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Fractional & Group CFO Services·Three decades of finance leadership

You have a bookkeeper. You have an accountant once a year. Nobody is deciding what the numbers mean.

We have been running finance functions for three decades. Anywhere else a fractional CFO is one person, and what you get is the limit of what one person can carry. Here you get a staffed finance function, named on day one — a CFO who owns the decisions, a controller who owns the close, the analysis underneath them, and a named backup on every seat. Behind them, the specialist bench and our own engineering, capital and insurance arms. One fixed monthly fee. One invoice.
BOOK A CONVERSATIONSEE WHAT YOU GET
THIRTY TO FORTY-FIVE MINUTESDIRECTLY WITH A PARTNERNOTHING TO PREPARE
THE WORK WE RUN
01Planning & Forecasting02Reporting & The Board03Cash & Working Capital04Controls & Systems05Debt & Lenders06Equity & Investors07Transactions08Value, Exit & Succession09Pricing & Margin10Tax & Incentives11Cross-Border12Compensation & Team14Risk, Fraud & Crisis15Capital Allocation16Cost Base & Suppliers01Planning & Forecasting02Reporting & The Board03Cash & Working Capital04Controls & Systems05Debt & Lenders06Equity & Investors07Transactions08Value, Exit & Succession09Pricing & Margin10Tax & Incentives11Cross-Border12Compensation & Team14Risk, Fraud & Crisis15Capital Allocation16Cost Base & Suppliers
Why Companies Call
01 / 14
Nobody calls us because everything is going smoothly.
Most of our clients call us at a specific moment. If one of these is why you are here, it is the conversation we should be having.
01
The numbers arrive too late to act on
Six weeks after month end, by which time you have already made the decision without them.
02
Profitable on paper, tight on cash
Your P&L says one thing, your bank balance says another, and nobody can explain the gap.
03
A lender is asking for more
A covenant, a renewal, a facility increase — and no one on your side to lead the conversation.
04
Buying, selling or raising
And your financial record will not survive a diligence process in its current state.
05
Growth has outrun the back office
More entities, more locations and more currencies than your system was built for.
06
One blended margin
Nobody can tell you which products, customers or sites actually make money.
07
The finance person is leaving
And most of what they know has never been written down.
08
The board wants answers
Questions arriving faster than your reporting can answer them.
01  RECORDED
NWC 7502MARGIN 3150LIQUIDITY 9855ACCRUAL 77.1%NWC 4.76xACCRUAL 94.1%TURNS 50.3%BACKLOG 1194COVENANT 6611TURNS 53.1%FORECAST 1081MARGIN 61ACCRUAL 34DEBT 38ACCRUAL 88.5%CLOSE 354FX 3.90xDEBT 60VARIANCE 2.14xCAPEX 9872VARIANCE 26.3%RESERVE 1233COVENANT 32.4%DEFERRED 67.5%WIP 20DPO 2.67xCOVENANT 26.5%OPEX 59ACCRUAL 2.91xDSO 59.9%MARGIN 9951BACKLOG 5.11xDEBT 67DSO 38
02  FILED
Revenue, indexed100.0
Gross margin37.7%
Operating cost28.6%
EBITDA margin9.1%
Net debt / EBITDA2.41x
Covenant headroom1.47x
Order book, weeks18.2
Working capital8 331
03  DECIDED
A bookkeeper records it. An accountant files it. A CFO decides what it means.
HOLD THE RAISE · REPRICE CHANNEL C · REFINANCE IN Q3
What We Do
02 / 14
One dedicated CFO in the seat. A whole firm behind them.
One leader in the seat, with the specialists behind them brought in as your engagement requires. When your month needs a transaction specialist, a systems engineer or someone who has structured debt from the lender’s side of the table, your lead brings them in. No second invoice.
01
PLANNING AND FORECASTING
Pick the one that is hurting most. That is where your first ninety days go.
WHAT WE DO
01Planning and forecastingBudget, rolling forecast, scenarios, and the model everything else runs off.→
02Reporting, KPIs and the boardManagement pack, board and investor reporting, the measures that matter.→
03Cash, treasury and working capitalCash conversion, banking, covenants, a rolling twelve-week cash view.→
04Controls, systems and the closeThe close, the control environment, the platform, audit readiness.→
05Debt and lendersPackage, structure, negotiation and the ongoing relationship.→
06Equity and investorsRaise strategy, materials, data room, cap table, term support.→
07TransactionsBuy-side and sell-side, diligence preparation, deal modeling, integration.→
08Value, exit and successionExit readiness, value drivers, ownership and management transition.→
09Pricing, margin and unit economicsWhat actually makes money, by product, customer, channel and site.→
10Tax coordination and incentivesStrategy with your accountant, SR&ED, R&D credits, grants.→
11Cross-border and multi-entityConsolidation, structure, intercompany, transfer pricing, currency.→
12Compensation and the finance teamPay and incentive design, team structure, hiring, succession.→
14Risk, fraud and crisisControls against loss, insurance adequacy, governance, liquidity under stress.→
15Capital allocation and investment appraisalBusiness cases, hurdle rates, lease against buy, and what the last one actually returned.→
16Turnaround and profit improvementCrisis cash protocol, lender workout support, a quantified profit program, and the supplier renewal calendar.→
17Technical accounting and revenue recognitionRevenue, leases, stock compensation and purchase price allocation, written up before the audit rather than during it.→
18Governance and stakeholdersDelegated authority in writing, a board calendar with standing papers, and the compliance calendar across every entity.→
One Seat, A Firm Behind It
03 / 14
A dedicated leader is not the same as a lone consultant.
You get named people who are yours for the whole engagement. What sits behind them is the reason that works: when your month needs a transaction specialist, a systems engineer or somebody who has structured debt on the lender side, your lead brings them in. Same fee, same relationship.
YOUR FRACTIONAL CFO
A named CFO and controller, inside your business
Chosen because they have run a finance function in your sector and your situation before. They run your close, own your numbers, sit in your board meetings, take your lender’s call, and stay for the term of the engagement.
Modeling & analysis
Three-statement builds, scenarios, margin and unit economics
Debt & capital markets
Lender packages, covenant structuring, raises and data rooms
Transactions
Quality of earnings, diligence management, integration
Systems & data
ERP, integrations, reporting automation, the control environment
Tax & cross-border
Strategy, incentives, consolidation, transfer pricing
Risk & insurance
Fraud exposure, cover adequacy, crisis liquidity
And behind the bench, seven more divisions of the same firm your CFO can call on — four hundred people in all.
ENGINEERING
Rebuilds your reporting
When the answer is that the reporting itself is wrong, our own engineers rebuild it. You never run a software selection.
CAPITAL
Raises, and gets you ready to ask
The people who talk to capital sit in the same company as the people preparing your numbers for it.
INSURANCE
Checks what you are really exposed to
A risk review that starts from your actual numbers rather than from a renewal questionnaire.
BUILD
When the answer is a system
A delivery team already briefed, because the brief came from your own finance lead.
COMMUNICATIONS
When you have to face investors
What you say publicly and what you file are built from the same set of numbers.
Your CFO brings them in. You never sign a second agreement, and you never get a second invoice.
How A Month Works
04 / 14
Every date in your month is a date you can hold us to.
Close finished by the seventh working day. Pack in your hands on the eighth. A CFO session every fortnight, and on demand whenever something cannot wait for the next one. Every one of those is a scheduled figure in the agreement, not an intention — and through a raise, a covenant test or a cash squeeze we are with you daily until it settles, at the same fee.
01 / THE CLOSE
Finished by the seventh working day
Closed to the same standard on a calendar agreed before we start, with a credit against the month’s fee if the date is missed. You can plan around a date that does not move.
02 / THE PACK
In your hands on the eighth
The month’s results with a written explanation of why each number moved against last month and against plan, and what it means for the next ninety days. In plain English, before you ask.
03 / THE SESSION
Every fortnight, and on demand
Your CFO on the two or three decisions that actually need making, with a recommendation on each and the reasoning behind it. Twice a month as standard, and whenever something cannot wait.
04 / BETWEEN
Thirty minutes when it matters
A payroll that will not run, a payment that failed, a lender deadline. Answered in thirty minutes, day or night, and anything else you send acknowledged inside two business hours.
The Monthly Close
Numbers that arrive on a date written into the agreement.
THE SEVENTH WORKING DAY, TWELVE MONTHS A YEAR
JAN
FEB
MAR
APR
MAY
JUN
JUL
AUG
SEP
OCT
NOV
DEC
Sample Deliverables
05 / 14
Look at what we produce. Not a description of it.
Four pages out of real engagements. Figures are indexed and the client detail is blacked out. Everything else is exactly what landed on the desk.
BOARD PACKPAGE 04
Trading & variance
Revenue, indexed100.0
Gross margin31.4%
Operating cost24.8%
EBITDA margin6.6%
vs budget−1.9 pts
vs prior year+0.4 pts
Net debt / EBITDA2.41x
Covenant headroom0.34x
Order book, weeks18.2
Working capital, days███
01 / BOARD PACK
The reporting pack
What lands on your desk by the eighth working day, and the written narrative that goes with it.
ROLLING CASH VIEWWK 01–12
Liquidity forecast
Weeks forecast12
Receipts, % of plan94.1%
Payroll runs coveredAll
Supplier terms, days41
Tightest weekWK 07
Headroom at WK 07███
02 / LIQUIDITY
The rolling cash view
The model we run for you weekly when your liquidity is tight.
MARGINBY SEGMENT
Where the profit is
████ range38.1%
███ range26.7%
█████ range−4.2%
Channel — direct34.9%
Channel — trade19.6%
Top 10 accounts, reranked7 of 10
03 / MARGIN
The margin breakdown
Where your profit actually comes from, by product, customer, channel and site.
LENDER PACKCONFIDENTIAL
Credit submission
Facility█████
PurposeRefinance
SecurityFixed & floating
Leverage2.41x
Interest cover4.10x
DSCR1.47x
Base case DSCR1.47x
Downside DSCR1.18x
Covenant testPasses
Headroom, quarters6
04 / LENDERS
The lender package
What we put in front of your bank when we lead the conversation.
Industries
06 / 14
Every business has a P&L. Almost none of them break in the same place.
A distributor and a contractor can post identical margins and be in completely different trouble. We set out twelve sectors in detail here, and we lead finance in more than thirty. We work well beyond them.
01Construction and tradesJob costing, work in progress, retention and holdback, bonding capacity.→
02Distribution and wholesaleInventory turns, cash conversion, landed cost, customer and SKU margin.→
03ManufacturingStandard costing, capacity, tariffs, capital investment cases.→
04Professional servicesUtilization, realization, work in progress and lock-up, partner economics.→
05Multi-unit and hospitalityUnit-level P&L, labor and input cost, new-site payback and lease economics.→
06Property and real assetsEntity-by-entity reporting, debt structure, development cash flow.→
07Technology and recurring revenueUnit economics, cohorts, revenue recognition, runway.→
08Healthcare and clinical groupsSite and provider contribution, payer mix, practice integration.→
Cross-Border
07 / 14
One finance function across the border. Not two that disagree.
Most firms in this category work one side of the border and treat the other as a footnote. We are staffed on both, because the differences are not cosmetic — they change the accounts, the tax registrations and the filings.
Companies that trade both ways end up with two sets of books, two accountants, two banks and a consolidation nobody trusts. We run it as one function — a consolidation that reconciles, intercompany charges that are deliberate, and a currency position somebody is watching.
CROSS-BORDER AND MULTI-ENTITY
GROUP STRUCTURECONSOLIDATED MONTHLY
Operating Co.USD
Holding Co.USD
Property Co.USD
Trading Co.CAD
Services Co.CAD
Employment Co.CAD
One consolidated group pack
We give you eliminations that reconcile, intercompany priced on purpose, one reporting currency, and every entity traceable back through it.
ELIMINATIONSINTERCOMPANYTRANSFER PRICINGFX POLICYSTATE & PROVINCE TAX
TWO REPORTING FRAMEWORKS
US GAAP one side; ASPE, ASNPO or IFRS the other. Leases sit on the balance sheet in one and stay off it in the other, so leverage ratios are not comparable until somebody makes them comparable.
SALES TAX THAT IS NOT ONE SYSTEM
State economic nexus on one side. On the other, federal tax plus separately administered provincial taxes that are not harmonized, each with its own thresholds and its own rules.
INCENTIVES ON BOTH SIDES
Research credits in the United States, and the Canadian scientific research and experimental development program, claimed properly and supported by contemporaneous records rather than reconstructed in the spring.
RULES THAT ARE PROVINCIAL, NOT FEDERAL
Franchise disclosure, trust accounting, carrier safety registration and employment obligations are set province by province, and several provinces have no statute at all. A United States playbook does not transfer.
Risk And Controls
When the month goes wrong you find out in week one, not at the covenant test.
CONTROLS · COVENANTS · LIQUIDITY · GOVERNANCE
Our Commitments
08 / 14
Everything we promise is written into the engagement.
Adjectives cannot be enforced. Ours are clauses — eight of them, in every engagement letter we sign, in language you can hold us to. Ask us for it on the first call and read it before you decide anything.
ALL NINE CLAUSES
ENGAGEMENT LETTER
SCHEDULE 1 · COMMITMENTS
PAGE 1 OF 1
Schedule 1
Commitments of the Firm
1.1Continuity. The individual who leads the first conversation shall lead the engagement throughout its term, supported by the specialist resources of the firm at no additional fee.
1.2Scope. The full scope is set out in writing before signature, including where your accountant’s work begins and ours meets it.
1.3Fee. One fixed monthly fee. No hourly billing, no timesheets, no charge for correspondence.
1.4Term. Month to month after the first ninety days. No lock-in and no exit fee.
1.5Independence. No referral fee or commission is accepted from any vendor, bank, lender or broker.
1.6Availability. Response the same business day; within the hour where cash or a deadline is at risk.
1.7Handover. All models, policies and documentation are the client's property from creation.
1.8Measurement. Success is defined in writing at week three and reviewed against at ninety days.
FOR AND ON BEHALF OF THE FIRM
BINDING ON SIGNATURE
Selected Engagements
09 / 14
Three of six hundred and forty. What we were called in for, and what was different afterwards.
For each one we set out the situation we walked into, what our diagnostic found, the work we did, and what the business could do at the end that it could not do at the start.
01 / DISTRIBUTION
Profitable for three years, and borrowing to make payroll
We found their cash sitting in stock, and nobody had measured how much.
Cash equal to eleven percent of a year’s revenue taken out of stock and unpaid invoices. The overdraft was repaid and closed.
READ THE ENGAGEMENT →
02 / CONSTRUCTION
A bonding limit that had quietly stopped moving
We found work in progress nobody could defend, and a surety losing patience.
The bonding company backed 2.4 times the work it had before, so three more projects could run at once with the same crews.
READ THE ENGAGEMENT →
03 / MANUFACTURING
Two entities, two accountants, one consolidation
And a lender who no longer believed the numbers he was being handed.
The same plant producing thirty-one percent more of what actually earns, with no new machine and no new shift.
READ THE ENGAGEMENT →
Insights
10 / 14
We write about the decisions our clients actually have to make.
01 / LENDERS
What your bank is actually looking at
The four things your lender reads first, and what they conclude when one is missing.
→
02 / CASH
Profitable and out of cash
Why your P&L and your bank account disagree, and how to close the gap.
→
03 / EXIT
Eighteen months before you sell
What a buyer's diligence team will find in your numbers, and what it costs to fix it late.
→
The Method
ASSESS · INTEGRATE · EXCEL
We work in three steps. The third one is where our name comes from.
01
assess
We find out what is actually true before we change anything. Your accounts, your systems, your close, your controls and your cash position, written down plainly — including the parts you would rather not read.
02
integrate
We are in the room when you decide, not copied in afterwards. Above your bookkeeper, alongside your accountant, in front of your lender, and in the room when you decide.
03
excel
Your margin, your cash and your numbers get good enough to survive a buyer, a lender or a bad quarter. Margin, cash, the quality of your numbers, and what you can prove when somebody finally asks.
NAMED FOR THE OUTCOME AND THE PROCESS
The First Conversation
One hour on your business.
Nothing else on the agenda.
One of our partners meets you, asks what is actually going on inside the business, and tells you what we would do about it. You get a straight answer either way.
01
What is actually going on
Where the pressure is right now — the cash position, a lender, a deal on the table, or a board that is asking questions the reporting cannot answer.
02
What we would do about it
Not a proposal. The two or three things we would move on first, why those and not the others, and roughly what changes inside ninety days.
03
Whether we are the right fit
We say so plainly and early. If your business is better served by something other than a fractional CFO, we will tell you that on the call.
BOOK A CONVERSATIONSEE WHAT A MONTH LOOKS LIKE
THIRTY TO FORTY-FIVE MINUTES · DIRECTLY WITH A PARTNER · NOTHING TO PREPARE