Seed Stage: Keep It Lean but Accurate

At the seed stage, your priority is keeping costs low while maintaining accurate records. You likely don’t need a full-time finance hire yet, but you do need reliable systems.

Typical setup:

• Bookkeeper (part-time or outsourced): Handles basic bookkeeping, payroll, and monthly reconciliation.
• Fractional CFO or finance advisor: Offers high-level guidance on cash flow, fundraising prep, and financial modeling.
• Tools: Xero or QuickBooks, plus a simple expense management tool (like Expensify or Ramp).

The goal here is to establish clean books, monitor runway, and create investor-friendly visibility without burdening the founders.

Series A: Build for Clarity and Control

Once you’ve raised your Series A, the stakes are higher. Investors expect timely reporting, clean audit trails, and defensible metrics.

Evolving your finance team:

• Senior Accountant or Controller (in-house or fractional): Owns reporting, ensures GAAP compliance, and manages financial closes.
• Fractional CFO (more hands-on): Leads financial strategy, helps track burn and runway, and prepares for board meetings and scenario planning.
• Financial Analyst (optional): Supports modeling, unit economics, and revenue forecasting.

At this stage, you also need to start building controls—expense policies, budget tracking, and basic FP&A processes.

Series B: Build a Scalable, Strategic Finance Org

As you approach Series B, your finance team must scale with the complexity of your business—especially if you’re expanding to new markets, hiring aggressively, or launching multiple products.

Ideal structure:

• Full-time CFO: Strategic partner to the CEO, focused on capital efficiency, expansion planning, and investor relations.
• Controller or Finance Manager: Oversees financial operations, audits, and compliance.
• FP&A Lead or Analyst: Owns forecasts, dashboards, and business insights.
• AR/AP Specialist or Operations Accountant: Manages receivables, payables, and cash flow.

By Series B, your finance team should not only keep up with compliance but drive decisions—turning data into strategy.

Final Thought

Hiring too early wastes capital. Hiring too late creates chaos. The right finance structure evolves with your stage and goals. By layering in support as needed—from bookkeepers to CFOs—you can stay lean while building a strong financial foundation.

At BlockOffice, we help startups scale their finance function with fractional CFOs, outsourced teams, and growth-stage support—so you get the right structure at the right time.

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