Chief Financial Officer

LJA • Houston, TX

3h • Hybrid

About The Position

As Chief Financial Officer, you will serve as a key member of LJA’s executive leadership team and lead the company’s strategic Finance organization. The CFO will provide forward-looking financial leadership in support of sustainable growth, operational performance, capital allocation, liquidity, and long-term enterprise value.
The successful candidate will bring broad financial expertise, strong business judgment, and the ability to translate financial information into actionable insights for executive and operational leaders. The role partners closely with executive, sector, operational, accounting, and business solutions leaders. It balances growth, profitability, liquidity, risk, and investment while building finance capabilities suited to a multi-entity, multi-location, acquisition-oriented, project-based professional services organization.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Finance, Accounting, Business Administration, Economics, or a related discipline.
• Minimum of 15 years of progressive senior financial leadership experience within an organization exceeding $1B in annual revenue, including experience as a CFO, senior finance executive, or controller with broad enterprise responsibility.
• Demonstrated expertise in strategic financial planning, forecasting, treasury, capital allocation, financial analysis, and executive decision support.
• Strong understanding of financial reporting, accounting, audit, internal controls, and tax matters.
• Experience leading finance within a large, growing, and operationally complex organization, including process improvement, financial transformation, systems enhancement, and organizational scalability.
• Experience supporting M&A, integrations, financing activities, capital planning, growth initiatives, or other complex strategic transactions.
• Proven ability to build and lead high-performing teams, partner effectively with executive and operational leaders, and influence organizational success through sound business judgment and financial leadership.
• Strong executive communication skills, analytical judgment, integrity, and ability to manage highly confidential information.

Nice To Haves

• Advanced degree, CPA, CFA, or other relevant professional credential preferred.
• Experience in engineering, professional services, consulting, construction, or another project-based business environment preferred.
• Experience partnering closely with operations and business-unit leaders to improve profitability, forecasting, resource allocation, and business performance.
• Experience with employee ownership or an ESOP organization preferred but not required.

Responsibilities

• Advise executive leadership on business performance, strategic alternatives, resource allocation, and the financial implications of major decisions.
• Translate complex financial and operational information into concise, actionable recommendations for financial and non-financial leaders.
• Establish financial priorities, decision frameworks, and performance measures that reinforce accountability and value creation.
• Own the enterprise budget, long-range plan, and rolling forecast processes, including revenue, labor, non-labor costs, overhead, profitability, cash flow, and capital requirements.
• Evaluate actual results against budget, forecast, and prior periods; identify underlying drivers, emerging risks, and opportunities; and lead corrective action planning when performance falls short.
• Advance management reporting, scenario modeling, KPI dashboards, and predictive analytics to improve the speed and quality of decision-making.
• Partner with business leaders to strengthen forecasting accuracy, project and client profitability, margin performance, utilization, working capital, and financial accountability.
• Maintain and communicate core financial results, including cash flow, profit and loss, balance sheet, and other enterprise performance statistics.
• Develop historical project and client profitability and collections information to support pricing, risk evaluation, and commercial decisions.
• Lead cash flow forecasting, liquidity planning, banking relationships, debt management, reserve investment, and capital structure strategy.
• Assess financing alternatives and manage compliance with credit agreements, debt covenants, and other treasury requirements.
• Develop capital allocation recommendations across organic growth, acquisitions, facilities, technology, debt reduction, and employee ownership obligations.
• Advise executive leaders on the optimal use of debt and educate external banking partners about the economics and operating model of the business.
• Lead lease-versus-buy and investment analyses for significant facilities, real estate, technology, and capital equipment decisions.
• Monitor interest-rate, liquidity, counterparty, customer credit, and concentration risks and recommend mitigation strategies.
• Provide financial leadership for acquisition strategy, valuation, financial due diligence, transaction structuring, working capital assessments, and investment recommendations.
• Partner with operational and functional leaders to evaluate strategic fit, integration requirements, synergy opportunities, and post-close performance.
• Establish disciplined investment review and tracking processes that compare acquisition and other major investment performance with approved business cases.
• Partner with the Chief Accounting Officer and/or Corporate Controller to maintain clear accountability between forward-looking finance activities and accounting, reporting, audit, tax, payroll, and compliance responsibilities.
• Promote strong internal controls, reliable financial information, ethical decision-making, appropriate segregation of duties, and stewardship of company resources.
• Coordinate with legal, human resources, facilities, information technology, operations, and other functions on enterprise risks, investments, contracts, and strategic initiatives.
• Monitor overhead spending and support disciplined cost management across the organization.
• Provide financial input on employee ownership obligations and communicate relevant implications to enterprise leadership.
• Build, lead, mentor, and retain a high-performing finance organization with capabilities in FP&A, treasury, corporate finance, operations finance, and corporate development.
• Define roles, decision rights, talent priorities, succession plans, and professional development pathways across the finance function.
• Create a culture of business partnership, analytical rigor, continuous improvement, ownership, and clear communication.
• Provide financial education to technical and professional staff on the business and accounting issues that affect operational performance.
• Represent the company with credibility and sound judgment in interactions with lenders, advisors, acquisition partners, and other external stakeholders.

Benefits

• Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP)
• Generous Time Off: PTO, paid holidays, and a full office closure between Christmas and New Year’s.
• Comprehensive Benefits: Multiple plan options for health, dental, and pets. Along with mental health support.
• Family Support: Paid maternity and parental leave to help you focus on what matters most.
• Education Support: Tuition reimbursement and in-house courses provided by our Learning and Development team.
• Referral Bonuses: Know great talent? Get rewarded for helping us grow.
• Community Impact: Company-sponsored volunteer days and philanthropic initiatives.
• Professional Development: Memberships to industry organizations to keep you connected and growing.
• Career Growth: Great internal mobility opportunities to advance your career.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Executive