Real Transformations.
Real Results.

The Situation

McDermott Construction had grown rapidly, but their back-office systems hadn't kept pace. With 12 months of unreconciled accounts, co-mingled expenses, and no clear job costing, they were bidding on new projects while completely blind to past profitability.

The Challenge

• 12 Months of Backlog — Bank feeds disconnected. An entire year of transactions completely unreconciled.
• No Job Costing — Materials and labor weren't allocated to specific projects, so there was no way to know which jobs made money.
• Subcontractor Chaos — Disjointed payments creating 1099 compliance risks and vendor strain.
• Lost Revenue — Out-of-scope work and material price hikes were never billed back to clients.

Our Approach

Kyler Advisory initiated a comprehensive "Clean Up" protocol — treating their books like a distressed property requiring a full structural overhaul. We prioritized triage first: stop the cash bleed, ensure tax compliance before year-end, then rebuild.

Key Interventions

• 45-Day Sprint Reconciliation — Imported, categorized, and reconciled over 10,000 backlogged transactions from the past year.
• Project-Based Accounting — Redesigned Chart of Accounts to support true Work-In-Progress (WIP) and job costing.
• Revenue Leakage Audit — Identified over $150K in change orders and materials that had never been billed to clients.
• Subcontractor Clean-Up — Audited vendor list, collected missing W-9s, reconciled payouts to eliminate tax liability surprises.

Results & Impact

By bringing the financials current, McDermott avoided major tax penalties. The historical cleanup revealed that three specific types of remodeling jobs were consistently unprofitable due to misestimated labor costs. Recovering $150K+ in missed billings made the engagement pay for itself immediately. Today, McDermott can bid on $1M+ projects with complete confidence in their margins.

The Situation

West Tec Automotive had built a stellar reputation and steady customer flow, consistently generating $2.5M in annual revenue. However, reliance on manual processes combined with severe seasonal revenue swings was eating into their bottom line and exhausting the team.

The Challenge

• Seasonal Cash Flow Swings — Slow winters and chaotic summers meant constant reaction to cash flow crises instead of forward planning.
• Invisible Labor Costs — High payroll with no clear tracking of technician efficiency made profitability a guessing game.
• Inventory Bleed — Manual management led to duplicate ordering, lost materials, and capital tied up in unused stock.
• Tech Resistance — A team of veteran technicians deeply skeptical of any new digital tools.
• Customer Churn — No system to track Customer Lifetime Value or trigger preventative maintenance reminders.

Our Approach

For an established service business like West Tec, a heavy-handed corporate rollout would have failed. Our Optimize approach was two-fold: deploy the right technology to capture the data, and lead a culturally sensitive change management process to ensure the staff actually used it.

Key Interventions

• Predictive Financial Forecasting — Built a dynamic cash flow model that anticipated winter slowdowns and eliminated off-season cash crunches.
• Automated Inventory Management — Replaced clipboards with cloud-based inventory system, eliminating shrinkage and waste.
• Labor Productivity KPIs — Established dashboards tracking billed vs. actual hours per technician.
• Customer Retention Dashboard — Automated CRM tracking service intervals and sending maintenance reminders.
• Change Management Support — On-the-floor support to help technicians adopt new digital workflows at their own pace.

Results & Impact

Technician productivity increased 28%, directly driving a $40K increase in annual revenue per employee — without hiring additional staff. The inventory system improved turnover by 45%, freeing significant working capital. The customer retention dashboard boosted repeat business by 35%, reducing seasonal variance by 60%. West Tec went from surviving month-to-month to actively planning for their second location.

The Situation

Surge Ventures had an impressive product and early traction, but their financial infrastructure was a black box. As they approached their Series A fundraising window, they lacked the unit economics clarity and professional reporting required to survive rigorous institutional due diligence.

The Challenge

• Vague Unit Economics — The founders couldn't confidently state their exact CAC or LTV, making it impossible to prove the business model was scalable.
• Audit Anxiety — Books weren't GAAP-compliant — an immediate red flag for Series A investors.
• Operational Drag — The 12-person team was wasting hours every week on manual data entry and disconnected software workflows.
• Visibility Gap — With a $120K monthly burn, founders were guessing their zero-cash date rather than knowing it.

Our Approach

Kyler Advisory moved Surge Ventures from "Founder Math" (hope-based) to Investor Reality (data-based). Our Scale engagement focused on building the Three Pillars of Fundability: Clean Compliance, Operational Efficiency, and Strategic Forecasting.

Key Interventions

• Series A Financial Modeling — Built a dynamic multi-scenario model (Best/Base/Worst) for real-time stress testing during investor meetings.
• "Clean & Compliant" Audit — Overhauled 18 months of historical data to ensure GAAP compliance. Zero audit findings.
• AI-Powered Tech Stack Optimization — Replaced manual processes with AI-driven tools and automated revenue recognition software.
• Unit Economics Deep-Dive — Isolated CAC/LTV ratios for three customer segments, discovering one was 4× more profitable than the others.

Results & Impact

When a Tier-1 VC initiated a 30-day due diligence period, Surge passed the audit with zero findings — because Kyler Advisory had already built the data rooms and reporting frameworks. Operational optimizations reduced monthly burn from $120K to $90K without cutting headcount, effectively buying 8 additional months of runway. They closed a $6.2M Series A at a 20% higher valuation than their initial target.