CFO Family Office and Business Services
CeFO, Inc; short for Consulting Excellence for Organizations and Family office, provides business consulting services specializing in accounting, finance and tax services. We invited Bill Shenkin, our CEO of the Year in Colorado, to talk to us about the informative and expert services that the firm offers, helping clients in a variety of different ways.
CeFO provides family office services to wealthy families and outsourced Chief Financial Officer services for small to medium sized businesses which do not have a chief financial officer. Furthermore, the firm also provides tax preparation and compliance services, as well as providing consulting services for merger and acquisition services, and also assisting companies to acquire businesses or to sell their own business.
Working alongside Bill in managing the firm, is three years in a row award-winning Denver 5280, Pamela Fraser (pictured with Bill) who partnered with CeFO in 2015 in order to expand her small business services practice. As a result, the two have formed a formidable company which has resulted in the firm achieving and receiving multiple accolades.
Describing his responsibilities as CEO, Bill outlines his leadership style, elaborating on what techniques are used in order to get the best out of his team and the best results for clients and customers.
“As well as being CEO, I am the original founder of the Company which started January 1, 2000. As CEO, I am responsible for managing CeFO’s growth, services and procedures and I am also actively involved in servicing clients. My leadership style is to manage with a carrot and not a stick, and I am a firm believer in encouraging and nurturing staff to their full capabilities.”
Ensuring staff have the creativity and freedom to shine in their respective roles and live up to their potential, Bill adopts an honest and transparent approach to his role, as alluded to earlier. He goes into a bit more detail about the working environment within CeFO and how this leads to staff maximizing their potential.
“Internally, our culture is an opendoor policy. Any staff member is welcome to share their thoughts, insights, and suggestions, something that helps define our culture and makes us successful. Our entire staff meets once per week to review client engagements, firm administration and any other topics that need review.”
Placing a firm emphasis on the client, Bill believes that the client comes first. He is quick to mention that the key to the success of CeFO is employees’ ability to take care of clients, trusting that this is a major contributor to the firm’s achievements.
“Essentially, the key to our success is taking care of our clients. We pride ourselves in providing outstanding services and value to our clients, as we treat our client’s business as if it is our own providing the best recommendations and service.”
Operating as CEO, Bill has faced many challenges in his role and throughout this career. He explains what techniques he has used and what steps he has taken to overcome these challenges, commenting on how this has impacted on his view of running a company.
“Frequently, our clients have challenges that they need our help with and assisting our clients has made us stronger and given us the ability to provide quality services. Additionally, managing staff and building an excellent team is also a challenge. However, hard work, patience and dedication has produced one of the best staffs we have had in a very long time.”
Being selected as U.S. Business News’ CEO of the Year for Colorado last year is an honour for Bill. He tells us how it feels and also what attributes he possesses that have made him an award-winning business leader.
“It is an incredible feeling to be selected for this honour and much appreciated. Caring about our clients and caring about our staff, we strive to provide a wow factor regarding client experience. Our clients know that we care about them and their business and we strive to keep that faith.”
It is important that staff at CeFO are able to keep up to date with the latest technology trends within the industry, and Bill is aware of how important it is to have a high level of IT services.
“Regarding technology it is important that we adapt to the technological advances in the sector. We have been a paperless office for 17 years and we believe technology is so important that we outsource our IT needs to a very high skill level and competent provider. Also, we constantly take courses and webinars to keep our technology at state of the art.”
Interestingly, it is not only technology in which the sector is evolving at a rapid rate. Bill believes that it is becoming more important to stay ahead of developments and specific industry needs, and he explains how he works hard to do so.
“By attending seminars and courses including those geared for the accounting profession. In addition, I have obtained the designation from the American Institute of CPA’s as a certified information technology professional. All the skills that I have learned whilst obtaining and maintaining this designation, are used to improve our practice and our client service.”
In order to stay ahead of developments, Bill and his team must possess the ability to predict and foresee what developments will arise within the industry. He tells us what developments he foresees and how the business will adapt around these. This leads Bill on to tell us his future aspirations for CeFO, and where he foresees both himself and the company in five years’ time.
“For our tax services, tax law is constantly changing which includes the necessity for software upgrades. We ensure we are with one of the best providers of tax preparation and other service software to provide the best for our clients.
“Ultimately, we will continue to grow our practice, especially in the family office sector. We will continue to work with clients who see and receive value from our services.”
Company: CeFO, Inc
Contact: Bill Shenkin
Address: 88 Inverness Circle East Suite L107, Englewood, Colorado, 80112, USA
Phone: 001 720 506 4105
Website: www.cefo.net
