Mid-Year Financial Check-In

Jason Medlin
Jun 29
3 min read

Black-and-white photo representing mid-year business financial review

June is here. Half the year is gone.

For most business owners, this is the perfect time to step back and check whether reality is matching the plan. Or whether there even was a plan.

A mid-year check-in isn't complicated. It's just a structured way to look at what's working, what's not, and what needs to change before December arrives and it's too late to adjust.

Here's what to review.

1. Revenue vs. Goal

Start with the basics: Where are you on revenue compared to where you expected to be?

If you set an annual revenue target, you should be roughly halfway there by now (adjusted for seasonality). If you're significantly ahead, ask why. If you're behind, ask why.

More importantly: What would it take to hit your year-end number? Is that realistic given what you know now?

If you didn't set a revenue target in January, this is your chance to set one for the back half of the year.

2. Profitability Check

Revenue is one number. Profit is the one that matters.

Look at your year-to-date P&L. Are your margins where you expected them to be? Has anything shifted?

Common mid-year discoveries:

→ Revenue grew but margins shrank (costs outpacing growth)

→ One expense category crept up without anyone noticing

→ A service that seemed profitable isn't when you look at the full picture

→ You've been busier but not more profitable

Mid-year is early enough to course correct. December is not.

3. Cash Position

Profit and cash are not the same thing. You can be profitable on paper and still run out of money.

Check your current cash position against where you were on January 1. Did it grow? Shrink? Stay flat?

Then look forward: What does the second half of the year look like? Are there big expenses coming? Slow seasons? Tax payments?

If cash flow is going to get tight, you want to know now — not in October.

4. Tax Planning

Mid-year is the ideal time to estimate your tax liability for the year.

Too many business owners wait until tax season to find out they owe a lot more than expected. By then, your options are limited.

At mid-year, you still have time to:

→ Adjust estimated payments if you're underpaying

→ Accelerate deductible expenses if it makes sense

→ Fund retirement accounts

→ Make equipment purchases you were planning anyway

→ Talk to your tax preparer while there's still runway

Tax planning done in July is proactive. Tax planning done in December is scrambling.

5. Goal Reset

Remember those goals you set in January? The revenue target, the new hire, the service launch, the systems you were going to implement?

How are those going?

Mid-year is a good time to honestly assess:

→ Which goals are on track?

→ Which need to be adjusted?

→ Which should be dropped entirely?

→ What new priorities emerged that weren't on the list?

It's okay to change the plan. It's not okay to ignore that the plan isn't working.

6. Operational Review

Beyond the numbers, how is the business actually running?

→ Are you spending your time on the right things?

→ Is your team working well?

→ Are there bottlenecks that keep showing up?

→ What's working that you should do more of?

→ What's not working that you should stop doing?

The numbers tell part of the story. The operational reality tells the rest.

The Value of Pausing

Most business owners are too busy running the business to step back and evaluate it.

A mid-year check-in forces the pause. An hour or two spent reviewing the first half of the year can save months of heading in the wrong direction.

You can do this yourself. Or you can do it with someone who brings an outside perspective and asks the questions you might not think to ask.

Make Mid-Year Count

At Bottomline Capital, we do mid-year reviews with all our advisory clients. We look at the numbers, compare them to the plan, and build a clear picture of what needs to happen in the back half of the year.

If you don't have someone helping you do this, now is a good time to start. Book a free consultation and let's look at where you are and where you're heading.