Specialist AC Process Executor at Absa South Africa

Job Summary

• Financial Control is responsible for ensuring that Absa Africa fulfils its financial, statutory and regulatory reporting requirements, while ensuring compliance with accounting, regulatory and balance sheet control policy. Financial Control comprises the following areas: Accounting Control, Reporting & Analytics, Policy Governance & Controls, Technology Enablement, Cluster Control and Technical Accounting. Financial Control serves as the Group’s primary interface with the auditors and regulators. 
• Accounting Control owns the processes that enables sustainable, accurate and timeous financial information in support of reporting to external and internal stakeholders. The individuals will operate in the key processes in Accounting Control.

Job Description

Key Accountabilities

• Accountability: Manage financial information completion process (60%)
• Act as a process executor for completion of financial information, including the accountability for the following key processes:
• Journals and month-end close
• Reconciliation
• Completion of Supplementary information
• Consolidation and Internal eliminations
• Tax
• Accounting Functions
• Support to Process Owners on resolution of issues and requests from stakeholders including:
• Cluster Financial Controller
• Cluster CFO/BP&A team members
• Other Financial Control functions
• Managing/obtaining TAG opinions and ad hoc queries on accounting issues.
• Act as the process executor for implementation of new standardised processes where relevant.
• Provide feedback to stakeholders on results reflected in the financial accounting system, as well as issues identified where there are potential risks to numbers.
• Act pro-actively in correcting issues and implement a sustainable process
• Ensure that principles of the Financial Control Operating Model are complied with and sustained.
• Maintain and enhance processes:
• Identify areas of improvement in completion, review and or submission processes to drive and implement a sustainable and effective process in support of quality and accuracy
• Identify synergies between different reporting processes and implement new and or enhanced processes
• Accountability: Provide support to other process executors through motivation and employee engagement (20%)
• Understanding and managing team dynamics to maximize performance.
• Escalate issues around allocation of resources to process architects tasks to ensure delivery of team objectives.
• Ensure continued development of resources, through coaching and mentoring, to empower value added delivery of tasks.
• Accountability: Process Execution (20%)
• Execution of processes as designed.
• Constantly review, improve and maintain own activities to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of processes.
• Recommend areas for improvement in order to reduce cycle times, improve productivity, create capacity and improve process reliability and customer satisfaction.
• Assist in the implementation of new and/or enhanced processes.
• Identify activity-specific risks and work with Process Owner / Process Architect to mitigate risks.
• Maintain awareness of own activities and the impact thereof on related / interdependent activities.

Role/Person Specification

Knowledge & Skills:

• Exceptional interpersonal and team-working skills
• Ability to identify control gaps and weaknesses
• Ability to interpret the end-to-end flow of financial data
• Strong problem-solving skills
• Analytical skills
• Negotiation skills
• The ability to work in a pressured and unstructured environment and to cope with the demands of working to tight deadlines

Education and Experience Required 

• CA(SA) newly qualified/1 to 2 years PQE experience
• Business experience in a Banking environment gained from a Finance, Product
• Experience in SAP advantageous

Competencies:  

• Deciding and initiating action;
• Entrepreneurial and commercial thinking;
• Relating and networking;
• Adapting and responding to change;
• Persuading and influencing;
• Creating and highly innovating.