Berlin, Berlin, Germany
I am an expert in Financial Planning & Analysis for medium-sized businesses operating across Europe. I give leadership teams the financial clarity to make high-stakes decisions with confidence. I support businesses with multiple entities and teams distributed across Europe, particularly in France, Germany, and the UK. In the last 10 years, as Head of Finance / Head of FP&A, I have supported SaaS, FMCG and professional services operating across the EU and the UK If your business is expanding in several countries either through organic growth or a buy and build strategy, and you need to build a finance function that is both sound and strategically useful, I'd be glad to connect. I can help you when things get complex, for example if you have payrolls in several countries, multi-currency accounting and reporting, in particular post-M&A: integrating the new acquisition’s accounting, consolidating the new acquisitions in the group’s reporting, I also help you monitor and quantify that planned synergies. Most finance professionals are built for either the engine room or the leadership table. I operate in both. I can play defence and offence. Playing defence: I review your accounting policies and processes, build a consolidated view of your business (or improve it if one is already in place), and deliver a diagnosis of performance and financial stability. This work lays the foundation for sound planning — you can only plan well from numbers you trust. Playing offence: Most companies have a budget. Few have a useful planning process. I design and lead the full FP&A cycle — from long-range plan to operational budget to monthly performance reviews to reforecasts — using rigorous models and disciplined methods that make the numbers meaningful. The result is a connected, repeatable process where leadership always knows where the business is headed, gaps to the plan are identified, explained and acted on, and the financial plan stays relevant as the business evolves. For growing companies, this is a core process that enables sound and timely decisions at every level.
Fundraising, M&A / Exit Support: - designed the company's financial model: 3 statement model with unit economics module - coordinated the due diligence documentation - attended calls with potential investors - prepared the financial-related parts of the pitch decks - management of the sale of a part of the business: definition of the scope of the transaction, review of the asset purchase contract with legal team, production of the accounting policy and of the financial statements for the divested segment. Financial Management, Strategy: - put in place and attend the monthly reviews with the C-Suite members - designed a 13 week cash flow forecast model - segmentation of the company's product line P&L Management finance function: - coordinated of the company-wide budget process - recruited the Business Intelligence team - directed the work of the BI team: definition of KPIs (ARR, Revenue Retention, Churn, Unit Economics KPIs such as Lifetime Value (LTV), Payback, Customer Acquisition Costs (CAC), production of dashboards - coordinated month end closing, year end closing Special projects: - restructuring of the business: headcount planning, tracking restructuring-related costs and savings
(eos Products ceased operating in the EU in August 2020) Organised the Financial Planning function for the Europe Region: - designed the budget model for a multi-country/multi-currency region - designed a weekly sales report that included actual and forecast - designed a consolidated Europe-wide demand planning model: 100+ SKUs and 27 retail Customers - organised and ran the quarterly review process
What was achieved: - improved revenue forecast from 61% to 95% accuracy at a $200m Revenue / year business unit - enhanced the finance function’s usefulness during the business’s most protracted crisis by drawing contingency plans and monitoring their execution. The effort helped the business preserve its high margin and its solvency. Day to day responsibilities: - led the production, the review and the delivery of a Europe-wide budget (45 offices) - EMEA CEO and European senior management team’s main point of contact for all finance-related issues - was responsible for communicating the financial results, assessing and presenting forecast to the EMEA CEO and European senior management team - was responsible for coordinating the preparation and the delivery of the EMEA CEO’s presentation to the executive team in the US - participated in executive meetings by providing insight into the company's situation and prospects - developed driver-based financial models. - advised and provided guidance to the country planners (Hyperion, Oracle) on all financial issues - organized the work and mentoring financial analysts' team.
Responsible for all financial and tax issues for one of BASF’s largest legal entities: - coordinated with the shared service centre the production of monthly, quarterly and year-end group and statutory closing and reporting - ensured tax returns are completed accurately and on a timely basis main point of contact for external auditors - responsible preparation of statutory accounts Advisory role to the country CFO on group financial reporting and on technical accounting issues (payroll, IFRS)
Post-merger integration Accounting and Corporate Reporting: - planned and executed integration of 3 newly-acquired companies to group financial reporting in multi-currency and cross-border contexts - converted legal chart of accounts to group chart of accounts - converted financial statements from US GAAP to IFRS - monitored migration of data to SAP - supervised production of first-time annual financial statements and notes under IFRS - integrated statutory accounts in SAP-FI Development of European shared service centre: - built partnership with with legal entity finance directors to ensure that confidence in the shared service centre is restored and increased - organised the transition to the shared service centre of accounting activities (tax computations and returns, deferred taxes, payroll) and of tax returns prepared locally - delivered IFRS training to all accountants in the shared service centre Country team management Corporate Reporting: - supervised month-end, quarter-end and year-end group and statutory closing and reporting for 15 legal entities: - trained and supervised 9 accountants in the production of group financial statements, notes to financial statements, statutory accounts and balance sheet review documents - ensured that financial statements were delivered in accordance to group guidelines (IFRS) and in accordance to local GAAP (French GAAP)
- implemented a driver-based planning process (5 year plan) for a business unit with a $2bn cost base - managed the reporting of post-merger synergy projects: tracking of operational savings, presentation and reviews. The projects achieved $500mio reduction in runrate - within Finance, contributed to setting up the governance for the post-merger projects with the Project Management Office - rolling forecast for a business unit with an $80m revenue