Find out if a CFO would pay for itself in your business

Answer eight questions about your revenue, your runway, and the decision in front of you. You get an honest read on whether you need a CFO now, later, or not yet, and the one move to make next. If a bookkeeper is all you need today, the score will say so.

What is your annual revenue?

Trailing twelve months is fine. Round to the nearest band.

Are you raising capital or taking on debt in the next 12 months?

A planned round, a line of credit, or a growth loan all count.

Do you have a rolling cash flow forecast you trust?

A forward view of cash in and cash out, weeks ahead, that you actually rely on.

Can you see profit margin by product, client, or channel?

Not company-wide margin. Margin broken down by where the money comes from.

Have you been surprised by a cash crunch despite being profitable?

Profit on the P and L, but a scramble to cover payroll, taxes, or a supplier.

Who turns your numbers into decisions today?

Not who records the numbers. Who uses them to make the calls.

Could your financial model survive investor or lender diligence today?

Forecast, unit economics, and assumptions an outside party could stress test.

What is prompting you to look now?

The honest reason you are taking this scorecard today.

What your number actually tells you

Four bands. No false alarms, no false comfort.

Your score weighs the same signals a CFO weighs before taking on a company: revenue stage, a raise on the horizon, cash you can see ahead, margin you can break apart, and the decision pushing you to look right now. Find your band below and you will know exactly where you stand.

0 to 35 · Not yet

Save your money. A bookkeeper covers you.

Clean, timely books are the right spend at your stage. Come back the day you cross $1M or a raise lands on the calendar. You will not be wondering whether it is time. You will know.

36 to 60 · Getting close

The signals are starting to flash

Two or three of the warning signs are already on. You might have a quarter to go, or you might be ready now. One free call settles it, and you walk away knowing either way.

61 to 80 · Ready

A CFO would likely earn its keep now

You have real complexity and real stakes riding on every call. At this band, one corrected decision, a fixed price or an avoided bad hire, usually covers the cost of the seat.

81 to 100 · Overdue

Every month you wait has a price tag

The high-stakes signals are firing all at once. You are making six-figure calls without a clear view of the numbers behind them. That gap is costing you now, not someday.

The questions founders ask before they hit start

Straight answers, before you spend two minutes

No. Your score and your recommendation land on screen the second you answer question eight. The email box is optional, there only if you want the full one-page breakdown in your inbox. Your result is never hidden behind a form.

Often around $1M to $2M in revenue, sooner if you are raising. The real triggers are not the revenue line, they are moments: a round or a loan coming up, profit on paper but a scramble to make payroll, growth that finance never caught up to, a board asking for actuals against budget, a six-figure call you cannot model, or margins slipping and no one can say why. Recognize two of those and you are likely past due.

In that band it is often the highest-return hire you make. You carry real complexity but not enough of it to justify a full-time CFO salary or keep one busy. Fractional gives you the senior judgment without the overhead, and it tends to pay for itself in one corrected call: a vendor contract renegotiated, a bad hire delayed, a price held where it should be. Under roughly $500K you likely need a bookkeeper first, and you will hear that straight.

Enough to know whether the conversation is worth having. It is a directional read, not a diagnosis, scored on the same signals a CFO weighs before taking on a company. Where it ends, the free call begins: that is where you go into your actual numbers and get a specific answer for your business, not a band.

A free call, about 30 minutes, with the CFO who would do the work, not a sales rep. You talk through your numbers and the decision on your mind, and you leave with a clear read. If it is a fit, you walk through what an engagement would look like, scoped to you. If it is not, you get pointed toward what you actually need. No obligation either way.