The $3M hiding in the handoffs

The bottleneck

A ~35-person construction-services firm was winning work faster than its back office could process it. More than $3M in completed work sat unbilled or uncollected. Team turnover was systemic, and sales, field operations, HR, and accounting each ran on their own disconnected tools — so every job crossed several handoffs that nobody clearly owned.

This is one from the track record of Flywheell's founder, who led the turnaround as the firm's operating executive — and it's the playbook Flywheell brings to growing businesses today.

What we did

The first move wasn't new software — it was ownership. Before touching a single system, every handoff in the business got an owner and a definition of done: who owns this, and how do we know it's finished?

• Mapped every handoff from sold job → field work → billing → collection, and assigned clear ownership.
• Reconciled the full receivables backlog — over $3M in unbilled and uncollected work.
• Rebuilt the back office and most of the field team around the new process, breaking the turnover cycle.
• Stood up one integrated operating system connecting sales, field operations, HR, and accounting.

The results

In year one: 40% revenue growth, 30% margin improvement, and $3M+ in receivables reconciled — with a stable team and one system of record where five disconnected tools used to be.

The lesson carries to any growing business: when cash goes missing, it's rarely a finance problem. It's a handoff problem — and fixing ownership is free.