Mike McKenzie
I show up as an Interim CFO driven by a sense of urgency from the two most important days of the week — Today and Tomorrow.
Like people, companies don't pretend to be sick — they pretend to be OK. I detect the ones pretending. Four decades inside the books and records of underperforming and distressed companies have produced the pattern recognition, operational judgment, and downside discipline that sponsors, lenders, and counsel pay a premium for when the thesis needs saving.
Market-Tested Business Judgment
Judgment forged when capital was scarce and mistakes were consequential — across every credit cycle since Volcker.
Built at the Intersection of Finance, Operations & Crisis
Bankers Trust
Managing Director, Structured PE DebtStructured leveraged debt alongside KKR, Blackstone, and Bain Capital during the era in which the modern buyout market was being built.
Ernst & Young
Restructuring AdvisoryAdvised boards through landmark Chapter 11 proceedings — during the post-LBO reckoning - left over from the 1980's.
Hilco Global
Senior Vice President, Asset Valuation & Corporate RecoveryAsset valuation and corporate recovery — the operational side of distress, where the number on the appraisal decides the shape of the case.
Twenty Years as Interim CFO & CRO
PE Portfolio Companies, $100M to $5B RevenueThe person lenders call when the operating story breaks down: stabilizing weekly cash flow, negotiating covenant relief, executing 363 sales, and telling sponsors whether they are holding a turnaround or a liquidation.
Carrying the Financial Record
Restructuring and insolvency counsel retain me at their client's direction when a case needs a financial officer who can carry the record and survive the questions that follow.
Thirteen-week cash forecasting and liquidity runway from day one. DIP and cash collateral budgets. Monthly operating reports. §363 sale support informed by valuation discipline rather than hope. The financial foundation on which plan feasibility ultimately rests.
I have sat on the other side of the table from lenders, committees, and regulators for four decades. I know what a court needs to see, and I know how long it takes to build it.
The Functional Equivalent of a PE Partner — Without the Carry
I detect liquidity traps before they become capital impairments. I am natively fluent in the languages of finance, operations, accounting, legal, and stakeholder relations — the multi-disciplinary literacy required to deliver a credible assessment to an investment committee or a creditors' committee in two weeks, not two quarters.
My communication discipline, sharpened as a former Associate Editor of the Journal of Corporate Public Relations, means I translate complexity into clarity for boards, lender groups, sponsors, and counsel under pressure.
Analytical Rigor Meets Operating Judgment
Northwestern University. Undergraduate degrees in physics and economics. MBA in accounting and finance. MS in marketing and data science.
Chicago Based | Globally Deployed
FinTech | Software | Artificial Intelligence