Home featured Expert Featured Let's Talk Expert Let’s Talk: Cash flow James Harkness March 14, 2018 Inadequate cash flow has been cited as the cause of two in five business failures in Australia *, lending credence to the age-old saying that ‘ cash is king ’ ( an especially unmerciful one at that ). For this week’s “Let’s Talk…” feature, we asked more than a dozen thought leaders to identify the common mistakes startup founders and other business owners make that kill their cash flow . Failing to track, forecast and plan for cash flow. Growing too fast. Splurging on ‘want to haves’. Doing stuff that adds no value. Overestimating future sales. Hitting a tight spot but not being upfront with suppliers. Taking a set-and-forget approach to receivables. Making it difficult for customers to pay. Committing to long-term supply contracts that don’t afford flexibility around spend. Not accounting for tax obligations and seasonality. Tying up cash flow in stock. And Paying invoices at any cost… these were just some of the many mistakes identified by this week’s commentators. Read on for further insights from this week’s line-up… Heather Marano , founder & director, Green Door Co: “ Many businesses aren’t properly monitoring or forecasting potential cash flow issues ahead of time. I fell into this trap early in my business. Once my overheads increased, I naively assumed that since I was bringing in enough revenue overall that we were covered. Of course, that wasn’t the case. I eventually became unstuck