The honest answer is on this page, including the cases where it is no. We work with two quite different kinds of company — and they turn out to need the same thing at the same moment.
A Series A founder and the owner of a $20M family manufacturer would not recognise each other’s language. But both have reached the point where the person keeping the books cannot answer the questions being asked — and where a full-time senior hire is either unaffordable, premature, or both.
Pre-seed through Series C. You have investors, a board, and a reporting rhythm you did not choose. Finance is currently a founder’s evening job or a part-time bookkeeper’s morning one.
Roughly $1M to $50M in revenue, profitable or bootstrapped, no outside board to answer to — and a growing suspicion that the numbers are not telling the whole story.
Both come to us through people who have seen us work — a PE operating partner, an attorney, a family adviser. Both need seniority quickly and quietly.
A CFO has left, an integration is failing, a lender is asking questions, or the reporting the sponsor expects does not yet exist. We step in with controls discipline and governance experience — audit committee and board seats, not just advisory work — and we hand over cleanly when the permanent hire arrives.
A generational handover, a partial sale, or the moment a second generation asks for numbers the first generation kept in their head. We build the finance function the next owner will need, without disrespecting the one that got the business here.
Nobody engages a finance firm because it seemed like a good idea in the abstract. In our experience it is always one of these six.
| The trigger | What it feels like inside the company | Where we start |
|---|---|---|
| A raise on the horizon | The model was built by three people in three styles and nobody can defend the middle column. | Sprint — fundraise-ready model |
| An audit coming | The auditor’s request list is longer than the finance team, and half of it does not exist yet. | Sprint — audit-readiness review |
| A board asking harder questions | Every meeting generates homework that takes two weeks and arrives after the decision. | Retainer — reporting & board pack |
| Nobody owns the forecast | Budget season happens in one spreadsheet, once a year, and is irrelevant by March. | Sprint — driver-based model |
| Data scattered across tools | Answering “how did last month go” takes three people, two exports and a day. | Sprint — dashboard build |
| A finance leader has left | Payroll still runs, but nobody is steering — and the board has noticed. | Embedded partner — interim |
Saying so early is cheaper for everyone than discovering it in month three. If you recognise your company below, we will tell you on the first call and, where we can, point you somewhere better.
If the job is transaction entry and a monthly reconciliation, a good bookkeeping firm will serve you better and cost far less. We will happily recommend one.
Some companies genuinely need someone in the building five days a week. We will say so — and can help you structure the search and the first ninety days.
If the goal is a logo for a slide rather than work that changes the numbers, we are the wrong firm and an expensive way to buy credibility.
Our tooling is governed on purpose. If the appeal is automating the finance function and looking away, we will disappoint you.
Whatever the starting point, the first quarter follows roughly this shape. You should feel the difference in the board meeting, not in the invoice.
Ledger, bank, billing and payroll reviewed. We tell you what is actually true today, including anything you would rather have heard later.
Close process, controls and reporting pack fixed first. Everything downstream depends on a close you can trust.
Driver-based model, forecast cadence and dashboard connected to governed data.
Handover of what your team can run, retention of what we should. Then the first quarterly review.
Thirty minutes usually settles it. If the answer is no, you will hear that clearly — along with what we would do in your position.