Manager Credit Control - EM South at adidas Group

Purpose & Overall Relevance for the Organization:

• The role is responsible for overseeing and driving all Credit Management activities within the local Wholesale business. This includes managing credit risk, safeguarding accounts receivable through proactive risk mitigation, high quality execution of daily operational processes and ensuring strong cash flow management. 

Key Responsibilities: 

• Drive timely collection of receivables by proactively managing customer interactions, resolving root causes of payment delays, and maintaining strong customer relationships to ensure consistent and sustainable payment performance.
• Assess & review the credit risk of the customer on regular basis, calculate and suggest the required credit limits
• Decide on the release of the blocked orders and ensure timely release
• Provide insight in the development of the accounts receivable position of the customer to sales and finance teams
• Manage the relationship with customer service, sales, DC operations and other key stakeholders in the business to facilitate and streamline processes
• Preparation of monthly reconciliations of Key Accounts for review by the Senior Credit Manager 
• Accurate and timely monthly cash flow forecasting
• Identify improvement opportunities and drive their implementation
• Ensure the lowest possible write off for uncollectable balances
• Calculate the bad debt provision journal and provide insight into the calculation of the required provision for uncollectable balances
• Play an active role in the credit note and returns handling process
• Support ongoing projects for the implementation of new technology solutions
• Support requests from partner Finance department
• Establish and maintain strong financial controls over the work performed

Reporting and Analysis:

• Review the monthly customer age analysis to identify overdue balances, assess credit risks and define follow up actions to improve collection performance
• Review of Customer Reconciliations to confirm alignment between customer and accounting records, investigate variances, escalate unresolved discrepancies, and ensure corrective actions are implemented promptly to clear long outstanding items.
• Review of monthly credit note report to validate the accuracy and appropriateness of issued credit notes, identify trends or unusual activity, and ensure compliance with internal policies and controls.
• Preparation of an accurate monthly cash flow forecast for accounts receivables 

People Leadership: 

• Provide leadership and guidance to direct reports to ensure inspired and engaged team 
• Monitor and measure progress against individual and team KPI’s

Key Relationships: 

• External Customers
• Customer Service
• Supply Chain
• Sales
• Finance

KPI’s 

• DSO’s
• Overdue Receivables
• Bad Debts
• Cash Flow forecasting

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities: 

• High degree of customer orientation 
• Strong Finance Acumen
• Experience with SAP S4 HANA
• Strong Excel skills (Pivot Tables, VLOOKUPS, SUMIFS etc)
• Good Problem solving and analytical skills
• Self-motivated and self-directed individual
• Ability to accept and work towards tight deadlines
• Collaboration with all colleagues from all levels across the business
• Outcome-focused and accountable leader
• Ability to work in a constantly changing environment

Requisite Education and Experience / Minimum Qualifications: 

• Accounting qualification preferably university degree (E.g Bcom)
• Minimum 5 - 10 years post qualification experience in the accounting / business area
• Minimum 2-5 years managerial experience 
• Experience in managing customer relationships 
• Broad and deep theoretical understanding of the finance job function
• Experience in SAP S4 HANA, MS Office and modern Communication Tools
• Very good command of the English language, both verbal and written
• Experience using AI (MS Co-Pilot) advantageous