Close & Accounting Operations
Cleaner books, stronger reconciliations, practical controls, and a dependable month-end close without making the owner the final backstop.
FINANCE OPERATIONS FOR GROWING BUSINESSES
Run the business.
We’ll run the finance.
The Practical CFO helps owner-led businesses build a stronger financial back office—using experienced judgment, disciplined processes, automation, and AI to reduce administrative drag and improve decisions.
Relationship-led
CPA-led
Operator-minded
AI-enabled
THE GAP
Smaller businesses need big-company financial capability. They just don’t need big-company overhead.
Growing companies often reach an awkward stage: the books matter more, cash gets tighter, pricing gets harder, and the owner still gets pulled into collections, purchasing, reporting, and financial cleanup.
The usual choices are imperfect. Hire a full internal team too early. Add disconnected software. Keep pushing more work onto the owner. Or hire advisors who explain the problem without owning the process.
The Practical CFO is designed for the space in between.
WHAT WE DO
Build the finance function your business actually needs.
Start with the highest-friction work. Standardize it. Automate what should be automated. Keep experienced human judgment where it matters.
Collections & Working Capital
Create a repeatable collections rhythm, improve visibility, reduce avoidable aging, and make cash conversion an operating discipline.
Purchasing & Spend Intelligence
Bring structure to vendor spend, purchasing behavior, approvals, and recurring costs so savings come from better process—not random cost cutting.
Pricing & Profitability
Understand where margin is created, where it leaks, and which customers, products, or services deserve more attention.
Reporting & Decision Support
Turn financial data into a concise management view: what changed, why it changed, and what deserves action now.
Practical CFO Leadership
Experienced financial judgment for owners who need more than bookkeeping but are not ready—or do not need—to build a full internal finance department.
HOW IT WORKS
Prove it before you rebuild it.
We prefer measurable improvements over promises. The engagement starts by understanding the current work, then improving one meaningful area at a time.
Diagnose
Map the work: owner time, employee time, outside cost, close timing, aging, process gaps, systems, and recurring friction.
Design
Create a simpler operating model using the systems you already have where possible, with clear roles, rules, controls, and automation.
Pilot
Run the new process in a defined area and compare it with the current approach. Measure time, cost, speed, quality, and owner involvement.
Expand what works
Once value is demonstrated, extend the model into the next highest-friction part of the finance function.
WHO WE HELP
Built for the owner who is still carrying too much of the back office.
The best fit is a growing, owner-led business with real operating complexity and an underbuilt finance function.
Often a good fit
- Roughly $3M–$50M in annual revenue
- Owner still touches collections, approvals, reporting, pricing, or purchasing
- Bookkeeping exists, but the broader finance function is fragmented
- Leadership wants better information without adding unnecessary headcount
- The business values practical implementation over consulting theater
THE PRINCIPLE
“AI should make experienced judgment more useful—not make accountability disappear.”
AI is the engine. It is not the pitch.
We use automation and AI where they can reliably reduce routine processing, identify exceptions, surface patterns, and accelerate analysis. Rules, controls, and human review remain where judgment and accountability matter.
The goal is not an “AI finance department.” The goal is a better finance department.
RECENT THINKING
Ideas from the operating side of finance.
Each week, Mark writes about the practical intersection of finance, operations, leadership, logistics, technology, and decision-making.
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ABOUT MARK
A finance partner should feel like a person, not a platform.
The Practical CFO is relationship-led. You should know who is responsible for the work, who understands your business, and who you can call when a decision matters.
Mark Stacy is a CPA and experienced finance and operating executive who has worked across accounting, treasury, pricing, collections, purchasing, logistics, and business operations. That mix shapes the firm’s approach: understand the numbers, understand the process, and fix the work that sits between them.
People in front. Systems behind the scenes.
Automation and AI should make the relationship better—not replace it. We use technology to reduce routine work, improve consistency, and surface better information so more time can be spent on judgment, decisions, and the business itself.
Mark writes regularly on LinkedIn about practical business questions—from capacity and working capital to leadership, systems, and the way finance can support better operating decisions.
Read Mark’s latest thinking on LinkedInSTART PRACTICALLY
Show us where finance is consuming too much time.
Start with a short conversation about the current process. If there is a meaningful opportunity, the next step is a practical back-office assessment—not a long implementation project.
What we’ll discuss: owner involvement, accounting workflow, collections, purchasing, pricing, reporting, and the systems already in place.