POSITION DESCRIPTION
Company: Highland Ventures, www.highlandventuresltd.com
Position: Chief Financial Officer
Reports to: Chief Executive Officer
Location: Brentwood, Tennessee
THE COMPANY
Highland Ventures is a 75-year-old, family-owned and operated, national venture management company focused on strategically developing and operating business subsidiaries centered around its real estate portfolio. A family owned business, Highland Ventures operates in the real estate, foodservice, and healthcare industries, while also evaluating other industries for investment.
The current portfolio includes Legacy Commercial Property with more than 700 properties and 6 million square feet of property, Hoogland Restaurant Group, the largest owner and operator of Marco’s Pizza franchises with more than 100 restaurants, Intune Physical Therapy, a growing physical therapy platform, and Highland Pure Water & Ice with more than 70 self-serve, ice and water kiosks.
OPPORTUNITY
Reporting to the Chief Executive Officer, the Chief Financial Officer will serve as a pivotal leader for the corporation who will help the executive team manage the business at both a strategic and operational level. While being responsible for all financial activities of the company and its investments, the CFO will also be a strategic business partner and financial advisor to the company and family.
The Chief Financial Officer is responsible for directing the overall financial reporting, corporate structure management, financial analysis, accounting, tax planning, and treasury, including cash management, banking relationships, and financial planning and forecasting. As an operationally focused CFO, the successful candidate will support the CEO and the executive team with overall business planning and strategic initiatives, as well as advising on the operational impact of financial decisions across the organization.
The current team is accounting-focused and the new CFO will manage the accounting team while building the financial team for the organization. The executive team is in the office full-time with normal travel to their office in Springfield, Illinois, as well as other necessary travel for investment opportunities and business needs. Travel is anticipated to be 10-20%.
RESPONSIBILITIES
- Oversee all financial functions and ensure timely and accurate financial forecasting and reporting of financial results, including key performance indicators to the CEO and executive team.
- Assist the CEO and executive team in addressing key financial, administrative, and strategic issues, specifically giving guidance regarding financial performance and financial infrastructure.
- Create a culture of trust and partnership with the CEO and organization.
- Be a sounding board, and trusted partner, to the CEO and executive team.
- Lead all financial functions including Accounting, Finance, Tax, Treasury, and FP&A.
- Lead the evaluation of systems and necessary changes to technology tools.
- Drive an efficient, effective, and comprehensive process for developing financial plans and analysis that link to organizational-wide strategic objectives.
- Create and maintain a variety of corporate metrics, dashboards, and reports to drive insight and action and support the corporate entity as well as operating divisions.
- Create and maintain corporate entities (LLC’s, S-CORP, etc.) and assist with family estate planning
- Assist with the evaluation, due diligence, and integration of acquisition opportunities across business entities.
- Scan the environment, maintaining competitive intelligence, including both privately held and publicly traded entities to inform the ELT of results, trends, and ongoing opinion on the outlook of industries where the company invests.
- Extract incremental value out of existing systems and help implement new systems to support forecasting and data analysis requirements.
- Instill a financial mindset across the organization to drive operational improvement and be keenly aware of profit optimization and the growth of the business.
Overall Accountabilities
- Strategic financial leadership.
- Strategic plan projections.
- Growth & acquisition support.
- Annual budget.
- Periodic forecasts.
- Strategic purchase analyses and CapEx budget.
- Monthly meetings and reporting packages with analysis.
- Ongoing communication of forecasts with analysis.
- Weekly reporting of operating results and KPIs with analysis.
- 13-week cash forecast with analysis.
- Create and maintain corporate entities (LLC’s, S-CORP, etc.) and assist with family estate planning
- Manage and optimize banking relationships.
Accounting and Financial Planning
- Build and maintain a professional and scalable team and infrastructure in finance and accounting.
- Provide management and leadership for all financial and accounting operations of the Company.
- In partnership with the Controller, maintain a timely and accurate monthly close process.
- Ensure accurate, thorough, and timely financial reporting and analysis, including monthly financial statements, annual audits, and annual budget presentations.
- Manage cash needs of the business, including cash flow forecasts and projections.
- Manage day-to-day activities including timely invoicing, job costing, receivables collections, payables, and working capital monitoring.
- Manage the Company’s working capital needs with continual focus on optimizing the cash conversion cycle.
- Ensure all financial transactions, analysis, and reporting meet deadlines and accounting standards.
- Work with auditors for the annual audit process.
Risk Management
- Be the Company leader in identifying, assessing, and quantifying situations requiring risk management and mitigation.
- Drive the Company’s insurance coverage and compliance needs and proper record-keeping.
- Manage the legal needs of the company, including managing outside counsel, where necessary.
- Institute and drive continuous improvement of all accounting processes and internal controls.
- Lead acquisition and integration processes in all M&A activities.
- Ensure that all requirements under the credit agreement are met and that all required lender reporting is prepared.
- Assure all regulatory and tax compliance requirements and timeframes are met.
- Assist with, and monitor, real estate financials, including tenant credit checks, ROI analysis, tenant A/R aging review, collections assistance, and lease review
Budget
- Lead the preparation of budgets and forecasts; develop appropriate analytical tools to proactively drive targeted and committed business results.
- Evaluate growth initiatives, acquisitions, CapEx plans, and asset dispositions for complete and comprehensive financial impact.
- Provide budget information and analysis to the CEO and Board of Directors.
- Work with the ELT to work with lenders (monthly reports, general business updates, covenant compliance, etc.) to maintain a productive partnership.
- Maintain all Company forecasts, including short-term and long-term financial and KPI projections.
QUALIFICATIONS
- Undergraduate degree in accounting or finance required. MBA / CPA preferred.
- 15+ years’ experience as a financial leader with comfort across financial functions and a keen business acumen.
- Experience as a CFO or top financial executive is required.
- Experience in a privately held, family held, or private equity environment would be ideal.
- Strength in an industry where real estate is a critical aspect of the business.
- Strong knowledge of GAAP, cost, and percentage of completion accounting and related financial reporting complexities, including experience managing a WIP schedule.
- Advanced Excel modeling skills required, as well as strength operating in systems such as MRI and Sage Intacct.
- Ability to operate strategically, while also building the appropriate organization and getting into the weeds.
- Exceptional leadership presence to build and mentor a team, as well as work closely with the executive team.
- Strong project management, planning and organizational skills, including the ability to handle multiple projects simultaneously in a fast-paced environment.
- Comfort working in an environment with disparate systems and data that needs to be consolidated, especially through acquisition and investment processes.
- Proven leader and manager for M&A due diligence and integration of accounting and finance functions.
- Operational curiosity to seek out potential areas of improvement.
- Change agent experience where respecting the history of the business is critical, while also making key decisions to improve the business for the future required.
PERSONAL ATTRIBUTES
- Trust builder across an organization.
- Low ego, collaborator, and culture driver.
- Been through failures and has learned what to do differently.
- Positive team builder, with demonstrated success in coaching and developing a team and driving effective levels of employee engagement.
- Proactive self-starter, who is action oriented; self-motivated with a strong aptitude and desire to learn.
- Excellent communications skills, both oral and written.
- Evidence of the practice of a high level of confidentiality.
- Excellent organizational abilities and customer service skills.
- Strong sense of urgency.
- Ability to operate effectively and professionally under pressure.
