Straight answers to real questions about CFO careers and executive finance recruitment
Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I like to think that I’m a pretty well-qualified financial executive. I’ve got an MBA, I’m a CPA CMA and I’ve been a very successful VP Finance / CFO in three different companies over the past fifteen years. My resume shows that I’ve progressed through a number of challenging [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I’m currently the CFO of a $150MM food processing company. I’ve been with my current employer for six years, and previously, I’ve had twenty years’ experience in various industries including food service and consumer goods distribution. I decided to start looking at the market for a new position a month [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I was most recently CFO of a good-sized public telecommunications concern. I had been with the company for seven years, the last five of which as VP Finance. Two years ago, the company replaced the CEO, my boss, with another telecommunications executive recruited from outside the company. The new [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I run a $100mm manufacturing business out in Mississauga. My CFO just quit and I need to find a replacement. Frankly, I’m not sorry to see this guy go, he never really added a lot of value other than keeping the accounting function going smoothly. He was with [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I’m the Controller for a Canadian, TSX listed, software company up in Markham. I’ve been recruiting for a Manager of Financial Reporting and we’re at the offer stage with one of the candidates that we’ve been interviewing. When we started interviewing this person (let’s call him Steve), we told [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I run a $45mm CPG manufacturing company and we’ve been recruiting for a new VP Finance to replace the incumbent who’s about to retire. I posted the job on LinkedIn and have interviewed four people so far who’ve headed up finance departments in CPG companies. Of the four [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I’ve recently been interviewing with a $100mm manufacturer for a newly created Vice President, Finance position. I started the process four months ago and have had six interviews so far. I’ve met the CEO, his executive team, his father and brother (the company is family owned), the firm’s public [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: Two weeks ago, I had the final of four interviews for a VP Finance role at a mid-sized public company. A few days later, the recruiter I was working with told me the company had gone with another candidate who was a “better fit”. Yesterday, the recruiter called again [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I’m the Vice President of Finance for a fairly large retail concern with stores across Canada. I recently promoted one of my divisional controllers into a regional Director of Finance role and I needed to backfill that position. Since I didn’t have anyone in my accounting group ready to [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I’m currently VP Finance of a mid-sized auto parts manufacturer with over twenty five years’ experience behind me. I wasn’t really on the job market but I was recently approached by a headhunter on a really interesting CFO position with a PE owned company in the auto parts industry [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I’m the controller of an $800mm TSX listed company and my assistant controller is going on maternity leave for a year. Normally I’d hire a contractor to fill in for the duration, but the CFO has put a moratorium on any contract hiring. We’re already running pretty lean so [...]
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Straight Answers to Real Questions Question: I’m the VP Finance of a $300mm TSX listed software services firm. My Director of Financial Reporting resigned a couple of months ago and since have the bench to replace her from within, I needed to go outside the firm to recruit for this position. As I was considering [...]
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