Job Description

Due to maternity leave, an opportunity has arisen for this exceptional role in Finance department that provides a front to back view of all financial processes, across all legal entities and an opportunity to work with a wide range of teams. There is exposure to senior management and opportunity to make a difference.

The team is comprised of individuals with strong audit & controls background and can also be well suited for a candidate with a good understanding of financial or regulatory production wishing to transition to a controls-based role.

Summary of the key purposes of the role

• Perform appropriate reviews based on risks (e.g. architectural front-to-back process reviews, specific extensive reviews and Identification of closing review topics to perform around quarter-end close cycle)
• Liaise with external audit, internal audit, and other Level 2 control functions.
• Follow-up of action plans
• Annual roadmap exercise
• Appetite and aptitude for developing digitalization solutions (Alteryx, Business Intelligence) as this is a key mandate for this team over the next year.
• Perform 2nd level reviews: Independently perform reviews, de-brief with the managers, and document the report.
• Reviews include a range of topics across a range of financial topics: 
• Accounting: topics (technical topics such as IFRS 9.1 & 9.2, IFRS 16, process reviews on topics such as accounts payable, intercompany, cash breaks, intangibles etc.) and regular spot checks on account certification (substantiation of balance sheet and P&L accounts with supporting documentation).
• Regulatory reporting: Solvency and Liquidity reporting to UK regulators or to the group,
• Management accounting (budgets, forecasts etc.),
• Structural risk related (e.g. ALM & Treasury)
• Various types of reviews are performed. Full architecture (or framework) review involves a review of activity, process, risk, and controls.
• Extensive reviews are less detailed than architecture review.
• Closing reviews are performed during accounting close on specific accounting topics.
• The report on the design and effectiveness of control framework is presented in standardized group formats.
• Annual roadmap preparation: Preparation of the annual roadmap through gathering and analyzing data for the previous year. This includes errors and incidents, audit points, management letter points, risk and control self-assessment, balance-sheet and P&L data, regulator feedback etc.
• Identifying closing review topics and performing closing reviews: On a quarterly basis, gather and analyze data related to closing cycle. This includes pre-close (zone-de-risk) exercise, review of KPIs, study of internal control certification results (SOX-lite approach) etc.
• Assess the risks and perform timely closing reviews where required. These are provided to the external auditors globally.
• Remedial action plan follow-up on: 
• Action plans raised during reviews and closing cycles
• Residual risks still on-going.
• Committees and governance: Preparation of group quarterly synthesis of the CTL activities of the team, preparation of risk-committee and internal control committee packs.
• Take ownership of data quality of own perimeter of the L2C tools and act as a liaison with group team for data quality queries for the L2C tools (E-control and My Actions) where questions are raised regarding missing fields or inconsistent data. Training on these tools will be provided.
• Ad-hoc projects related to digitalization – Digitalization developments and improvement projects.
• Digitalization is a key focus area for the team this year (e.g. solutions using Alteryx and Business Intelligence).

Required Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

• Experience and skills in audit, accounting and/or controls framework is desirable.
• Degree in Finance/Accounting. ACA/ACCA or equivalent will be very beneficial.
• Relevant experience in a financial services institution or professional services firm
• Demonstrated knowledge of accounting, audit, controls and banking framework
• Strong verbal and written communication skills,
• Strong ability to liaise will all relevant departments and levels of management and work with various teams
• Ability to identify and take ownership of complex issues and conflict resolution
• Fluent in English