Dara Griffith Email & Phone Number

Chicago, Il

As an independent consultant, I leverage over 20 years of public and private accounting experience to provide high-value outsourced CFO services and accounting and tax consulting to small and mid-sized, owner-managed businesses and investment fund managers. My expertise includes consolidations, accounting process review and improvement, success measures, advanced modeling, software selection and implementation assistance, financial report template creation and preparation, and creation and clean-up of books and records using various bases of accounting. Current clients include a private equity investment company and its investment entities, an alternative healthcare center, and a real estate brokerage.

Chicago, Il

The Financial Reporting Outsourcing (FRO) group provides back office accounting and reporting assistance to real estate opportunity funds, development companies, and investment firms. As leader of the FRO team, I have supervised up to four staff and managed clients with combined AUM of approximately one billion dollars. My team prepares periodic financial reports on the GAAP, income tax, and fair value basis of accounting, as required, and tax basis trial balances for use in tax preparation. Clients have varied complexity: from small, single-building joint ventures to large, non-public REITs.

The mission of the Great Lakes Women's Leadership Group of McGladrey is to recruit, retain, advance and create leadership opportunities for women. As Co-Director of Women's Leadership, I coordinated an annual calendar of activities across the region including a networking "derby" to encourage business development, an annual peer mentoring program for high-performing female managers, and various internal and external networking and educational programs. The mentoring program was particularly successful in closing the promotion and retention gap between female managers and their male counterparts.

Deerfield, Il

The Accounting Solutions Group (ASG) provides back office accounting assistance, tax and attest services to small and mid-size companies. Services include QuickBooks setup and file maintenance, month end close assistance, outsourced CFO, individual and entity tax returns, and compilation and review reports. As a manager, then director, on the ASG team, I served as the trusted business advisor and accountant for multiple clients across a variety of industries including Software and Web B2B, Real Estate, Manufacturing, Advertising & Marketing, Law Firms and Private Equity Funds. Atypical projects included assisting the FDIC with bank closings and drafting quarterly and annual SEC filings on an outsourced basis for a Small Business Issuer. I was a key member of the Software and Women Business Owners business development teams, which resulted in an overflowing Rolodex (or the new millenium equivalent thereof) of trusted contacts and valued business partners.

Performed financial statement audits and staffing assistance for large public and private companies including Charter Communications, Venture Stores and May Department Stores. Managed construction accounting, cost-segregation tracking, and rent calculations for a multi-million dollar building renovation for Koch Industries. Significant member of the Andersen IPO team for Young Innovations.

Monthly account analysis and reconciliations and preparation of financial statements. Supervised a senior accountant. Managed the budgeting process and taught "finance for non-financial managers classes" to assist managers with participating in our bottom-up budgeting process. Integral piece of migration team to Sequel to Platinum software.

Mas, Accounting

Ba, Political Science

Activities and Societies: Volunteer Illini Projects - Blood Donor Program