Emmalene Maxwell

Risk-taking your way out of a traditional start in finance sure is a bold approach to career growth, but CFO Emmalene Maxwell has a track record of proven success.

We caught up with her to see how she’s aligning personal passion with professional pursuits, and leveraging finance transformation to take luxury women’s retailer The Fold to new heights.

The road to becoming CFO 

No matter the prestige of the company, if you’re not passionate about the product it might be a sign you’re in the wrong place. 

That’s the lesson Emmalene learned early on in her career. While grateful for the time spent honing her skills in investment optimisation at American Express, subsequent roles in the finance function at Tesco and L’Oreal were much more up Emmy’s street: 

“In the case of L’Oreal working in their fragrances division, I was much more motivated because I could get onboard with what I was touching, seeing, smelling - and ultimately selling!”

A career break gave her the clarity - and the courage - she later needed to take a leap into the start-up realm, after being approached to join a mysterious new make-up brand at the time …

“Initially it was all very top secret - I wasn’t allowed to know the name behind the company and they hadn’t begun trading yet. But as early as that first message on LinkedIn, I could barely sleep from excitement at the idea of building something from the ground up.”

Emmy landed the job as finance manager. The name of the brand? Now multi-million global sensation Charlotte Tilbury Beauty:

“When I joined I was employee number six, and the only  finance personnel! Within three years I was FD with a finance function made up of twenty five people. It was amazing to be a part of a company that went from 0 to 100 like that. I really enjoy the hard graft of scaling a business up from scratch.”

Some sink and others swim when moving from a big corporation to a small start-up environment, but for Emmy it’s been the perfect way to grow into the role of CFO, and cultivate a passion for finance transformation along the way:

“Working for smaller, fast-growing start-ups means you absolutely have to be open to change. Things evolve so rapidly in those environments that you really embrace finance transformation and appreciate the impact a new process, system or tool can have on a business.”

Tech transformation highs and lows

It’s safe to say the retail industry isn’t for the faint of heart. So how does digital finance transformation at The Fold help to navigate such a notoriously volatile sector? 

“The challenging retail environment over the last eighteen months has encouraged us to keep moving with the times and constantly look at ways to improve, particularly when it comes to customer service. These days it’s crucial to reach customers in new and exciting ways.” 

From implementing new tech to bridge the gap between the in-store and online shopping experience, to a unique partnership with Harper Concierge for door-to-door delivery of clothing items by a stylist, digital transformation has kept The Fold at the cutting edge of consumer experience: 

“We’ve really leveraged digital transformation to give our customers back more time, and internally that’s exactly where I’ve seen finance transformation have the biggest impact too.”

Having headed up a number of tech implementations, including a new ERP during her time at Charlotte Tilbury, Emmalene knows all too well there’s no gain without pain when it comes to finance transformation: 

“I’ll be honest, that particular implementation was one of the toughest periods of my working life! But seeing how sophisticated the reporting was afterwards showed me the benefits of finance transformation to set a business up for the future.”

When the going gets tough during digital transformation, Emmalene’s advice is to look ahead to what’s on the horizon to get yourself - and your team - through the challenges along the way: 

“It’s likely everyone is going to hate the new system for the first weeks after it’s been implemented! Accept you will see a slight dip in productivity while they get used to a new way of doing things, but focus on the long term benefits and encourage your team to see positives too.”

The future of finance

Modern finance in the digital age requires a different type of leader to step up, according to Emmy: 

“CFOs can’t stay in a finance box any longer. The business is looking to them for guidance on things that historically we had no stake in. For example, I get hundreds of emails a day now about the latest AI tools. If I’m selecting a new ERP, I know exactly the criteria to look out for! But for newer tools it’s tough to know the right tech to implement.”

Embodying the role of business partner begins with a desire to seek out new information to make the best decisions for every department: 

“I’m an inherently nosy person so that comes naturally to me! People assume being an accountant must be terribly boring but I love working in finance because it gives you access to all areas of a business.”

A genuine enthusiasm for supporting others  is at the heart of The Fold’s ethos, and has also been the key to Emmy’s success as a CFO: 

“At The Fold, one of our values is to be ‘humbitious’. We’re all super ambitious people who want to see the business achieve great heights. But we’re also very humble - it’s not about having elbows out and kicking other people to the curb! We uplift each other and that’s very motivating to me.”

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