Melissa Kibler

Melissa has over 35 years of experience providing financial advisory, restructuring and turnaround services to Fortune 500 and mid-sized companies and their stakeholders. She also heads the Litigation Advisory & Testimony practice area at Accordion and has extensive investigative, litigation and valuation experience, including insolvency-related litigation, avoidance actions, fraud investigations, M&A disputes, director and officer claims, and other commercial litigation support.

Melissa has served in C-level interim management roles including acting as Chief Restructuring Officer in the bankruptcies of Rubio’s Restaurants, a Mexican coastal grill, and Juno USA, previously the third-largest ride-hailing company in New York, and as the Chief Financial Officer of Edmentum, a leading provider of online learning solutions.

Melissa has led or played a senior role in teams delivering exceptional solutions in numerous restructuring and/or related litigation matters for clients such as the examiner in Residential Capital (ResCap); represented debtors/companies in matters such as Output Services Group, Sprint, North Pacific Group, Havens Steel, and Iridium; advised creditors or official committees in cases such as Boy Scouts of America, Corner Bakery, Pareteum, Energy Future Holdings, Savient, Engineered Plastic Products, Kmart, Bethlehem Steel, Warnaco Group, Singer and numerous out of court matters; and provided litigation support, investigatory services or expert testimony in restructuring and other matters such as Tronox, Enron, Chrysler, Neff, Tribune, Quebecor, Amaranth, ASARCO, Sentinel Management Group, Kmart, Singer, Capital Consultants, American Commercial Lines, Keywell, International Offshore Services, Calumet, FirstMed EMS and Syngenta.

Melissa is a Fellow and past Chair of the American College of Bankruptcy and has held other leadership positions including President and Chair of the American Bankruptcy Institute, Director of INSOL International, and Chair of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) Bankruptcy Task Force. She has received many industry recognitions, including Crain’s Chicago Business 40 Under 40, Consulting Magazine’s Leadership Award for Women Leaders in Consulting, AICPA’s Women to Watch Award for Experienced Leaders, International Women’s Insolvency & Restructuring Confederation’s Woman of the Year in Restructuring Award, Global M&A Network’s Women’s Leadership Award and inaugural Diversity & Inclusion Award, and Chicago Turnaround Management Association’s Certified Turnaround Professional of the Year Award.

Melissa joined Accordion/Mackinac in 2016 and was previously a senior managing director in the Chicago office and an executive committee member of Mesirow Financial Consulting following their 2004 acquisition of the corporate recovery practice of KPMG LLP, where she had served as partner-in-charge of the Midwest Region Corporate Recovery practice and the Pacific Northwest Corporate Recovery and Forensic and Litigation Services practices since 1999. She started her career in financial advisory services at Price Waterhouse LLP.

Melissa graduated summa cum laude with a B.B.A. in Accounting from Texas A&M University. She also earned an M.B.A. from Southern Methodist University (first in class). Melissa is a Certified Public Accountant, Certified Insolvency and Restructuring Advisor, and Certified Turnaround Professional, and holds the Certified in Financial Forensics and Certification in Distressed Business Valuation credentials.