The Challenge
A $22M IT services and consulting firm was preparing to raise $5M in growth capital to fund geographic expansion and a new managed services offering. The CEO had strong client relationships and a clear growth thesis, but the financial story was not there to back it up.
Board meetings consisted of a P&L printout from QuickBooks and a verbal update. There were no KPI dashboards, no variance analysis, no cohort metrics, and no forward-looking projections. The existing bookkeeper handled AP/AR and payroll but had no FP&A experience.
“Every investor meeting ended the same way: ‘Your business is interesting, but your financials are not investor-grade.’ I needed to fix that fast.”
What We Did
Investor-Grade Financial Infrastructure
We embedded as the company’s fractional CFO, working directly with the CEO and existing bookkeeper to build a complete financial operating system:
- Monthly financial package: P&L with budget variance, balance sheet, cash flow statement, and management commentary, delivered by the 10th of each month
- KPI dashboard: Revenue per employee, utilization rate, project margin by practice area, pipeline coverage ratio, customer concentration metrics, and monthly recurring revenue tracking
- Rolling forecast: 12-month rolling forecast updated monthly with actual results, replacing the annual budget that was stale by February
Board Deck and Governance
We designed a standardized board deck that told a clear financial story each quarter:
- Executive summary with 5 key metrics and trend arrows
- Financial performance vs. plan with variance explanations
- Cash flow waterfall and runway analysis
- Sales pipeline and revenue forecast by practice area
- Strategic initiatives update with financial impact tracking
- Risk register with mitigation actions
Fundraising Materials
We built the complete financial package for the capital raise:
- 5-year financial model with revenue build by geography and service line
- Use of proceeds analysis tied to specific growth initiatives
- Investor pitch deck with financial narrative and market sizing
- Due diligence data room with 3 years of clean financials
The Results
“DMW gave us the financial credibility that matched our operational excellence. We went from getting polite rejections to having investors compete for our round.” , CEO
Key Takeaway: Investors do not just invest in businesses. They invest in management teams that demonstrate financial discipline. A fractional CFO who can build investor-grade reporting, clean financial models, and a compelling board narrative is not a cost. It is the highest-ROI investment you can make before a raise.
Preparing to raise capital?