Controller - Finance 201

Unique Personnel boasts over 50 years (established in 1970) of personnel and staffing experience, so it's not surprising that even though our main focus has been providing on South African Staffing Solutions, we now recruit internationally for over 5000 clients Duties & Responsibilities

MAIN PURPOSE:

Position requires an experienced Controller to join the Finance leadership team and provide independent financial oversight, analysis and challenge across the Group.

The role is responsible for ensuring that financial and management information is accurate, reliable, consistent and meaningful, while providing senior management with insight to support sound business decisions.

This is an ideal opportunity for a technically strong finance professional who combines IFRS expertise, analytical capability, commercial awareness and the confidence to constructively challenge financial information and business assumptions.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:

Strong analytical and problem-solving ability. •

Independent judgement and professional scepticism.

High attention to detail and technical accuracy. 

Integrity, objectivity and accountability.

Confidence to constructively challenge and influence stakeholders. 

Strong commercial and business acumen.

Excellent communication and stakeholder-management skills. 

Ability to communicate complex financial matters clearly to non-finance stakeholders.

A continuous-improvement and automation mindset.

Ability to operate effectively with senior management and executives

MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS:

Financial Reporting & Controllership:

Provide independent review and challenge of financial reporting and accounting information.

Coordinate monthly management, Executive and Board reporting. 

Review balance sheet integrity, reconciliations, significant accounting adjustments and financial movements.

Identify financial reporting risks and recommend corrective action. 

Drive accurate, consistent and first-time-right reporting.

Group Consolidation:

Coordinate and review the Group consolidation process. 

Review intercompany eliminations, consolidation adjustments and foreign currency translation. 

Investigate consolidation differences and promote consistent accounting treatment across entities.

Identify opportunities to improve consolidation processes, standardisation and automation.

Budgeting, Forecasting & Planning:

Coordinate the annual budgeting process and maintain standard methodologies. 

Review and challenge revenue, margin, cost, headcount, capital expenditure, working capital and cash-flow assumptions. 

Coordinate rolling forecasts and assess the quality and realism of forecast assumptions. 

Perform scenario and sensitivity analysis and identify emerging risks and opportunities.

Financial Performance & Business Analysis:

Analyse actual performance against budget, forecast and prior periods.

Analyse revenue, margins, profitability, operating costs and business-unit performance. 

Investigate material variances and challenge management explanations where appropriate.

Provide actionable financial insight and quantify the financial impact of business decisions.

IFRS & Technical Accounting:

Provide oversight of IFRS and Group accounting policy application. 

Monitor changes to IFRS and assess their impact on the Group. 

Review complex, unusual and non-routine transactions.

Review significant accounting judgements, estimates and financial statement disclosures. 

Prepare or review technical accounting papers and coordinate specialist advice where required

Financial Controls, Risk & Audit :

Independently review the design and effectiveness of key financial controls.

Review segregation of duties and material control exceptions. 

Analyse audit findings, audit adjustments and recurring control weaknesses. 

Monitor remediation and escalate material financial reporting, control, audit and accounting risks.

Systems, Data & Continuous Improvement:

Improve the consistency and efficiency of financial reporting, budgeting and forecasting.

Identify opportunities for automation and improved ERP-to-reporting integration.

Improve financial data quality, dashboards and analytical capability. 

Reduce manual intervention, reporting errors and unnecessary rework.

All maker-checker, dual-authorisation, supporting-document and audit-trail requirements remain mandatory.

Payment release activity must be excluded from the Controller’s subsequent independent review or reviewed by another suitably independent authorised person. 

The Controller may release a payment only where the Controller did not prepare the payment, approve the underlying transaction, create or amend the beneficiary, perform the first-line review, or undertake any other incompatible activity. 

The Controller may act as an alternate authorised payment releaser when required for business continuity or operational support, provided the authority is formally approved under the Delegation of Authority and banking mandate.

Desired Experience & Qualification

Requirements:

A relevant tertiary qualification in Accounting, Finance or a related field.

A professional accounting qualification such as CA(SA), CIMA, ACCA or equivalent.

Significant experience in financial reporting, financial control and financial analysis. 

Strong practical knowledge of IFRS and technical accounting. 

Experience with Group consolidation, budgeting and forecasting. 

Strong understanding of financial controls, audit and governance. 

Proven ability to analyse financial performance and turn financial information into meaningful business insights. 

Advanced Microsoft Excel capability. 

Strong financial systems, data and analytical skills. 

Experience with automation, reporting systems, ERP integration or data analytics would be advantageous