The CFO & Controller's Reference Guide

Download the First 90 Days Preview

The opening chapter of the guide — the week-by-week playbook for the CFO who just walked through the door. What to look at first, who to talk to, what to fix before month-end close, and the discipline that decides whether the rest of the tenure runs smoothly. The honest version, not the seminar version.

14 pages · PDF. No email required.

↓ Download the free PDF

Who this guide is for

Written for the working CFO and the people they collaborate with. Each chapter has practitioner depth on the technical side and frank handling of the people-side topics other CFO books skip. The persona-routing table below tells you where to start.

You are…	Start with these chapters
First-time CFO in your first 90 days	Ch 3 The CFO's First 90 Days · Ch 7 Three-Statement Modeling at PE Depth · Ch 22 Debt Covenants & Lender Management · Ch 30 Treasury & Banking · Ch 33 Hiring & Comp
Sitting CFO at $5M-$50M company	Ch 11 Working Capital Management · Ch 14 Capital Allocation & CapEx Discipline · Ch 16 AI in the Finance Function · Ch 28 KPI Dashboards · Ch 35 Board Management
Sitting CFO at $50M-$500M company	Ch 7 Three-Statement Modeling · Ch 18 Audit Prep & SOX · Ch 23 PE Operating Partner Cadence · Ch 30 Treasury & Banking · Ch 36 The CFO-CEO Partnership
Fractional CFO building a practice	Ch 3 First 90 Days · Ch 28 KPI Dashboards (use as client deliverable template) · Apx N AI Tool Prompts · cfo-engagement.html (engagement profitability tool)
Controller targeting CFO	Read front-to-back. The technical chapters (1-15) are the controller's strong suit; the strategic chapters (28-38) are the gap.
PE operating partner evaluating CFOs	Ch 23 PE Operating Partner Cadence · Ch 27 Portco KPI Dashboards · Ch 33 Hiring & Comp (the rubric for what good looks like)
CEO hiring a CFO	Ch 33 Hiring & Comp · Ch 36 The CFO-CEO Partnership · Ch 3 First 90 Days (so you know what to expect)

38 chapters across 5 parts plus appendices including the AI Tool Prompts library (50+), comprehensive glossary, and index. Page counts approximate.

PART I · The First 90 Days & Foundations

1What CFOs Actually Dop1

2CFO Persona Routing & How to Read This Bookp7

3The CFO's First 90 Daysp13

4Building the Finance Function from Scratchp25

5Close Calendars & Reporting Cadencep35

6Books, Records & the Audit Trailp43

PART II · Technical Accounting & Modeling

7Three-Statement Modeling at PE Depthp51

8Revenue Recognition & ASC 606p65

9Lease Accounting & ASC 842p73

10Stock Comp & ASC 718p81

11Working Capital Managementp89

12Cash Flow Forecasting (13-Week + LRP)p99

13Tax Provision & Deferred Tax Mechanicsp107

PART III · Capital, Debt, Treasury

14Capital Allocation & CapEx Disciplinep115

15Tech Stack & ERP Selectionp125

16AI in the Finance Functionp135

17Cyber, Data Security & SOC 1/2p147

18Audit Prep, SOX, & External Auditor Managementp155

19Pricing Strategy & the CFO's Rolep165

20Customer Profitability & Cohort Economicsp173

21Sales Operations & the CFO-CRO Partnershipp181

22Debt Covenants & Lender Managementp189

PART IV · Operating & Performance

23PE Operating Partner Cadence (if PE-backed)p199

24Inventory Operations & the Inventory CFOp209

25Manufacturing CFO Specificsp221

26Services / Software CFO Specificsp229

27Multi-Entity / Multi-Currency Operationsp237

28KPI Dashboards & the Monthly Packp247

29FP&A Cadence & Forecast Disciplinep259

30Treasury & Bankingp267

31Insurance, Risk & Captive Programsp277

32Estate Tax, §1202 & Liquidity-Event Planning (for the founder you serve)p287

PART V · The People & the Career

33Hiring & Comp Structurep297

34Building & Managing the Finance Teamp307

35Board Management & the Audit Committeep315

36The CFO-CEO Partnershipp325

37Common Mistakes & the Recovery Playbookp333

38CFO Career Architecture (private, public, fractional, founder)p341

Appendices

ASample Monthly Reporting Packp349

BSample 13-Week Cash Flow Forecastp353

CSample Operating LRP (5-year)p357

DVendor Scorecard / Cyber Scorecard / AI Readiness Scorecardp361

NAI Tool Prompts Library (120+ practitioner-grade prompts)p369

GComprehensive Glossaryp381

IIndex of terms with page referencesp389

Preview the inside pages

14 sample pages from the actual guide — cover, table of contents, persona routing, sample chapter openers, AI prompt examples, and back matter. These are the actual pages that ship; not marketing renders.

Page 1

Page 2

Page 3

Page 4

Page 5

Page 6

Page 7

Page 8

Page 9

Page 10

Page 11

Page 12

Page 13

Page 14

What's actually in the bundle

1. The reference guide (PDF)

38 chapters + appendices. Searchable, hyperlinked TOC and index. AI prompts inline at section boundaries in 15 chapters, plus a 50+ prompt library in Appendix N. Single-user license for one practitioner.

2. The companion Excel workbook (XLSX)

The actual templates a sitting CFO uses — three-statement model with formula-driven tie-outs, 13-week cash flow forecast, 5-year operating LRP, monthly reporting pack, KPI dashboard, vendor scorecard, cyber scorecard, AI readiness scorecard, CapEx justification template with NPV / IRR / payback. The same workbook the partner uses, not a textbook example.

3. The AI Tool Prompts Library

120+ practitioner-grade prompts for Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini. Each prompt is field-tested for finance use cases — board memo drafting, variance analysis writeup, lender covenant compliance memos, M&A working-capital normalization, year-end audit prep questions, ASC 606 revenue recognition fact patterns. Use them directly in your AI tool of choice.

4. Group reporting & impairment toolkit (XLSX)

Four additional formula-driven workbooks, each self-checking and built to teach the mechanics as you use them. The Subsidiary Reporting Package turns one trial balance into a full IFRS statement set — position, profit or loss, changes in equity, and a fully traced indirect cash flow — with consolidation, IAS 21 FX translation, intercompany, roll-forwards and a tax-data-pack tab. Plus three US-GAAP impairment models, each building the cash flows up line by line: ASC 360 long-lived asset / asset group, ASC 350 goodwill (reporting-unit / subsidiary), and ASC 350-30 indefinite-lived intangible (relief-from-royalty). A built-in decision aid routes you to the right impairment test.

Plus: Free live tools derived from this guide

Ten free interactive tools at tools.baratelliinstitute.com run the math from the guide on your scenario. No purchase required.

CapEx Justification Three-Statement Builder WACC Calculator CFO Engagement Profitability AI Readiness Assessment

Companion tools for Chapter 19 (Stock-Based Compensation)

Five companion calculators for Chapter 19 — the four standard ASC 718 / IFRS 2 valuation models plus Phil's SBC Reality Check framework (not offered by any other public web tool).

SBC Reality Check (Phil's framework) Black-Scholes-Merton Option Valuer Binomial / Lattice Option Valuer Monte Carlo Market-Condition (TSR) Valuer Intrinsic Value / RSU Valuer

About the author

Philip A. Baratelli, CPA, MBA — Founder, Baratelli Institute. Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida.

three decades in operating finance and M&A (a CPA since 1995). The guides in this library are the references he wished existed when he was doing the work.

Recommended path

Pick by the seat you sit in.

The rest of the route compounds on top of the desk reference.

These are reading paths, not bundles. Every Guide is sold individually on Gumroad — there is no discount, no package, no “buy three save X.” The dollar totals below simply add up the à-la-carte prices for the practitioner who follows the recommended path. Buy one and stop. Or buy the three that match your week. The Library is built to compose on the shelf, not to upsell at checkout.

If you buy one

By the seat you sit in

$99 — $449

For the CFO desk — CFO Guide. For PE / corp-dev / FO direct investing — PE Guide. For the M&A counsel scoping the engagement — LEP. For the trustee or trust officer — Trust Admin.

If you buy three

Desk + AI + adjacent specialty

~$547

Desk reference (above) — $449 (CFO or PE) or $149 (Trust) etc.
+ one of: Trust Admin ($149) · Estate Planning Decoded ($149) · LEP ($99)

AI Integration Decoded is the leverage layer under everything else. The third pick is the adjacent specialty — usually the one your largest client’s next matter touches.

The full route

Desk + everything that touches the desk

~$1,095

CFO Guide + PE Guide ($698)
+ LEP ($99) — the M&A layer
+ Trust Admin + Estate Planning Decoded ($298) — legacy infrastructure for the upstream client
+ Family Office Reference Guide ($449) — understand the seat you serve

The practitioner who buys the full route can speak fluently to the CFO, the GP, the family principal, the trustee, and the M&A counsel — on every matter type their firm handles.

Why it's worth it

One idea earns it back. The tools alone outprice it.

For the professional who runs the close, advises the client, or carries the liability, this isn't priced against other books. It's priced against the cost of the work it replaces — and the upside of a single better decision.

Measure it against the numbers you already manage

A CFO doesn't price a reference against other books — they price it against the figures on their own statements. Audit fees run into seven figures; the fully-loaded cost of the finance function runs higher still. Shave a few points off the audit with cleaner, audit-ready schedules — trim days off the close and the reporting cycle — sharpen the visibility behind a single capital-allocation decision — and the return isn't a multiple of the price, it's a different order of magnitude. At the scale you operate, this guide is a rounding error against the decisions it improves — for a company, it sits below any approval threshold and is expensed without a second thought.

Buy it for one idea

At the level you work, a single usable insight — one cleaner close, one defensible position — pays the price back many times over. The other several hundred pages are upside.

The models alone cost more to build

Price out having your team build and test the ASC 842 lease calculator, the ASC 360 / 350 impairment models, the deferred-tax engine, and the subsidiary reporting pack. A day of analyst time already exceeds the price — and a build-and-validate cycle is weeks, not a day.

Senior judgment, without the engagement

The answer a full career arrives at — ready to use, for a fraction of the first hour of the equivalent advisory engagement. And unlike the engagement, it doesn't leave; it's there for the next decision, and the one after that.

An idea goldmine for your practice

Bring one fresh, well-reasoned idea to a client meeting and you've set yourself apart from every peer with last year's advice. A single volume is a year of substantive material — for client conversations and for your own public voice.

And on the downside: one prevented misstep — a missed disclosure, a surcharge, a restatement — covers the price many times over.

These weren't assembled by a content team or handed to a junior associate. They were built by one practitioner — a full career in the work, every hard lesson already paid for — for the professional who needs the right answer now.

— Philip A. Baratelli, CPA, MBA, Founder

“The book you don't read won't help.”

Jim Rohn

The ideas are already on the page. The only thing between you and the first one is the decision to start. Backed by a 30-day money-back guarantee.

The method — how the Institute reads every entry

The Six Lenses: one transaction, six numbers.

A single entry doesn’t produce one number — it produces six, one for each audience that asks. Most references give you only the GAAP figure. This guide reads every significant entry through all six lenses and keeps them reconciled — so you always know which number an audience is hearing, and why two charges that both get “added back” are not the same thing at all.

Two charges, side by side: $4.0M stock-based comp (non-cash) and $3.0M restructuring & severance (cash, tax-deductible when incurred). Both get added back to adjusted EBITDA — watch why that’s misleading.

Lens — who asks	$4.0M stock comp (non-cash)	$3.0M restructuring (cash)	Comment
US GAAP SEC filings; auditors	−$4.0M expense (ASC 718)	−$3.0M expense (ASC 420)	Both reduce GAAP operating income and EPS in full.
Adjusted EBITDA / EPS The Street (Reg G)	$0 — added back (non-cash)	$0 — added back (non-recurring)	Both removed — but for opposite reasons. Disclosed and reconciled to GAAP.
Tax (IRS) Return & cash taxes	Deduction decoupled from book — lands at vest/exercise on intrinsic value; ISOs none; §162(m) $1M cap	Fully deductible when incurred — a real cash-tax benefit (~$3.0M × rate)	The trap. Both are “added back,” yet only the cash charge actually cut cash taxes. Adjusted EBITDA treats economic opposites identically.
Bank covenant EBITDA Lenders; ratios	$0 — added back (usually uncapped)	Added back only within the agreement’s capped permitted add-backs	Restructuring add-backs are typically capped; SBC usually isn’t. Read the defined term.
Bonus / incentive plan Comp committee	Typically added back	May be declined — it’s real cash the team spent	Plan-defined. Treating a cash cost like a non-cash one over-pays the pool.
International & statutory Local filings, by country	IFRS 2 / local GAAP differs; intercompany recharge	Expensed in statutory books; local deductibility varies	Both hit the statutory P&L; the cash charge’s local deduction is usually clearer.

“A deduction is gold to whoever thinks in cash. An add-back is gold to whoever thinks in terms of an annual bonus. An NOL is gold to a founder — and invisible to a manager paid on EBITDA.”

That is why the same charge is fought over from opposite directions — and why one number is never enough. Every major estimate in the guide — the inventory-obsolescence reserve, the AR allowance, the tax valuation allowance, leases — is read through all six lenses, with a companion workbook tab that keeps them reconciled to GAAP. The full method page leads the free preview.

✓ 30-day money-back guarantee

Walk into your next advisor, lender, or boardroom conversation already fluent in the numbers and the moves — a more informed partner to the professionals you work with, and clear-eyed on the cost of getting a big decision wrong. If it isn’t worth many times what you paid, take the refund.

Read a free sample →