Director of Strategic Finance & Advisory

Ember Search has been retained on a Director, Strategic Finance & Advisory search for a self-funded, profitable finance advisory firm headquartered in New York City.

The firm operates as a genuine hybrid between an in-house finance team and a traditional advisory practice, staffing teams of 2 to 5 professionals across multiple client engagements at once. Clients bring the firm in for both transaction work (M&A, equity raises, debt raises) and embedded operating finance work (FP&A, budgeting, operating model builds), often needing both from the same engagement over time. The team has grown from 3 to 9 people in under two years, entirely through organic, referral-driven growth, working with clients across industries including telehealth, defense, software, consumer, retail, and B2B, among others.

Location: New York, NY, Hybrid (in-office Tuesday through Thursday)

The Role

You'll operate as a senior finance leader across a portfolio of client relationships simultaneously, closer in scope and autonomy to an in-house finance executive than a traditional advisor.

You will:

• Lead client-facing finance work-streams spanning M&A diligence, equity raises, and debt raises
• Build and own complex financial models from scratch, often under live deal timelines
• Drive FP&A, budgeting, and operating model work embedded directly inside client organizations
• Partner within small, senior client teams while managing multiple engagements at once
• Manage day-to-day client relationships with the authority and visibility of an in-house finance leader
• Support the firm's growing investing activity as it deploys its own balance sheet capital into new opportunities

Candidate Profile

• 6 to 10+ years of experience, starting in banking or private equity, followed by time spent as an in-house operator, is required
• Prior operating role at a Series B+ or comparable growth-stage company
• Strong financial modeling and analytical rigor, ideally built at a bulge-bracket bank or top-tier boutique
• Track record of navigating messy, half-built financial processes and turning them into clean, decision-ready output
• Comfort managing multiple concurrent client relationships and context-switching across industries and deal types
• Based in or willing to relocate to New York, NY, able to work on-site three days per week

Why This Role

• Real ownership. You'll run point on live deals and client relationships directly, not sit a level removed from the decisions.
• Breadth most in-house seats can't match. Instead of one company's finance cycle, you're exposed to a portfolio of clients and transaction types at once, compressing years of typical CFO-track experience into a much shorter window.
• A firm still being built. The team has grown from 3 to 9 in under two years on organic growth alone, and is actively expanding into new lines of business including its own investing activity. Early team members have real influence over where the platform goes next.
• Direct investment access. As the firm builds out its own investing arm, you'll have the potential to gain equity in select client companies, a form of upside not typically available in either a traditional advisory role or a single-company operating seat.
• Reports directly into the firm's founders , both former bankers turned operators, in a lean, senior team with no layers between you and firm leadership.

Equal Opportunity Statement

Ember Search and our client are equal opportunity employers. We are committed to building diverse and inclusive teams and do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, disability status, or any other protected status.