Assistant Business Controller

POSITION SUMMARY
You are a person with natural interest in the business, the products, the customers, and the way everything comes together. You can not only quickly assimilate and connect various pieces of information, understanding interrelationships and identifying issues and trends but you are confident in communicating your findings and suggestions to a variety of stakeholders in clear concise language together with your excellent presentation skills.
You are responsible in developing and implementing strategic direction by business partnering with other functions outside of finance, providing key insights to business performance, risks / opportunities, and risk mitigation to ensure the business achieves its target, and build plans to identify growth opportunities. You are responsible in month-end statutory reporting, budgeting, and forecasting, all of which help the organization stay on track in P&L delivery.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
Business Partnering

• Understanding of the business logic and dependencies between key operational processes, relationships, and metric
• Participate in S&OP meeting: simulate sales and forecast to ensure it ties to budgeted sales phasing
• Work very closely with Brand Teams in optimizing media & promo expenses, and provide actions plan in clearing slow moving stock
• Providing actionable insights, key findings, and conclusions to business, not just numbers

Financial Performance Analysis & Reporting

• Anticipating financial risks and exposure, pro-actively communicating to the management, and ensure appropriate treatment is actioned onto P&L
• Manage and control financial performances to meet budget commitment. Stringent control of actual expenses vs budget (capital expenditure, A&P, SG&A)
• Optimizing costs and efficiency of investments, continuous monitoring of resources’ productivity
• Define assumptions and perform boutique P&L simulations based on a variety of business scenarios
• Provide and share insightful reports which link to zone, group reporting requirements and local management tools to improve monthly control for the division

Forecast & Planning

• Support the planning and forecasting processes by providing financial parameters to be utilized in sales and cost planning and forecasting by the business (e.g., inflation rate, foreign exchange rates, increases in wages and salaries, costs for corporate materials, etc.)
• Validate and analyse the outcome and ensure realistic level of figures
• Ensure that plans and forecasts are consolidated and reported forward in a timely manner and that deadlines are respected

KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS (KPI)
To be determined by the position’s reporting manager with the following factors also be taken into consideration as part of the role’s KPI:

Direct Influence:

• Financial reporting accuracy
• Variance analysis between budgeted and actual performance
• Cost-saving measures

Indirect Influence:

• Implementation of process improvements
• Timely provision of information to other stakeholders for reporting
• Providing reliable data for management’s decision making

Other measures of success but are not limited to:

• Positive stakeholder feedback – management, peers, visitors
• All communication reflects company’s standards
• All deadlines are met
• All matters dealt with quickly and professionally
• All procedures and policies adhered to

KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS, AND EXPERIENCE

• Minimum a Degree in Finance / Accounting or a member of a Professional Accounting Body e.g., ACCA
• Meticulous and able to handle challenges with a strong sense of responsibility and commitment
• Self-motivated, good interpersonal and communication skills and able to work independently
• Competence in Microsoft Excel, Pivot and VLOOKUP are essential
• Has good understanding of the business, the company’s norms and policies and is a business partner
• Someone who can anticipate and has strong analytical skills and business acumen
• Step up when necessary to protect the business practice and P&L delivery