Board-ready finance, built for the pace of private equity.
1Truth rebuilds FP&A, operational finance and planning for small to mid-sized PE-owned businesses - so portfolio finance teams stop firefighting month-end and start driving the value creation plan.
Most portfolio finance functions weren't built for PE ownership.
They were built for steady-state businesses - not 100-day plans, 13-week cash forecasts, insightful value-creating analysis and robust quarterly board packs.
Month-end takes three weeks
Close, consolidation and variance analysis run on spreadsheets and manual reconciliation - by the time numbers are ready, they're already out of date, and often are woefully bereft of actionable insights.
Board packs built by hand, every cycle
Reporting to the sponsor eats days of the CFO's time each quarter, and still arrives as a clunky standalone deck riddled with errors that sometimes only surface at the board meeting.
Planning can't keep up with the thesis
Forecasts live in disconnected workbooks that break under bolt-on acquisitions, new cost lines, or a change in the deal thesis.
Short-term cash forecasting is clunky and unreliable
Without a robust 13-week cash forecast, headroom against covenants is only visible after the fact - putting quarterly bank covenant compliance at risk just when the sponsor is watching closest.
Four disciplines. One finance function that holds up to PE scrutiny.
We don't sell software or generic BI builds. We fix how the finance function reports, plans, and runs - using best-in-class techniques and solutions that leverage our 10+ years working with leading PE houses.
Planning that survives contact with the deal
Driver-based forecasting, rolling forecasts, and variance analysis rebuilt from the ground up around how PE-owned businesses actually operate, deal to deal.
- Driver-based budgeting & rolling forecasts
- Variance & bridge analysis the board can read
- Scenario & sensitivity modelling for deal theses
A close process built for speed and insights
Accelerated Month-end close processes, delivering fast actionable insights through streamlined, repeatable workflows, regardless of ERP platform.
- Month-end close redesign & controls
- Finance process automation
- Working capital & cash reporting discipline
Pigment & Anaplan, implemented to be used
Platform selection and implementation for AI-native planning (Pigment) and enterprise planning (Anaplan) - sized to the business, not the vendor's ambitions.
- Platform selection & business case
- Pigment AI implementation & optimisation
- Anaplan implementation & model rescue
A board pack that's a system, not a scramble
KPI frameworks and automated reporting that track the value creation plan in real time, holding up under sponsor-level scrutiny at every board meeting.
- Portfolio KPI & reporting frameworks
- Automated board pack production
- Value creation plan tracking
Diagnostic-led. No lengthy discovery decks, no theory.
Every engagement starts with a short, fixed-scope diagnostic - so you know exactly what's broken and what it takes to fix it before committing to a full programme.
Diagnose
A focused review of the finance function - process, people, platforms - benchmarked against what PE ownership demands.
~3 weeksDesign
A prioritised roadmap: what to fix first, what platform (if any) is right-sized, and the business case for each step.
Fixed-scopeDeliver
Hands-on implementation - process redesign, platform build, or a managed FP&A service - with a founder-led team that stays accountable to outcomes.
Outcome-basedSelected outcomes
Six outcomes from 1TRUTH's track record with PE-backed businesses, spanning FP&A optimisation, operational finance, EPM advisory and PE board reporting.
Building Group FP&A function from the ground up
Led the transformation of the group FP&A function and reporting for a Tier 1 aerospace supplier, replacing fragmented site-level processes with a single group standard.
Making branch profitability visible for the first time
Overhauled FP&A capability across a major UK insurance broking group's branch network, driving best practice and transparency into every branch's numbers.
Creating finance capacity by optimising month-end close
Led a team of 35 through automation of transaction processes and a full redesign of the close process at a £500m-turnover NI dairy group.
Rebuilding Operational Finance across 20 manufacturing sites
Designed and rolled out an Operations Finance KPI and reporting suite, including standing up Monthly Ops Reviews with the Operations leadership team.
Bringing Sales and production planning together
Delivered a bespoke sales forecasting application and an Anaplan production optimisation model across 100 SKUs and 7 lines for a PE-backed caravan manufacturer.
Getting reporting ready for the sale process
Designed and rolled out product profitability platform. Rebuilt Board and PE reporting for a global ship management group, then led the sell-side analytics behind the business's $650m sale.
A founder-led boutique, not a Big 4 conveyor belt.
1Truth was founded in 2016 by Paul Cullen, a former PwC senior director with a background spanning global FMCG, global manufacturing, payment processing, insurance and business process outsourcing. Since then, the firm has worked exclusively with PE-owned businesses to deliver FP&A optimisation and finance transformation that actually drive value creation.
No large teams of juniors, no generic frameworks - every engagement is led by Paul himself, leveraging AI-enabled tooling and his extensive associate network necessary.
Ready to see what a diagnostic would find?
A fixed-scope, three-week review of your finance function - with a clear view of what to fix first.