Through the cycles, utilization and job-level margin decide your year. A part-time, senior CFO goes into your operational data, looks for where cash may be leaking — idle equipment, jobs that lose money, working capital stuck in the field — and proves what it finds on your own numbers before you change anything.
A fractional (or outsourced) CFO gives you a seasoned chief financial officer a few days a month. The person in your data is a 35-year CFO who came up through capital-intensive energy and industrial businesses.
See which jobs, crews, and pieces of equipment make money — and which quietly lose it — instead of one blended number that hides both.
Idle and under-utilized equipment, field tickets that never make it to margin, and working capital stuck in unbilled work and slow receivables — found and put in dollars.
Clean, defensible numbers for a covenant renewal in a down cycle, a raise, or a sale — so the lender or buyer doesn’t find what you can’t explain.
Every one of these is the same story: a capital-intensive operation that couldn’t see itself until it saw the whole picture at once.
A fractional CFO is worth most for an energy-services firm when a few of these are true:
One low-risk first step, then proof, then a relationship — we don’t hand over a report and leave.
A focused call about where the pressure is. If there’s a fit, we scope a short, defined piece of work on your own data under NDA — and agree a fixed fee before you commit. If there’s likely nothing there, we’ll tell you that too. No obligation.
If there’s something worth chasing, that scoped work is built and tested on your own data — so what we recommend is grounded in your numbers, not a pitch.
The part that matters most. We take the fractional CFO seat — board reporting, cash and margin, the risks that matter — until the improvement is real and your team can hold it.
How does a fractional CFO help an oilfield services company?
A fractional CFO gives an energy-services firm a senior finance hand a few days a month to see true job, crew, and equipment margin, surface idle assets and field working capital, and produce numbers a lender or buyer will trust through the cycle — without a full-time hire.
How do you improve equipment utilization?
We start by putting a real number on it — most firms can’t say what their utilization actually is until the whole fleet is visible at once. The same approach applies to idle field equipment.
How much does a fractional CFO cost?
AJM Solutions’ fractional CFO engagements are far less than a full-time CFO, scoped to what you need. Most start with a short call, so you see the value before you commit.
Can you get us ready to sell?
Yes. A buyer will find what you can’t and price you on it. We find it first — the job-level margin, the utilization, the working capital — and present the numbers clearly, so you protect (or defend) your valuation.
A 20-minute call about your situation. If it’s a fit, we scope a short, defined piece of work on your own data — and if you’re already tight, we’ll tell you that too.
Book a call →If there’s nothing there, we’ll say so — that’s the point.
AJM Solutions is a Calgary-based fractional CFO firm working with owner-led oil & gas services, trucking, and distribution businesses across Alberta and Saskatchewan. See our fractional CFO services →