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A finance chief, at a fraction of the hire.

Growing companies hit a stretch where the books are clean but nobody is steering the numbers — pricing, cash, hiring, and debt decisions all land on the owner. A fractional CFO fills that seat for a few hours a month, not a $250k salary.

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What this can cover.

Fractional CFO

Scope is set per client. Not every line below applies to every engagement — some are not necessary at all — and what we take on is agreed with you before any work starts.

315.113-Week Cash ForecastA rolling forward view of cash, refreshed on an agreed rhythm — you see the crunch before it happens, not after.
315.2KPI DashboardThe five to ten numbers that actually run your business, tracked against targets.
315.3Budget vs. ActualsA budget built with you, then a regular read on where plan and reality diverged — and what to do about it.
315.4Margin & Pricing AnalysisWhich jobs, products, and customers actually make money — and what your prices should be doing about it.
315.5Board & Lender ReportingBanker-ready packages for loans, lines, and investors — numbers presented the way capital wants to read them.
315.6Debt & Growth DecisionsEquipment, real estate, acquisitions, new locations — modeled before you sign, with the tax team in the room.

When a fractional CFO makes sense.

The fit

The signals are consistent: the business has real revenue but decisions are still made on the bank balance; a loan or investor conversation is coming and the reporting isn’t ready; growth is eating cash faster than profit replaces it; or pricing hasn’t been revisited since the company was half its size.

A full-time CFO solves all of that — for $200–300k a year plus equity. The fractional model delivers the decision-grade layer at a flat monthly fee, and because Xel’s accounting team already closes your books and the tax team plans your year, your CFO advisor starts every month with numbers that are already right.

When the company eventually needs the full-time seat, we’ll tell you — and hand over a finance function that’s already built.

FAST FACTS

How the service runs

  • Works from your existing QuickBooks file
  • Standing monthly session with a partner
  • Flat monthly fee, quoted up front
  • Scales up or down with the business
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FAQs.

Quick answers
When should we hire a full-time CFO instead?Usually when finance work is genuinely full-time: heavy debt structure, institutional investors, M&A pipeline, or scale past the mid-eight figures. When you get there, we will say so — and hand your new CFO a finance function that already works.
Will you talk to our bank and board directly?Yes. Lender questions, covenant discussions, and board reporting are part of the seat — your CFO advisor presents the numbers and stands behind them.
How is this different from our bookkeeper?Bookkeeping records what happened; a CFO decides what happens next. The fractional CFO engagement sits on top of clean books and turns them into forecasts, targets, and decisions — same team, same file, no handoff.
How much time does it take from us?Plan on one standing monthly session with your CFO advisor plus quick answers in between. We do the preparation; you make the decisions.
Do we need this if we're profitable?Profitable companies run out of cash too — growth eats working capital. The forecast exists precisely so a good year doesn't produce a bad quarter.

The foundation is clean monthly books — if yours aren’t there yet, start with Accounting & Bookkeeping and grow into the CFO layer.

The numbers a CFO actually watches.

The dashboard
Gross margin, by lineBlended margin hides the product or job that quietly loses money. We split it by service line, product, or job and track the trend, not the snapshot.
Working-capital cycleDays to collect, days of inventory, days to pay — the three numbers that decide whether growth creates cash or consumes it.
Job-level / customer-level profitYour five biggest customers, ranked by what they actually contribute after the real cost of serving them.
Revenue per head & capacityThe early-warning indicator for hiring: whether the next hire is fuel or drag.
Covenant & runway headroomIf you carry debt or investors, the distance to every tripwire — watched monthly, never discovered in a lender letter.

Bookkeeper, controller, CFO — who does what.

Altitude

A bookkeeper records the past accurately — transactions, reconciliations, the monthly close. A controller makes the past trustworthy — accrual accounting, controls, audit-ready statements. A CFO uses that trustworthy past to decide the future: pricing, hiring, financing, and the timing of big moves.

Most growing companies need all three altitudes but only a slice of each — which is exactly what the Xel stack provides: the accounting team closes the books, the CFO layer turns them into decisions, and the tax team makes sure the decisions are structured well.

The engagement scales with the company: a monthly forecast-and-review session at the start, deepening to board packages, lender negotiations, and acquisition modeling as the business earns them.

Common first projects
  • Build the 13-week cash forecast
  • Reprice the two biggest offerings
  • Prepare a lender or investor package
  • Model a hire, location, or acquisition
  • Set the annual budget & targets
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Available at every office.

And everywhere else

Work with a local advisor in person, or run the whole engagement remotely — same team, same portals, same standard.

Fractional CFO services in Eugene, OR Fractional CFO services in Salem, OR Fractional CFO services in Ontario, CA Fractional CFO services in Orlando, FL Fractional CFO services in Savannah, GA Fractional CFO services — virtual, all 50 states

Stop steering by the bank balance.

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