to build something from scratch when they can easily use something that already exists or utilize a consultant who has “done this before.”  The role of the Fractional CFO has been developed for this exact reason.  There is no reason for a company to “try to figure it out” when an experienced CFO can be brought in to create immediate value.  When a company is growing, an experienced Fractional CFO can help build the foundation of the accounting department, help understand cash needs and secure funding, and eliminate hurdles to increase the probability of success.  Like the bands above who used proven cover songs to get better traction, companies have a variety of fractional resources at their disposal, so they don’t need to recreate the wheel.

If you would like further information about Crown CFO & fractional CFO services, reach out to Mike DeMaio – mike@crowncfo.com