Meet the Team
GET TO KNOW US
Dan Wells
Founder and CEO, GrowCFO
Ex-KPMG equity partner and Deloitte audit engagement partner Dan Wells brings extensive experience in senior finance roles. He has delivered audit, advisory and M&A services to businesses worldwide. Dan is dedicated to helping finance functions by creating world-class community-led CFO development programs, team training, and powerful networks.
Catherine Clark
Mentor & Course Facilitator
Catherine Clark, an Executive Mentor with 25+ years as a CFO and Director, has empowered over 1,100 finance leaders worldwide. Her mentoring elevates confidence and leadership, drawing from her extensive experience. As a Chartered Accountant and thought leader, she engages with CFOs and C-Suite Directors, inspiring personal and professional growth.
Kevin Appleby
COO & Podcast Host
Kevin is a chartered accountant who has worked as a CFO and management consultant. More recently, Kevin is involved in learning and development, teaching skills linked to business and financial transformation projects. Kevin's passion is to pass on his knowledge to as many people as possible and Kevin sees GrowCFO as a great place to do this.
Catherine Marks
Course Facilitator
With two decades of finance and M&A expertise, Catherine is a Fellow of the ICAEW and a former Deloitte Chartered Accountant who has worked across multiple industries. Career highlights include serving as VP of Finance at Depop and leading FP&A at O2 during its merger with Virgin Media, specialising in finance transformation and exit advisory.
Damian Smith
Course Facilitator
Damian Smith, a “recovering CFO” with 25 years of experience, a regional BN$ CFO, Regional Sales Director, and a leadership and systemic team coach, specializes in transforming finance teams and coaching senior finance leaders. Damian has worked for many flagship businesses including Sony, BlackBerry, Virgin Media, Telefónica and Vodafone.
Danielle Stein Fairhurst
Course Facilitator
Danielle Stein Fairhurst, a renowned financial modelling consultant and speaker, founded the Financial Modellers’ Meetup groups and authored pivotal books on Excel modelling. With an MBA and a role on the Financial Modeling Institute's Advisory Board, she crafts impactful business cases and pricing models, sharing her expertise globally through training and seminars.
Oliver Deacon
Course Facilitator
Oliver, a former Microsoft Finance Director and qualified PCC Executive Coach, offers a modern, inspiring perspective on finance. He helps teams manage change by integrating next-generation finance skills. Oli has coaches thousands of finance leaders and senior professionals and is a regular keynote speaker at high profile CFO conferences across the world.
Susana Serrano-Davey
Course Facilitator & Mentor
Susana Serrano-Davey (FCA) has a lengthy international career. She is a natural entrepreneur, a great communicator, an inspiring author, and people leader with a collaborative and approachable style. As a professional mentor she spends her time sharing her experience to accompany professionals and entrepreneurs to find their own strategies and solutions.
Christian Wattig
Course Facilitator
Christian is a seasoned FP&A leader with 12+ years of experience at multinational consumer goods giants and fast-growing tech startups including Unilever and P&G. He has dedicated himself to educating finance business leaders in essential FP&A skills and trains thousands of senior finance professional globally.
Melanie Coeshott
Course Facilitator
Melanie, a former Mastercard UK Financial Controller and qualified PCC Executive Coach, empowers finance professionals to manage their careers confidently. Melanie is now a full-time dedicate coach and finance professional trainer to both finance leaders and their teams. She focuses on helping people elevate their financial impact, achieve self-fulfillment, and deliver impressive results in their work.
Adam Shilton
Course Facilitator
Adam navigates the tech landscape, where poor decisions lead to financial and time losses. With nearly a decade of experience, he deeply understands the challenge of finding effective AI solutions among many subpar options. Adam’s mission is to simplify tech decision-making, helping individuals make informed choices to fully leverage the capabilities of modern-day cutting edge financial technologies.
Paula Kensington
Course Facilitator
Paula established the CFO Conversations platform, advocating for performance that benefits all stakeholders, including the environment. She emphasizes a holistic approach to business outcomes. Paula is a professional mentor, executive coach and seasoned CFO with highly impressive experience at Regus, Keycorp and Chubb Security Services.
Richard Nero
Course Facilitator
Richard helps clients unlock transformative efficiency with strong expertise in data, systems, and automation. With hands-on experience at FTSE giants like Royal Mail and M&S, and credentials in computer science and an executive MBA, Richard excels in training finance leaders and their teams to optimize their use of Excel, VBA, Power Automate, SQL, and Python, maximizing accuracy and minimizing risk.
Katrina Nacci
Cross-Border Accounting Advisor/GAAP Conversion Expert
A US CPA with Big Four and private equity experience in capital markets and accounting & advisory services, helps finance leaders and their teams navigate US-Europe GAAP for fundraising, M&A, and IPOs, enabling European companies to secure 8-9 figure US investments. Katrina boasts an impressive track record of supporting clients during their biggest life cycle achievements.
Dan Stockdale
Course Facilitator
Dan, a former management consultant at PwC’s Strategy & Consulting business, specializes in strategic and financial modeling. With a background as a commercial analyst and modeller, he has worked with senior management for top brands in London and Sydney. Dan is a CIMA member since 2010, holding a BSc in Money, Banking & Finance and an MSc in Marketing from the University of Birmingham.
Ashley Vukovits
CFO | Executive Mentor
As an Executive Mentor based in the US state Indiana, Ashley has incredible CFO experience in both SMBs and large listed company, covering fundraising, M&A and company exits. Ashley mentors an impressive number of finance leaders and aspiring CFOs to help them grow professionally while also maintaining their personal goals and work-life balance.
Rishi Sapra
Course Facilitator | Microsoft MVP
Rishi is a Microsoft MVP and commercial technologist with deep expertise and huge passion towards training finance professionals in Power BI and Microsoft Fabric. A Chartered Accountant with an Executive MBA (Hons), he brings over 20 years of experience from the Big 4, Financial Services, and Avanade.
Helene Brichet Herbinet
CFO I Strategic & Change Leader I Executive Coach & Mentor
As an executive coach and professional mentor, Helene’s mission is to help the next generation of finance leaders reach their full potential whilst maintaining a personal balance. Helene has impressive finance leader experience in many household businesses including Visa, Barclays, and Capital One Group. She is also an experience NED and Audit Committee Chair.
Peter McKenzie
CFO | Executive Coach and Mentor
Peter is a seasoned CFO, executive coach and professional mentor with 25 years experience at Citi and PwC. He helps clients unlock their full potential, achieve their career aspirations and attain long-term sustainable success while flourishing in their personal lives.
Fay Wingrove
CFO | Professional Mentor
Fay is US-based with impressive experience spanning 30 years as a successful business owner, fractional CFO and full-time finance leader. This includes multi-billion-dollar public and private companies, SMBs, and regional public accounting firms.
Wassia Kamon
CFO | Professional Mentor
Wassia is based in Atlanta, Georgia, and arrived in the USA at 17 from Ivory Coast where English wasn’t her first language. She adjusted to a totally new way of life, joined PwC, qualified as an accountant, and is now performing a CFO finance leadership role.
Brandon Leigh
Chair | NED | Mentor
Having qualified as a Chartered Accountant with Deloitte, Brandon enjoyed a 21-year career with FTSE 250 international consumer goods business PZ Cussons Plc (PZC), the last 13 years as Chief Financial Officer. Brandon now mentors an impressive portfolio of CFO successors in publicly-listed companies.
Ian Simpkin
Fractional CFO | Portfolio FD | Mentor
Ian has over 25 years of finance director experience in both fractional and full-time CFO roles and was European CFO of a Nasdaq 100 multinational during a period of rapid growth from $20m to $450m revenue. Ian mentors a number of finance leaders in rapid growth capital-backed startups and scaleups.
Patrick Butcher
CFO | NED
For more than 25 years as a CFO, Patrick has been privileged to be in a position to support people on their career and life journeys. His passion is to unlock finance leaders' potential through a holistic approach of professional mentoring and coaching to overcome their biggest issues and optimize their impact.
Julian O’Neill
CFO at Ardent Hire Solutions
Julian is a high-impact seasoned CFO with impressive experience in a range of different industries (and roles). These include FTSE 100 businesses, startups, scaleups, large corporates and high growth agile PE backed organizations.
Hugh Watchorn
Part-time CFO | Mentor
Hugh is passionate about music, food, wine, cricket and meeting people. His clients receive honesty, support and impact. Hugh boasts an impressive 35+ year career in business, working almost exclusively in the SME space – and is still very much not retired…
Paul McKoen
Experienced CFO | Finance Director | Advisor | Coach & Mentor
Paul is a highly experienced CFO across various different sectors, covering both small start-ups and large mature businesses. He is comfortable in different cultural environments. Paul acts as a professional mentor and team trainer to an impressive portfolio of finance professionals.
Our Expert Facilitators:
Former FDs & CFOs from Leading Companies
Meet GrowCFO Founder
Dan Wells
With over two decades of experience collaborating with finance leaders, Dan finds fulfillment in guiding talented individuals up the career ladder. Recognizing the formidable challenge of ascending to the CFO role, his career ambition revolves around crafting world-class community-driven CFO training programs and support networks. These initiatives are designed to ensure individuals never experience isolation or lack support in their roles.
Engaging with numerous finance leaders weekly, Dan assists in overcoming their most pressing challenges. His expertise spans a broad spectrum of topics, including soft skills, leadership, imposter syndrome, communication, relationship building, gravitas, influencing, personal brand development, resilience, value enhancement, and impact. He actively participates in public speaking engagements, chairing webinars, facilitating workshops, and serves as a leading commentator within the CFO profession.
Ready to transform your finance team?
Book your free consultation with GrowCFO today and empower your finance team to confidently navigate today’s financial landscape.
