Cond Nast is a global media company, home to iconic brands including Vogue, GQ, Glamour, AD, Vanity Fair and Wired, among many others. Our award-winning content reaches 84 million consumers in print, 367 million in digital and 379 million across social platforms, and generates more than 1 billion video views each month.
We are headquartered in London and New York, and operate in 31 markets worldwide, including China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Mexico & Latin America, Spain, Taiwan, the U.K. and the U.S., with local licence partners across the globe.
The role, based in Dubai, will work closely with the Global Controlling function and other Market Controllers, to implement the Controlling operating model and strategy in the region , and be responsible for delivering Controlling activities.
The Middle East (hereafter ME) market is a new and rapidly expanding region within our global company, we launched in 2023 with two brands namely Vogue and Architectural Design (AD), in 2024 we are excited to be adding two further brands to our ME portfolio and expect the business to continue its fast track growth. As the business continues to grow and set its foundations this role requires an experienced qualified accountant with a flexible and hands on approach.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES AND REQUIREMENTS
As an ambitious qualified accountant , this would be your first or second senior role in financial accounting.
The ME Market Controlling Accountant reports to the Global Controlling Function, for everything related to Accounting, Compliance, Audit, Balance Sheet Risk Management, etc and partners closely with the wider regional and HQ Finance organisation, including the ME Business Partner.
To provide leadership and oversight of the following key ME Market Controlling activities.
- Responsible for the ME Balance Sheet, reviewing reconciliations regularly and overseeing reconciliations performed by Controlling Operations Bangalore team, assessing the quality of reconciliations and providing key approvals for agreed High and Medium priority reconciliations.
- Oversee the statutory audit process in the ME and engage KPMG in order to secure the process, timelines and consistency of the audit process.
- Ensure that Controlling activities are delivered on behalf of the ME Market according to country regulatory reporting requirements and according to CN Global standard processes, policies and controls (including US GAAP).
- Responsible for compliance with accounting policies, controls and processes.
- Responsible for the market's Collections activity, performing credit control activities to ensure prompt payments from clients; also act as approval escalation point on requests for non standard extensions of client credit terms.
- Ensure that daily cash allocation activities are performed accurately and on time, rigorously monitoring any aged unapplied cash and maximising the use of Workday technology to post cash to the correct customer account and invoice.
- Engage in initiatives to improve Working Capital, contributing to the development of opportunities in the ME and influencing key stakeholders to support the achievement of Free Cash Flow targets.
- Preparation and coordination of the ME busines financial accounting and cash flow forecast.
- Review and approve agreed high value and any judgement based manual journals.
- Identifying and implementing improvements to the balance sheet and cash flow forecasting and reporting processes.
- Work with the Controlling Operations team to define and monitor operational KPIs and service delivery, working collaboratively to ensure actions are taken to address key risks and identify opportunities for improvement across the team.
- Ability to run the tax reporting and compliance activity and to work closely with tax specialists internally or external third parties in tax filings and other legal regulatory reporting requirements in a timely and accurate manner.
- Provide input a range of Global and Market specific projects, ensuring that all Controlling related projects that impact the ME are successfully delivered and embedded in the organisation.
Bangalore Hub Services :
Transactional processing support for Controlling Operations activities such as Accounts Payables, Billing, Month end close, Cash Applications, AP payments, Balance sheet reconciliations are delivered by the Bangalore Shared Services team.
The Controller is the customer of the Controlling Operations Bangalore team receiving services mentioned above, but does not directly manage the offshore team.
The Controller will provide oversight and guidance to Bangalore where needed, for these activities and act as their primary point of contact.
ESSENTIAL SKILLS & REQUIREMENTS
- Post Qualified experience (CCAB, ACA, ACCA, CIMA), with 5+ years relevant experience
- Technically Strong and Analytical Finance Professional
- Ability to manage and influence change and deal effectively with change management initiatives.
- A strong track record of success in a senior finance leadership role in a large, complex organisation and of leading controlling teams.
- Strong organisation skills to ensure that communication and engagement happens in an appropriate timely manner across all of the Finance teams in Europe.
- Internal Networker
- Communications and Presentation
- Industry Knowledge
- Technical Expertise
- Workday and Oracle EPM experience preferred.
