CFO | Profile needed by investment stage

Risk Management, build financials, buy insurance, taxes, register with states for hiring, corporate legal structure, payroll, quickbooks, pay bills, close books

Generalist, hands-on, high integrity, good communication skills, transparency with Founders, excel, quickbooks

Successfully built financial models,

Build Financial Models, build business plan, put vision into spreadsheet, board prep, pay bills, payroll, milestones for future funding, ensure financial metrics, revenue, expenses, cash flow, burn, cap table management, stock options, 409A (valuation), HR / IT / legal / facilities / back office

Generalist, hands-on, excel, power point, good communicator, trusted person (by CEO), track record of execution, fast-aced environment, likes playing with data, understands their own weaknesses

Successfully built business plans and financial models, run back office, built board decks, improved business performance, participated in acquisitions or raised funds

Understand / Put in place sales comp structure, Start to track data, track spend, ex. spend on GTM and weigh vs potential ROI, Keep an eye on trends within the business, track churn (if any).

Build team - accounting (controller) and budget & planning side (FP&A), present to board and own financial piece, build finance strategy and vision, scale systems and processes, generally own HR, IT, Legal, Start looking at cohort analysis

presents well externally, have an opinion and build loyalty with CEO, strategic, risk management, educate CEO on metrics, valuation and dilution, good rapport with other sr. executives built on mutual respect (No BS, ask the tough questions, why did we miss here)?

Hired great team & comfortable with them running their functions (FP&A/Accounting) successfully raised funding or has led team through acqusition

Build team - accounting (controller) and budget & planning side (FP&A), present to board and own financial piece, build finance strategy and vision, scale systems and processes, generally own HR, IT, Legal, Corporate Governance

Thinks wholistically about the business and knows how the business makes money, presents well externally, have an opinion and build loyalty with CEO, strategic, risk management, educate CEO on metrics, valuation and dilution, works well with other sr. executives (primarily sales & marketing)

uses data and financial analysis to run business more efficiently, automate as much as possible i.e. uses software - A/P no longer manual, looks at big business problems i.e. marketing not generating intended ROI

Sales pipeline efficiency (reps not hitting quota), recruiting efficiency, employee retention, margins, revenue numbers,  infrastructure spend, churn (subscription business), CAC, payback period per customer profitability,

Filing S1, ensure repeatable business, practice quarterly forecast and actually hitting forecast (revenue is predictable & "to the right"), practice quarterly filings, external facing responsibilities (engage with bankers on potential company acquisitions and IPO), hire more senior team (VP Finance), SOX implementation, real revenue recognition, audit from Big 4, Corporate governance

know market opportunity, know your product(s) in and out, competitive analysis, guide CEO & Board on potential exits, Understand the challenges that need to be solved and proved to get to IPO or acquisition.  Know the questions you will be asked and the appropriate responses, Soft skills - grit, inquisitive by nature, challenge, presence, backbone, continue to ask "why" until you are satisfied (but do it politely)!

3 things: scalable, predictable, profitable

Analyzing business lines, geographies, enterprise vs SMB.  CAC ratios, gross margin (needs to be 70%+ for SaaS business), bookings growth, revenue growth, sales efficiency, churn, Net revenue retention (existing contracts vs upgrades), ACV, head count & retention issues, ARPU (Average revenue per unit), LTV, billing frequency (monthly vs quarterly vs annual), contract length, renewal rate (customer renewal), professional services, trends, outages/instances (if part of the business).