From $300 million exit to fractional CFO: How Julian built a business around what founders need most

And why the merger with Gilligan Sheppard is the next chapter in helping growing businesses succeed…

Julian doesn’t own a  Porsche, nor a Haines Hunter. After being part of a $300 million company sale, the only thing he upgraded was his garden shed.

“I’m not that guy,” he says with a laugh. Instead, he spent the capital – and more importantly, his time – learning about investment and tech startups. That curiosity led him to build CFO 4U, a fractional CFO practice that’s now joining forces with Gilligan Sheppard.

It was destroying my soul

Julian’s path wasn’t a straight line. He was CFO of an overseas-owned company when he was invited to join the leadership team. When the founders were planning their exit, Julian bought in.

“It gave me the opportunity to learn about M&A at that time,” he recalls. “We went through two exit processes – first selling 51% to a PE firm, then within three years, selling to a US listed company.”

But corporate life wasn’t sustainable. “It was really destroying my soul,” Julian admits. “It wasn’t me.” So he started navigating toward something different – first making a living, then building a business.

She replaced me. Then I called her.

Five years ago, Fatima joined Julian. Their paths had crossed in an unexpected way – she had replaced him when he was made redundant years earlier.

“We didn’t know each other for three years,” Fatima explains. “Then he called me one day and said, ‘What are you doing now that you’re not in that job?’ And we just started working together.”

The partnership works because of their differences. Julian is self-aware about his strengths: “I’m the charmer, I’m the talker, I’m the salesperson, I’m the ideas guy. But I can’t deliver things for –” he pauses, laughing. “I’m a mess when it comes to some of the stuff.”

Fatima brings structure, process, and the patience Julian admits he lacks. “If you don’t get it within ten minutes, I start losing patience,” he confesses. “That’s when you go to Fatima.”

Covid changed everything for the business. “Virtual CFO became really popular from that time,” Julian says. “Selling became a lot easier.” The team grew to five people spread across New Zealand – Hamilton, Wanganui, Warkworth, Rotorua, and one team member in the Philippines.

We help you know how to make money

When Julian describes CFO 4U’s work, he cuts through the jargon: “What do we actually try and help? We provide information so that the business owner knows how to make money. That’s our role.”

Their typical clients fall into a few categories. There are startups that have just raised capital and have a bare minimum finance infrastructure. “We set up basically everything for them from scratch – chart of accounts, reporting, forecasting, board reporting,” Julian explains.

Then there are the established businesses hitting a wall. “I know I’ve got all the information there, but I’m lost,” Julian says, mimicking a common conversation. “The accountant gave me 200 lines of report. I can’t read it anymore. When the business was smaller, I could just look at cash flow, P&L, revenue, bottom line. Now it’s a $15 or $20 million turnover business. I can’t do this anymore.”

CFO 4U becomes the ‘translator’ – taking the noise of financial data and turning it into clarity about where to focus.

“I have no passion for tax”

The merger solves a fundamental challenge Julian had been facing. “We’re providing part of the service of what our clients need,” he explains. “Primarily helping around reporting, forecasting, and capital raising. But we’re not providing tax and compliance. A lot of our clients are asking for a one-stop shop.”

He’s refreshingly honest about his own limitations: “I am not a tax guy at all. Hats off to anyone dealing with tax – I have no passion for it.”

There was also a retention challenge. CFO 4U’s client relationships typically lasted about three years, until clients either grew large enough to hire their own finance team, or scaled back because they no longer needed the intensity of support. Without compliance services to maintain the relationship, “getting back into those clients is a lot harder,” Julian says.

For Gilligan Sheppard, the merger fills a different gap. “Compliance is compulsory – every company needs it,” Julian observes. “The special advisory side is transactional – I’m buying, selling, doing a valuation, need a loan. But there’s a gap in the middle. Who looks after the month-to-month? Who helps translate between those two worlds?”

The beer test

But numbers and service gaps weren’t the deciding factor. Julian kept coming back to one thing: the people.

“What is important about a merger is the human aspect,” he says. “If we can have  a disagreement and still hang out for a beer afterwards, and maintain a professional relationship – that’s the important part. Because if you can’t work through the human aspect, then every issue becomes a big issue.”

Through the due diligence process, Julian found that both teams shared a pragmatic approach to problem-solving. “We had things we didn’t agree on, but we always managed to work through it,” he says. “We listen to each other’s point of view and come up with relatively pragmatic solutions.”

What he discovered at Gilligan Sheppard resonated with CFO 4U’s own values of love, transparency, and teamwork: a firm that genuinely looks after its people.

“As a remote practice, how we look after people is really important because we don’t see them a lot,” Julian explains. “We might see team members three times a year. Having those connections and working well with people – those are things that are really important to us. And we found that in Gilligan Sheppard.”

Built around you

For Julian, the first priority is integration – understanding the challenges Gilligan Sheppard’s clients are facing and finding where CFO 4U can help. The goal is simple: make the combined offering genuinely useful for clients at every stage of their business journey.

“We shared the journey with our clients for over 40 years,” says Gilligan Sheppard CEO Joshna Mistry, “with all the challenges of growth, of pain, of succession, and of success. This merger will enable us to better help with whatever stage you’re at – with deeper, more regular interaction customised to your current challenges.”

It’s not about cookie-cutter reporting, Julian emphasises. “It’s built around you.”

For a man who turned a $300 million exit into a garden shed and a mission to help founders succeed, that focus on the individual feels about right.