Federico Diagnose
Two weeks inside the numbers and the team. What the close actually produces, what the cash really does, where the controls are missing, who is carrying the function.
Services
Fractional & interim Chief Financial Officer
Most mid-market companies reach a point where the accountant is no longer enough and a full-time Chief Financial Officer (CFO) is not yet affordable. That gap is where I work — a few days a month, or full weeks during an event, with the same accountability as a permanent hire.
25+
years as a Chief Financial Officer and Country Manager5
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) implementations led from the finance seat1
New York Stock Exchange listing supported from the South American sideWhat this is
A fractional CFO is not a consultant who reviews your numbers. It is a C-level executive who owns them: the close, the controls, the treasury position, the board pack, the conversation with the bank. The difference from a permanent hire is the calendar and the cost, not the responsibility.
I have held the role in companies from thirty people to a 3,600-employee subsidiary, in Brazil, Colombia, Peru and across Europe. That range matters: the finance function a forty-person business needs is not a scaled-down version of a multinational's, and building the wrong one wastes a year.
What you get
- A monthly close that lands on time and can be relied on
- Treasury and working-capital management, with a cash forecast that holds
- A board or investor pack that answers the questions before they are asked
- Controls, tax position and audit readiness proportionate to the company's size
- A finance team that is better than when I arrived — hired, trained or restructured
How it runs
Install
Fix the close, the forecast and the reporting line to the board. Put the controls in that the company's size justifies, and no more than that.
Run and hand over
Hold the seat for as long as it is needed, and build the permanent answer underneath it — usually a controller or a first CFO I help you hire.
The record behind it
At Ardagh Group I was Chief Financial Officer for South America through the group's 2017 New York Stock Exchange listing, which meant reporting, controls and audit readiness good enough to survive that process, plus Sarbanes-Oxley compliance and an internal audit function built from nothing. At Ingersoll Rand I ran Latin America finance for the industrial sector; at Whirlpool's Embraco unit, finance, legal and Information Technology for a €350 million European operation. The same discipline scales down: the first thing a forty-person company needs is a close it can trust.
Questions about this work
What is a fractional CFO, and when does a company need one?
A fractional Chief Financial Officer (CFO) is an experienced financial executive who works part-time or on a project basis, giving a company C-level financial leadership without the cost of a full-time hire. Companies typically need one in three situations: they have outgrown a bookkeeper but cannot yet justify a full-time CFO; they are between CFOs and cannot afford a gap; or they face a specific event — a fundraise, an acquisition, a restructuring, an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) implementation — that demands senior financial leadership for a defined period.
How much time does it take, and how is it charged?
Typically two to six days a month for an ongoing fractional role, concentrated around the close and the board cycle, with more during an event. It is charged as a fixed monthly retainer for a defined scope rather than by the hour, so the company knows the cost and I am not incentivised to stretch the work.
Will you work with the finance team we already have?
Yes, and usually that is the point. Most mid-market finance teams are competent and under-led. My job is to give them a structure, a calendar and standards, not to replace them — and where someone is genuinely in the wrong seat, to say so early rather than at the end.
Try it before you call
Finance · stress test
Cash Flow Stress Tester
Enter your financials, pick the crisis (revenue decline, FX shock, cost spike) and get a twelve-month runway projection with turnaround recommendations and a PDF report.
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M&A · due diligence
M&A Due Diligence Checklist
100+ items across eight categories. Track progress, flag risks, add notes, export a professional PDF — built from real transaction experience in Latin America.
Try itRelated services
Turnaround & restructuring
When an operation is losing money and the clock is running, the first job is not a strategy. It is control of the cash. I take that control, rebuild the cost base, and hand back a company with a plan it can actually fund.
Interim executive leadership
Sometimes the company does not need advice. It needs someone in the seat on Monday, carrying the profit-and-loss, making the decisions a departing executive left behind.
Start a conversation
A 30-minute call, in English, Spanish, Portuguese or Italian. No deck, no pitch — you describe the situation and I tell you whether I am the right person for it.