Meet the Team | Straight Forward

Jason Sellnow

Founder

With over 25 years of experience in small and mid-sized family-owned businesses, Jason has expertise uniquely tailored to the needs of entrepreneurial ventures. Having witnessed firsthand the dynamics of family businesses, including the integration of successive generations and the impact of family values on organizational culture, Jason brings a depth of understanding beyond that of conventional advisory roles.

In 2017, Jason founded StraitForward Financial Insights. This reflected Jason’s unwavering dedication to fostering meaningful relationships and providing unparalleled support to clients seeking to navigate the complexities of accounting, finance, cash flow management, and exit planning.

Jason takes pride in alleviating clients’ anxieties and transforming their aspirations into tangible outcomes. He does so with a focus on building trust, fostering collaboration, and delivering results.

MBA – Finance Emphasis, Pepperdine University
Undergrad in Business Administration
Certified Management Accountant
Certified in Strategy and Competitive Analysis
Certified Exit Planning Advisor

Alan Zeffer

President

Alan has over 40 years’ experience working with large public companies both NYSE and NASDAQ, family-owned businesses and start-ups as well as having extensive experience in mergers and acquisitions having completed over $1 billion in transactions. This wide range of experience provides Alan with the financial and operational tools needed to assist businesses and their owners through a variety of issues and challenges.

Successfully working with family-owned businesses, smaller companies and start-ups provides Alan a high level of satisfaction. It is those companies that provide the greatest opportunities throughout a variety of industries and our economy. Alan believes in the StraightForward fractional CFO approach which allows a client to resolve a variety of issues without committing to the requirements of a full-time employee: while we work on various issues for our clients what we are really doing is relieving the stress associated with a variety of business decisions.

Alan and his family moved to Wisconsin in 1988 and they love it here. Alan has a BS in Finance from Mercy College. He is an avid golfer. Alan and his wife love to travel.

Steve Wagner

Fractional CFO

Steve is an accomplished professional with over three decades of experience in financial and operational management across various sectors. With a diverse background spanning public accounting, private industry, and successful leadership roles, Steve brings a wealth of expertise to the table.

Since 1998, Steve has been dedicated to serving nearly 100 clients, where he’s provided invaluable guidance from fractional CFO services and interim controller support to spearheading profitability enhancement initiatives and facilitating debt and equity financing.

Notably, Steve has collaborated with private equity and venture capital firms, assisting in financial due diligence, post-acquisition integration, and providing strategic financial leadership to portfolio companies. His adeptness extends to overseeing business sales, division divestitures, and product line optimization projects, along with steering numerous risk management endeavors, including fraud risk mitigation and Sarbanes-Oxley Act compliance assessments.

In addition to his consulting endeavors, Steve is the visionary behind a precision machining enterprise catering to aerospace, defense, agricultural, and sports/recreational markets—a testament to his entrepreneurial spirit and commitment to innovation. Working with Steve, clients can rest assured they’re in capable hands, receiving expert guidance tailored to their unique needs and objectives.