Fractional CFO

About Tidal CFO

Tidal CFO is a remote-first, CPA-led fractional finance firm based in Atlantic Canada. We work with Canadian businesses - startups, nonprofits, and growing SMEs - to bring clarity, structure, and confidence to their finances.

We're not a traditional accounting firm. No timesheets, no billable-hour culture, no scramble to hit utilization targets. We run on a subscription model, which means you're measured by the quality of the work you produce and the outcomes your clients get - not the hours you clock.

Advisory is the product here. Clean books are the foundation everything sits on, and we have a team that produces them - but what our clients actually pay for is someone who reads the numbers before the meeting and tells them what to do about it. That's the seat we're hiring for.

The Role

We're hiring a Fractional CFO to carry a portfolio of four to five clients as their finance leader. You'll own the financial picture end to end: understanding what the numbers are saying, building the forecasts, running the meeting, and being the go to person the owner or the board calls when a decision is needed.

This is not a review-and-sign-off seat. You'll have a delivery team producing clean books underneath you and a Manager coordinating the close - but the analysis, the modelling, and the judgment are yours. The portfolio is deliberately small because the work goes deep. You are expected to know these businesses well enough to see what is coming before it arrives.

What You'll Do

• Own the financial picture
  • Review monthly results across your portfolio and form a view on what changed, why, and what it means
  • Work with the delivery team to resolve close issues affecting your clients
• Look forward, not just back
  • Build and maintain 13-week cash flow forecasts and rolling financial models
  • Prepare budgets, three-statement pro formas, and scenario analysis as engagements require
  • Flag pressure points early - runway, covenant risk, working capital, hiring capacity
• Lead the client relationship
  • Run monthly client meetings and drive the actions that come out of them
  • Advise between meetings on lender discussions, pricing, hiring, and funding decisions
  • Prepare board and investor reporting where the engagement calls for it
  • Maintain your professional network and refer opportunities internally - pipeline and pricing are owned elsewhere

What We're Looking For

Required

• 6+ years post-designation as a CPA in good standing, including at least two years in a Controller, Director of Finance, or CFO seat with genuine ownership of the numbers.
• A multi-client rhythm - either at a fractional CFO, CAS, or advisory firm, or in public accounting with real industry exposure. You know how to hold several businesses in your head at once and switch between them cleanly.
• At least one year owning month-end close on a deadline, together with substantive FP&A experience. We need both - one without the other does not work in this seat.
• Models you have built from a blank sheet - 13-week cash flow forecasts, three-statement pro formas, and rolling forecasts. Not inherited and updated.
• Strong Excel modelling. Driver-based, formula-driven, no black boxes.
• Credibility with owners, executives, and boards - you can influence a decision maker, and people take your view seriously because you have earned it.
• Comfort with tough conversations and judgment calls. You will need to tell an owner something they do not want to hear, and take a position when the answer is not clean.

Strong assets

• Professional relationships that outlast the engagement - clients, bankers, lawyers, and other advisors who would take your call three years later
• Industry depth in one or more of: nonprofit, construction and trades, property, or venture-funded startups
• Fluency in QuickBooks Online and Xero - you'll pull your own data
• Bilingual (English / French) is a strong asset - not required

What This Isn't

This isn't a compliance seat. If your background is audit and tax with no time spent inside a business owning the numbers, this will not be a fit - the work here is forward-looking.

It's also not a sales seat. No quota, no pipeline targets, no prospecting. If your network brings something to the door we will happily take it, but nobody is measuring you on it.

And it isn't a seat where you delegate the work. You have a team producing the books, but you build the model and write the analysis yourself.

What We Offer

• Competitive compensation aligned with experience, plus a portfolio performance bonus tied to the profitability of the clients you manage
• Comprehensive health benefits and paid vacation
• Fully remote - work from wherever you do your best work
• A small, high-trust team where your work is visible and genuinely valued
• Real influence over how the CFO practice gets built as the firm scales

To Apply

Send us your resume and a few lines on a decision you helped an owner or a board make, and what the numbers had to do with it - we read those.