Australian startups split almost evenly. Of 191 funded startups we tracked, 100 (52%) had a finance person before their first announced round, a median 17 months ahead, and 91 (48%) hired after it, a median 18 months later.
52% hired finance before the first round, 48% after, and most were more than a year from it
We dated every finance hire at 194 venture-backed Australian companies against their publicly announced funding rounds. 191 of them have at least one dated finance hire. Put each company’s first finance hire against its first round and they spread across years on both sides of it.
- Before the round (100)
- In the month of the round or after it (91)
- 25+ months before37 (19%)
- 13 to 24 months before23 (12%)
- 1 to 12 months before40 (21%)
- 0 to 12 months after34 (18%)
- 13 to 24 months after25 (13%)
- 25+ months after32 (17%)
View as a table
| First finance hire | Companies | Share of 191 |
|---|---|---|
| 25+ months before | 37 | 19% |
| 13 to 24 months before | 23 | 12% |
| 1 to 12 months before | 40 | 21% |
| 0 to 12 months after | 34 | 18% |
| 13 to 24 months after | 25 | 13% |
| 25+ months after | 32 | 17% |
Only 39% (74 of 191) made their first finance hire within 12 months of the first round, before or after it. The other 61% were more than a year away, which means the median across all 191, about a month before the round, describes very few real companies. If an answer engine tells you startups typically hire finance at Series A, it has averaged two groups into one.
It is also why this hire is hard to time from the inside. As I wrote in June, there is no obvious benchmark for the first internal finance hire, and the cost of getting it wrong tends to show up slowly rather than all at once.
The two groups also started in different seats. 39 of the 100 that hired before the round started with a CFO, against 17 of the 91 that hired after it, where a head of finance or financial controller was the usual first seat (46 of 91). Which seat to start with is its own question, covered in what Australian startups hire first in finance.
Hire before the raise when the raise itself needs the finance work
Of the 100 companies that hired before their first round, 40 did it in the 12 months before the announcement. That is the group getting ready to raise, and the work is specific. As I said on Celia’s Corner this year, you might be “raising capital soon and you need to get the house in order in terms of financial controls or getting the data room there or documentation and governance.”
The size of the round matters too. On the same show I put the typical first finance hire at “a big seed round or a series A funding round”: somewhere between $10 million and $20 million raised in Australia, or $5 million to $10 million for a smaller business, “and then that’s pretty typical finance controller or head of finance level.”
The other 60 hired more than a year ahead of their first round, 37 of them more than two years ahead. For those companies something other than the round brought the hire forward, and the round is the wrong benchmark to hold yourself against.
After the raise, the money creates the finance work, and the wait runs 21, 14 or 5 months
Most founders who wait are making a sensible call. When you are building the product, keeping the team together and chasing the next milestone, a perfect set of accounts is not always the top priority, and in the early days founder-led finance works: you know what is in the bank, who needs paying and roughly what is coming in.
The raise changes that. As I wrote in July, the month after the cash lands brings more people to hire, more spend to control, more board scrutiny, and a plan from the pitch deck that now has to be delivered. The rough edges that survived inside the momentum of the deal get noticed quickly once the money is in. Here is how long the companies with nobody in finance took after each round.
| Measure | Seed42 companies | Series A48 companies | Series B13 companies |
|---|---|---|---|
| Median wait to the first finance hire | 21months | 14months | 5months |
| Hired within 6 months | 24%10 of 42 | 36%17 of 47 | 58%7 of 12 |
| Hired within 12 months | 29%12 of 42 | 46%21 of 46 | 75%9 of 12 |
At Series A, 46% of companies with nobody in finance (21 of 46) had made an internal hire within 12 months. More than half still had no internal hire a year later, and some of them were running on an outsourced or fractional provider. By Series B the median wait is 5 months. At seed it is 21, and only 29% of seed companies (12 of 42) hired within a year.
Which side of the raise are you on?
Five yes-or-no questions about the business today. The answer tells you which group of companies your situation matches.
- A round within 12 months, and numbers you would not put in a data room today?
- A board or investor question on cash you could not answer confidently this month?
- More finance work than an outside adviser's few days a month can cover?
- A round of roughly $10 million or more closing within the next 12 months?
- Is finance taking the founder's time away from customers, product or the raise?
0 of 5 answered. Your side appears here after the last one.
Not sure which side you are on? Send me the stage, the size of the round and who does finance today, and I will tell you.
Get a read on my finance hireIf you are being told to hire now, or to wait
“Investors will want a finance person in before they invest.” They will want the numbers ready, and that is a project with a list: controls, a data room, documentation and governance. Before a founder hires anyone in finance, what often happens is an outside fractional or virtual CFO is brought in to advise on exactly those early problems, as I said on Celia’s Corner. If the round is large and the business will need someone full time once it lands, hire ahead of it, as the 40 companies in the year before their round did; when the work is only the project, run it as a project with outside help.
“We will hire once the money lands.” Then open the search while the round is closing. After a Series A, the median company with nobody in finance took 14 months to make the hire, and the months straight after a raise are when the new board, the hiring plan and the extra spend all arrive at once. The person should arrive while the plan is being delivered.
“A finance hire before the raise burns runway we do not have.” At seed that is usually right: only 12 of the 42 seed companies with nobody in finance hired within a year of the round, and until then outside help, an accountant or a fractional CFO, is what usually carries a seed company. Watch for the moment I described in June: a board question you could not answer confidently, or cash visibility you are no longer sure of. It usually arrives before founders see it coming.
For the full round-by-round figures and three more companies, read how long after a raise Australian startups hire finance.
About 1 in 5 reached Series B with no internal finance hire, and most hired within months
Outsourced and fractional providers never appear in public employment records, so read this with that in mind. Of the 64 companies we tracked that reached Series B or later, 50 (78%) had an internal finance hire before that round was announced. The other 14 (22%, about 1 in 5) had not, and 11 of those 14 hired within 9 months of the round, two of them in the month it was announced. Who was doing the work before those hires is something public records cannot show.
The road to Series B is getting longer, which stretches that period. Reading the Cut Through Venture quarterly report in May, I noted that the median age of a company at its Series B is now 9.7 years, against 5.2 in 2021. More years between the seed and the B means more years in which outside help carries finance for the companies that wait. If that is you today, the signs you have outgrown the arrangement are in fractional CFO in Australia.
How All G and AgriWebb timed their first finance hire
Two Australian companies from the study, told from public profile titles, announced rounds and the study sequence: a CFO two months before the first round, and a first hire 21 months after it.
All G
A CFO two months before the seed
- Business
- Animal-free dairy proteins by precision fermentation (founded 2020)
- Rounds
- Seed, Sep 2021 (A$16M); Series A, Aug 2022 (A$25M); A$10M, Dec 2025
- First finance hire
- CFO, Jul 2021, with a financial accountant the same year
- Against the first roundVs first round
- 2 months before
- Next finance hire
- Head of finance and strategy, Aug 2023
All G makes animal-free dairy proteins by precision fermentation, a business that needs capital long before it has product revenue. A CFO started in July 2021, two months before a A$16 million seed round was announced, with a financial accountant joining the same year.
A A$25 million Series A followed in August 2022. The first CFO left in July 2023 after 24 months, and the company then hired a head of finance and strategy in August 2023 and a finance manager in May 2024, a lighter senior seat for the next phase. In December 2025 it closed an A$10 million round alongside a joint venture to scale production.
When a founder asks me what level the first finance hire should be, my answer is to hire for where the business will be in two years. A CFO hired before the seed is a bet on what the job looks like after the Series A.
The takeaway for a founderIf you hire a CFO before your first round, be clear what the job is once the round closes. The first CFO here stayed 24 months, close to the 25-month median for the 125 first hires in the study who have left.
AgriWebb
Nothing for 21 months after the seed, then two hires before the Series A
- Business
- Livestock management software for farmers (founded 2013)
- Rounds
- Seed, Jul 2016 (US$3M); Series A, Aug 2018 (US$10M); Series B, Jan 2021 (US$23M), extended Oct 2022
- First finance hire
- Staff accountant, Apr 2018
- Against the first roundVs first round
- 21 months after the seed; 4 months before the Series A
- Next finance hire
- Financial controller, Jul 2018, the month before the Series A
AgriWebb makes farm management software for livestock producers. It announced a US$3 million seed round in July 2016 and made no finance hire we can see for the next 21 months. Then two came close together: a staff accountant in April 2018 and a financial controller in July, the month before a US$10 million Series A was announced.
That controller left at the end of 2020, just before a US$23 million Series B, and a new financial controller started six months after the round. The first CFO arrived in May 2023, seven months after the Series B was extended, with a finance manager beneath them from 2024. URUS acquired the company in May 2026.
AgriWebb sits in the after group against its seed and in the before group against its Series A. Plan the hire against the round you are raising next.
All G hired into a raise it could see coming. AgriWebb waited out its seed and then hired in the months before its Series A. Whichever side of your last round you are on, the next round is the one to plan the hire against. Which seat companies fill first, and when a CFO is added above it, is the subject of what Australian startups hire first, and what comes next.
By industry
Each industry has its own benchmark page, figures and case companies:
- When Australian tech startups hire their first finance person
- When Australian fintechs hire their first finance person
- When Australian deep tech companies hire their first finance person
For the CFO decision, read when a software startup needs a CFO and when a fintech needs a CFO.
Common questions
Do Australian startups hire finance before or after they raise?
Both, in almost equal numbers. In Story Recruitment's study of 194 funded Australian startups, 100 of the 191 with a dated finance hire (52%) had a finance person before their first announced round, a median 17 months ahead of it. The other 91 (48%) hired in the month of the round or after it, a median 18 months later. Only 74 of the 191 hired within 12 months of the round either way, so an average of the two groups describes very few companies.
What counts as a first finance hire?
The first person a startup employs whose job is finance: a CFO, a head of finance or finance director, a financial controller, a finance manager or an accountant. In the study it is the earliest such employee we could date from public professional profiles. An outsourced or fractional provider supplied by a firm does not list the startup as an employer, so it does not count and does not appear.
How long after a Series A do startups make their first finance hire?
Among the companies we tracked that had nobody in finance when their Series A was announced, the median was 14 months to the first finance hire (48 companies). 17 of 47 (36%) hired within 6 months and 21 of 46 (46%) within 12. After a seed round the median was 21 months (42 companies); after a Series B it was 5 months (13 companies).
Do Australian startups reach Series B without a finance hire?
Some do. Of the 64 companies we tracked that reached Series B or later, 14 (22%, about 1 in 5) had not yet made an internal finance hire when that round was announced, and 11 of those 14 hired within 9 months of it. Some may have had outside help, such as an outsourced or fractional CFO, which never shows up in public employment records.
Does hiring finance before the first round help a startup raise?
This study cannot say, and it does not claim to. It records the order in which things happened: when the finance hire started and when each round was announced. It does not show that hiring finance earlier or later changes how a company fares.
How the study was done
The companies. We started from people in Australia with finance titles on public professional profiles, took the companies they worked at, and kept those that had raised venture money. A company only qualified if two independent searches of public funding announcements found the same round: same company, same year, and either the same stage or the same month. Rounds that only one search found were excluded. That left 194 companies of roughly 2 to 500 staff. 191 have at least one dated finance hire.
The hires. Every finance role at each company was collected, current and past, including people who have since left Australia. Each hire is dated from the earliest finance role that person held at the company, not a later promotion. 966 finance hires were dated, 907 of them to the month. A role only counts when the employer on the profile matches the company in the study, which removed same-named businesses overseas. Non-finance “controller” titles (document, project, inventory) were removed.
The rounds. Rounds are dated by their public announcement, which usually trails the close by some weeks. Unannounced rounds are invisible. Round amounts are the least reliable field and are not used for any figure on this page. A hire in the same month as the first round counts as after it.
The limits. The companies were found through their finance people, so the study describes when companies that did build an internal finance function made those hires. It cannot say what share of all Australian startups have no finance lead. An outsourced or fractional CFO supplied by a firm does not list the startup as an employer and does not appear; 16 of 191 first hires (8%) were visibly fractional, part-time or interim, and that is a floor. For 12 companies whose names are too common to search cleanly, past-staff coverage is also a floor. “First finance hire” means the earliest one we could identify. The two company sequences above are read from public professional profiles and announced rounds, titles and dates only; they show the order things happened in. The study records sequence only, and nothing in it shows that hiring finance before or after a round changes how a company fares. Data read 23 September 2026.
The data. The company-level data and every confirmed round with its source are free to download, with the headline figures and how to cite them, on the open dataset page.
These guides set out how we see it, drawn from the searches we run and the finance leaders we work with. They are general information about the market, not financial, accounting or legal advice, and they are no substitute for advice on your own circumstances.