Location: Remote (US-based, required travel for onsite meetings)
Compensation: $120,000-$140,000 base
Reports to: Emberline Managing Partners; works closely with portfolio C-suite

About Emberline

Emberline is an investment firm that buys and builds founder-led businesses in B2B technology-enabled services and software. We invest where hands-on operating work can materially improve a company's trajectory, then work alongside leadership to build the infrastructure and capabilities required to scale.

We are operators at heart. The Managing Partners are in the work alongside the team, and that posture runs through every seat at Emberline. You will be part of a tight core team, but your work will reach across our portfolio companies and the CEOs, COOs, finance leaders, and operators who run them.

We currently have three portfolio companies and are building toward five. The portfolio spans B2B software and technology-enabled services across multiple end markets, with a mix of recurring-revenue, services, equipment, and capacity-driven business models.

Why This Role Matters

Most finance roles at this career stage give you one company, one model, and one reporting cadence. This role gives you the portfolio.

Across our companies, the important questions are operating questions first and accounting questions second. How long does onboarding actually take? Where does capacity break? What happens to cash if growth comes in faster than expected? Which service lines are really profitable? How should pricing flex? What staffing model supports the next stage?

Those answers do not come from QuickBooks alone. They come from understanding the business, getting the right data from operators, building the model, testing the assumptions, and translating the output into a decision. That is the work of this seat.

You will not sit on the edge of the process waiting for someone to hand you clean inputs. You will set up the COO call, pull the actuals, ask why the metric looks wrong, build the scenario, and walk through the answer with the Managing Partners and portfolio leadership. The work will show up in real decisions: pricing, hiring, capacity, cash planning, board materials, and growth investments.

As Emberline evaluates future acquisitions, you will also support the analytical work around new opportunities: underwriting the business model, pressure-testing revenue and cost assumptions, identifying the KPIs that will matter post-close, and helping build the first operating model for the company after acquisition. You will see how companies are evaluated, bought, and built from the inside.

This is a hands-on senior associate role with unusual range. You will spend a lot of time in spreadsheets and on working calls. You will also get direct exposure to CEOs, COOs, investor-facing and board-level questions, and the operating decisions that create value across a portfolio.

What You'll Own

Modeling and Forecasting

Build and maintain driver-based operating models for each portfolio company, tied to the strategic questions the Managing Partners and operating leaders are working on.
Develop rolling forecasts and scenarios for revenue, expense, hiring, capacity, deployment, and cash, with assumptions clearly visible and easy to flex.
Update models as actuals come in. Measure forecast accuracy, surface variances, and help leadership understand why the business is tracking ahead or behind.
Build the analysis behind specific decisions: pricing, onboarding economics, churn, staffing leverage, capacity utilization, and capital scenarios.

KPI Tracking and Cross-Functional Coordination

Set up working calls with COOs, finance leaders, and operating teams across the portfolio. Gather the data, walk through the numbers, ask sharp questions, and bring the work back into clean analysis.
Maintain KPI definitions and reporting logic so the Managing Partners and management teams agree on what is being measured and why.
Track service-line and unit economics for capacity-driven businesses: utilization, throughput, instructor or trainer capacity, program margin, and equipment economics where applicable.
Track recurring-revenue metrics for software businesses: ARR/MRR, retention, expansion, gross margin, deployment economics, and growth efficiency.

Reporting and Decision Support

Produce monthly operating and financial reporting packages with actuals, KPIs, forecasts, budget-to-actual analysis, and clear narrative.
Prepare board-ready and partner-ready analysis with defensible assumptions and clear conclusions.
Turn messy operating data into simple answers leaders can act on.
Communicate the work in language operators understand, not just finance shorthand.

Future Deals and Portfolio Growth

Support analysis for future acquisitions as opportunities arise: market and company model review, revenue and cost driver analysis, diligence questions, and post-close operating model design.
Help translate investment theses into the KPIs, reporting cadence, and management dashboards that will matter after acquisition.
Build reusable FP&A templates and playbooks so each new portfolio company starts with a stronger analytical foundation than the last.

Data, Systems, and Portfolio Scale

Coordinate with accounting, operations, sales, customer success, and other data owners across the portfolio to get reliable information flowing into the models.
Improve planning processes, reporting workflows, and analytical tooling as the portfolio grows.
Use AI and modern tools to make the recurring analysis faster, cleaner, and more repeatable.

First 90 Days

Learn the businesses. Meet the leadership team at each portfolio company. Map the revenue engines, cost structures, capacity constraints, cash cycles, and current data sources.
Take the first questions. The Managing Partners will point you toward the highest-priority analytical questions across the portfolio. You will set up the working calls, gather the data, build the first models, and bring back answers.
Stand up the cadence. Get monthly operating and financial reporting flowing for each portfolio company, starting simple and improving as the data gets cleaner.
Build trusted working relationships. Earn credibility with each CEO, COO, finance lead, and accounting owner. They will be your data and context partners going forward.
Get exposure to new-deal work. As live opportunities arise, support diligence and underwriting analysis so the same modeling muscles are applied before and after acquisition.

What Success Looks Like

Within the first year:

The Managing Partners and portfolio company leaders have the modeling firepower to answer hard questions quickly.
Each portfolio company has a reliable driver-based operating model, KPI reporting, and monthly reporting cadence.
Forecast accuracy is measured and improving.
Your analysis is used in pricing, hiring, capacity, cash, and growth decisions.
Your work holds up in board and partner discussions.
You are a trusted analytical partner across the portfolio, not just a person who updates spreadsheets.
You have supported new-deal or acquisition-readiness work when the timing of live opportunities allows.
You are developing the strategic finance instincts that turn this seat into the next one.

Who You Are

Excel Virtuoso: Spreadsheets are your instrument. You build clean, auditable models from scratch, drive them with clear assumptions, and make them flex easily for new scenarios. This is the floor of the seat, not the ceiling.
High Agency: You do not wait to be told twice. When you need data, you set up the call. When you need clarity, you ask. You bring energy across multiple workstreams and senior stakeholders, and you take ownership of outcomes, not just tasks.
Operator-Curious: You want to understand how businesses actually work. Recurring-revenue software, services, capacity-driven operations, equipment economics: you are curious about the mechanics, not just the financial statements.
Comfortable in Senior Discussions: You can sit across from a COO, CEO, or Managing Partner and run a working conversation without folding. Polished without being stiff. Direct without being arrogant.
Hungry for Range: You want a steep curve. Portfolio scope, partner mentorship, operating exposure, board-level questions, and future-deal analysis are part of what makes the role interesting to you.
AI-Fluent: AI is built into how you work. You use it to accelerate analysis, build repeatable workflows, and clear time for the judgment work that matters most.
Clear Communicator: You explain assumptions, risks, and choices in plain language. Visible reasoning, clear conclusions, slides and models that lead with the answer.

Qualifications

3-6 years in investment banking, growth equity, management consulting, strategic finance, corporate FP&A, transaction advisory, financial due diligence, quality of earnings, or a closely related seat.
Excellent modeling skills in Excel. Expect a practical modeling assessment.
Familiarity with BI tools, SQL, CRM data, ERP and accounting systems, or planning tools is a plus.
Private equity, portfolio company, transaction, or multi-entity finance experience is a plus but not required.
MBA, CFA, or similar credential is useful but not required. We care more about demonstrated ability than credentials.

Careers

Portfolio FP&A Senior Associate

Portfolio FP&A Senior Associate