Construction business owners are working through a period of tighter margins and slower cash collection on progress claims, and decisions about pricing, staffing and taking on new work now have larger consequences than they did a few years ago. In that kind of market, owners are well served by an adviser who has worked inside businesses under pressure and can help them work out which decisions matter most.
Xact Accounting has appointed Caine Barends as a Partner and Client Director. Caine has more than 30 years of experience advising businesses, family enterprises and high-growth ventures, and much of that work has been with owners at a point of change, such as a transition, a buyout, a period of underperformance, or a tax or structural problem that needed to be resolved.
Caine has held senior advisory roles with Australian and international firms, where he led multidisciplinary teams advising on tax, insolvency, business transformation, financial performance and governance. He has also worked on the owner’s side of the table. He was a part owner of an IT business, the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of a diverse corporate group with interests in legal services, earthmoving, home building, and construction and development, and the Interim Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Adenbrook Homes. He also spent two years in the special situations division of a bank, working with businesses that were underperforming.
Caine’s time as CFO of a group with home building and construction interests, and as Interim CEO of a home builder, means he has worked on the commercial side of construction, where decisions about cash, pricing and the program of work are made week to week. His turnaround work on Texon Plc, a UK-based company trading in more than 50 countries, was recognised with the large turnaround of the year award for the UK and Europe.
As a Partner and Client Director, Caine works directly with Xact clients as their lead adviser. He draws on the expertise across Xact’s Advisory, Compliance, and Financial Control and Bookkeeping teams so that each client has the right people working on the right issue at the right time. His work with clients covers business performance improvement, ownership transitions and buyouts, tax matters, and businesses that are under financial pressure and need a clear plan.
Caine’s approach is to break a complex problem down into parts the owner can act on, and to build a framework with the owner that helps the business operate through difficult periods and grow when conditions improve. He looks at the whole of a client’s situation, including the business, its entity structure and the owner’s personal position, before recommending a course of action. He then works through the options with the owner so that the plan is practical and the owner stays in control of the decisions.
Caine holds a Bachelor of Business from Griffith University. He is a member of Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand (CA ANZ) and of the Turnaround Management Association (Australia), and he is a registered tax agent.
Construction business owners who would like to talk with Caine about their business can book a conversation with him through Xact.
