The Evolution of Finance “Jobs-to-Be-Done”
· 4 min read
Why the humble budget morphs into multi-currency treasury as an organisation grows
Personal-finance apps promise seven core jobs: seeing everything in one place, budgeting, tracking income and spend, paying debt, saving for big purchases, managing money with a partner and monitoring investments. The same needs re-appear in business—then multiply as head-count, regulators and investors enter the picture.
Micro & small businesses (solo-founder → ±50 employees)
| Personal-finance job | Closest small-business analogue | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| View all finances in one place | Real-time cash-flow dashboard pulling bank, POS and loan feeds | 60 % of SMBs cite cash-flow pain as their top challenge ([pymnts.com][1]) |
| Manage my plan / budget | Rolling 12-month operating budget with variance alerts | Prevents overspending and highlights seasonality |
| Track income & spending | Automated invoicing (AR) and bill-pay (AP) | Late collections are the biggest cash-flow killer ([preferredcfo.com][2]) |
| Pay down my debt | Optimise credit-card float and working-capital lines | Interest erodes thin margins |
| Save for a large purchase | Cap-ex planning – lease vs. buy analysis | A poor equipment deal can starve operations |
| Manage money with a partner | Shared cloud book-keeping with co-founders & accountant | Keeps audit trail, simplifies taxes |
| Track my investments | Separate owner equity and retained earnings | Clarifies personal vs. corporate wealth |
Extra jobs unique to small firms
- Payroll & benefits compliance (accurate, on-time filings).
- Sales-tax / VAT collection & remittance across states or countries.
- Basic risk cover (liability, cyber, key-person insurance).
Lower- & mid-market companies (≈ 50 – 500 employees, often multi-entity)
- Department-level budgets plus rolling forecasts for FP&A.
- 13-week and 12-month cash-flow forecasting to protect covenant headroom ([eventusag.com][3]).
- Debt & equity portfolio management (term loans, venture debt, cap-table dilution).
- Multi-entity consolidation—inter-company eliminations and live FX re-measurement ([picus-capital.medium.com][4]).
- Internal controls & audit readiness (segregation of duties, SOX-lite).
- Vendor procurement & contract lifecycle monitoring.
- KPI dashboards for investors and lenders (EBITDA, ARR, DSO, working-capital days).
Large enterprise & global groups (500 + employees)
| Enterprise-specific job | Typical activities | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Global treasury & liquidity | In-house bank, cash pooling, daily sweeps | Minimise idle cash, cut bank fees |
| Capital-markets & hedging | Bond issues, interest-rate & FX swaps | Reduce funding cost & volatility |
| Regulatory & statutory reporting | Multi-GAAP close, ESG/CSRD disclosures | Avoid fines, enable listings |
| Tax strategy & transfer pricing | Inter-company agreements, BEPS 2.0 compliance | Lower effective tax rate |
| Cyber-fraud prevention | Payment-approval hierarchies, anomaly alerts | Finance is a prime fraud target |
| M&A integration / carve-out accounting | Day-one ledger cut-over, PPA | Acquisition-driven growth |
| Strategic capital allocation | Rank global cap-ex, hurdle-rate analysis | Deploy capital to highest ROI |
Key take-aways for product builders
- Same instincts, bigger stage – “show me everything” grows from a Mint-style dashboard into multi-ledger consolidation and treasury views.
- Cash is king at every tier – but the tooling jumps from spreadsheets to dedicated forecasting engines.
- Compliance balloons – payroll, tax, audit and ESG appear only in business contexts and dominate enterprise workloads.
- Stakeholders multiply – individuals coordinate with a partner; businesses juggle employees, suppliers, bankers, investors and regulators.
Understanding where a customer sits on this growth curve lets you prioritise features that move the needle—whether that’s instant cash-flow visibility for a café owner or cross-border liquidity pooling for a multinational.
