Alison Mitchell

FD/CFO

I’m an experienced CFO working with businesses to achieve their potential. Having spent over 30 years working for SMEs, I am passionate about helping business owners to realise their goals, working with them on a part-time/fractional basis. I thrive on finding practical solutions and helping teams succeed, whether it’s through operational efficiency, mentoring and training, timely management information or long-term strategic planning.

Track record highlights

Driven turnover and profit margin improvement through development of a universal pricing calculator to enable fee earners to allocate resource and time to jobs, whilst assessing break even and profitability. Delivered cost control and reduction measures to return higher margins.
Produced transformative change in management information systems and reporting in several companies across a variety of platforms and industries.
Developed and implemented flexible forecasting models to better determine the effects of future strategy/goals on cashflow, profit and margins.
Disbanded 5 remote underperforming client accounting teams, creating a centralised team from scratch. This resulted in a 20% cost saving and greater client retention.
Synergised and integrated teams, systems and procedures post-mergers.
Trusted partner to business owners and other operational heads, including People & Culture, Compliance, IT and Marketing.
Proven team builder, mentor and leader, responsible for financial learning and development at all levels across a business.

Sector Experience

Property Management
Professional Services
Legal
Outsourcing
Manufacturing
Retail & Hospitality

Alison's specialist skills

Management Information

Know where you stand and get that information in a timely, focused and digestible format. Create realistic budgets to plan for the year ahead, and measure actual performance against budget to analyse, reduce risk, make savings and/or exploit unforeseen opportunities.

Strategic Thinker

Work with business owners to plan for the future, using flexible business models to incorporate both goals and risks. Build actionable strategic plans alongside forecasts that look beyond the next 12 months.

Cash Flow Improvement

Manage cashflow through regular and timely cashflow reporting. Consider the impact of actual v budget results on working capital requirements. Look at pricing, costs, credit control, capital spend and seasonal trends. Use cashflows and forecasts to establish funding requirements, then leverage management information to obtain funds.

Profit Improvement

Create tools to drive sales and margin, whilst also focusing on appropriate cost control.

Financial Operations

Create an efficient and effective finance function to meet the needs of the business now and in the future. Support finance teams through training and mentoring.

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