Job Vacancies at Allan Gray Proprietary Limited

Job Description

• This position is within the Retail Division of Allan Gray Limited and the candidate will be reporting to the Team Coordinator. The job requires the candidate to work actively within a team but also independently.
• The candidate will be responsible for ensuring that all incoming work is seen to, that any pending work is followed up on to ensure that the case is finalized and to maintain contact with IFA or client during this process. This person will need to be flexible, energetic, and trustworthy, organized, self-disciplined, and enjoy working in a team environment.

Responsibilities

Processing of incoming instructions in respect of:

• New business transactions
• Existing business transactions (investments, retirement’s, withdrawals, switches, transfers, cessions and estate lates)
• Amendments to existing client information (investors, advisors, employers)

Validating All Incoming Instructions With Regards To

• Various legislative requirements relating to all applicable products
• Completeness and accuracy of instruction from client/IFA
• Proof of payment or money transfer
• FICA requirements complied with (where relevant)
• Ensuring all incoming work is captured within required turnaround times and before relevant cut off times.
• Attending to queries from clients, IFA’s and internal customers and responding to queries on time and diligently.
• Providing clients/ IFA’s with superior levels of service
• Maintaining records of all interactions with clients / IFA’s on Siebel CRM.
• Correct and timeous rectification of errors
• Liaise with clients / IFA’s regarding the correct implementation of instructions received to meet with our service delivery standards.
• Support fellow team members and Team Coordinator.
• Add hoc duties as may be required from time to time.

Requirements

• Relevant experience – Relevant Business Degree and/or Job Related Experience would be an advantage. Sound knowledge of the either the Life Insurance industry including Pension Funds and/or the Unit Trust industry would also be an advantage.
• Intermediate Computer Literacy – Word, Excel, Emai

Key Attributes & Competencies

• Accuracy and Attention to Detail
• Excellent Time Management Skills
• Excellent Problem Solving Skills
• Excellent Verbal and Communication skills
• Ability to function well under pressure
• Client focused and self-motivated
• Ability to work effectively as part of a team but also independently.
• Ability to accept responsibility for all tasks done

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Purpose of the role

• Our Client Service Centre is integral to our service offering for clients and independent financial advisers. As an Investment Service Consultant, your purpose will be to build clients’ and advisers’ trust and confidence through providing world-class service.
• Our consultants do impactful work by empowering our clients on thier investment journey. You will gain in-depth knowledge of Allan Gray's range of products and develop the necessary skills to confidently communicate with and educate our clients.

Responsibilities

• Provide excellent service to investors, potential investors and independent financial advisers via our various servicing channels, i.e. inbound calls and emails, face-to-face interactions, and webchat.
• Build trust and confidence by explaining our investment philosophy and long-term approach to investing.
• Educate clients by sharing product and fund knowledge and empower them to make informed investment decisions.
• Take end-to-end ownership of transactions and ensure accurate record-keeping.
• Actively participate in the organisation’s drive towards continuous improvement by contributing to solutions to client problems.

Skills And Competencies

• This role is suited to individuals who are highly performance driven and seek new challenges.
• A growth mindset and resilience are key attributes to successfully navigate the ever-changing needs of clients and the financial services industry.
• The role requires high adaptability, vigour and agility.
• Our consultants need to be empathetic and client focused.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills are essential.
• The ability to deal with complexity in a high-pressure environment, analytical thinking, attention to detail and problem-solving ability are crucial to ensure we always do what is best for clients.
• A genuine passion for people and a commitment to service excellence are vital to building long-term and meaningful relationships with our clients.

Qualifications

• A bachelor's degree in Commerce or Business Science majoring in Finance, Investments, Economics, Mathematics or Statistics (this is not an exhaustive list).

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Job Responsibilities

• Work as part of a larger IT team using the Scrum methodology.
• Interact with business users, Business Analysts and other developers to understand user requirements.
• Develop integration solutions using T-SQL and other vendor integration tools
• ETL development to load Data warehouse
• Maintain existing SSRS report definitions to present the data.
• Support existing integration and reporting solutions in the production environment by analysing problems reported by users and track down their cause through debugging techniques and discussion with other team members.
• Testing and deployment of new development

Requirements

• 5-8 years SQL experience (stored procedures, UDF’s, T-SQL, performance tuning and optimization, RDBMS, error handling and logging, etc.) is essential
• Experience with data integration, validation and reconciliation (SSIS or similar).
• Expert knowledge of reporting technologies (SSRS, PowerBI or similar)
• Experience with creating and maintaining cubes (SSAS) would be advantageous
• Expert experience with relational and dimensional database structures.
• Experience in interacting with business users to understand requirements and producing solutions
• Experience working in AWS Cloud implementation would be an advantage
• Exposure to PostgreSQL would be an advantage

Skills / Competencies

• Attention to detail and quality.
• Problem Solving
• Willingness to take initiative and responsibility.
• Ability to meet deadlines and deal with pressure.
• Ability to work effectively as part of a diverse team and cross-train with team members.
• Strong analytical skills.
• Good communication

Education

• Degree or diploma in information science or related technical discipline.
• Knowledge of financial concepts and terms and interested in attending courses to improve business knowledge.
• Financial Services industry experience would be an advantage.

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Job Responsibilities

Manage the technical aspects of the solution delivery and systems within the domain.

• Understand the focus and direction of the business area; prioritising and driving delivery that helps to achieve this.
• Define the technical direction for the domain and ensure design of solutions and delivery.
• Work closely with the domain owner of the domain.
• Involvement in the running of the domain, including sprint planning, design, drive delivery, retros, understanding root cause of issues/instability
• Responsible for the quality of technical solutions, maintenance of standards and managing impact/risk introduced by changes across domains.
• Review code and approve changes before deployment to production.
• Assist with technical analysis, root cause analysis and designing preventative actions.
• Oversee the choice of application and approach to development for the delivery of new system/technical solutions by the developers.
• Work with the Architect, other Tech Leads and Development Manager to understand and drive the strategic direction of the technologies within Institutional IT.
• Ensure domain technical direction is aligned with overall tech direction/architecture for Institutional IT, and overall tech direction caters for needs of the domains.
• Identify areas for continuous improvement of both systems and architectural standards and help drive implementation.
• Timeous, clear tracking, management and appropriate escalation of issues and risks.
• Ensure systems documentation for support are produced as required.
• Ensure a stable and sustainable technical platform is in place to support the business area.

Manage the developers in the domain

• Lead a team of developers (+/- 5 developers) in the domain, according to skill set.
• Carry out all aspects of people management i.e. staff performance appraisals, approve leave, recruit, train, develop and mentor staff.
• Responsible for assigning work to the developers, determining estimates, overseeing technical design and driving delivery according to our SDLC procedures and standards.
• Ensure the correct technical skills are in place in the domain to meet business needs

To make a personal contribute to our technical solutions.

• Develop key solutions that add to our central technical stack or contribute to our initiatives.

Technical Expertise

• Exceptional skills in writing SQL for Microsoft SQL server, including stored procedures, UDF’s and other T-SQL Querying.
• Experience with data integration, validation and reconciliation (SSIS or similar).
• Expert knowledge of reporting technologies (SSRS, PowerBI or similar)
• Experience in analysing data and performing complex data manipulation using Microsoft SQL.
• Design and implement relational and dimensional database structures.
• Experience with creating and maintaining cubes (SSAS) would be an advantage
• Experience working in AWS Cloud implementation would be an advantage
• Eposue to PostreSQL would be an advantage

Key Attributes / Consistencies

• Knowledge of professional software engineering practices for the full software development life cycle, including coding standards, code reviews, source control management, buil processes and testing.
• Excellent leadership skills – able to direct, motivate, delegate, inspire.
• Good interpersonal skills, ability to work with diverse personality types and deal with conflict in an effective way.
• Ability to deal with key stakeholders within Allan Gray.
• Willingness to take initiative and responsibility.
• Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Strong organisational and planning skills.
• Self-motivated and confident.
• Ability to work individually and with teams

Education

• Degree or diploma in computer science, computer engineering, information science or related technical discipline.
• Experience with managing a development team and driving team delivery.
• Knowledge of computer science fundamentals in object-oriented design, data structures and algorithms.
• Experience in interacting with business users to understand their requirements and managing the implementation of system changes.
• At least 8 years’ worth of professional development experience - able to perform at a senior developer level.

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Job Summary

• We are looking for a dynamic individual who will be the link between our Retail Umbrella Fund business objectives and our systems. The ideal candidate for this position is detail-oriented, highly analytical, and accustomed to working in a technological environment with multiple integrated systems. The successful incumbent will be responsible for translating business needs to IT solutions, by supporting and ensuring the successful completion of analytical and testing tasks of our software products

Job Responsibilities

• Understand requirements of the area and the minimal viable product.
• Lead the thinking, analysis, and solution design for business problems.
• Identify, prioritise, and plan work in collaboration with the Product Owner, business stakeholders and Tech Lead
• Get buy-in from and communicate with stakeholders
• Analyse integration and system requirements
• Understand and communicate system impact / dependencies on other IT systems
• Formulate required specs, diagrams and documentation of high-level test scenarios
• Work with the team to ensure requirements are understood
• Work with testers and business to ensure that test coverage is complete
• Manage project implementation, where applicable
• Facilitate and run grooming sessions
• Assist in helping the team function
• Coaches’ other BAs and assists in the onboarding of team members
• Makes an impact beyond their own team (e.g. other teams in Retail IT)
• Collaborate with other analysts in IT to ensure consistency of solutions and re-use of solutions, where possible
• Be the liaison between business and IT
• Participate in the monthly weekend releases, assisting the team verify the systems
• Assist with testing which includes creating test cases, facilitation of business user testing and managing any change requests
• Assist with production support
• Help identify and raise issues that affect the technology space
• Improve the function of the technology area as a whole and contribute towards the internal Business Analyst community

Skills / Competencies And Experience

• Relevant industry experience
• At least 3-5 years business analysis experience in a technical role
• Attention to detail and problem-solving skills
• Ability to handle complexity and work in complex integrating systems
• Understand and have experience in Agile methodologies, especially Scrum
• Understanding of SQL and database design
• UML or other diagramming techniques (Data/Sequence/Process/Context etc.) and business analysis frameworks and methodologies
• Understanding of APIs and Web Services
• Good conceptual thinking and critical analytical skills
• Good communication, facilitation and interpersonal skills
• Disciplined and methodical approach to work
• Ability to get things done, be accountable and self-manage
• Good leadership skills
• Planning, organizational and time management skills
• Ability to work in a team with a positive, friendly and respectful attitude
• Have an interest in global IT trends, and be willing to learn new skills

Education

• Technology or Business Analyst qualification
• Strong academic performance

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• As a Senior Business Analyst in the Middle Office Domain you will be responsible for working with key stakeholders to understand business direction, propose solutions, provide insight into business problems, and assist the domain in the implementation of long-term solutions. This role requires knowledge of asset management processes and business analysis experience in an IT context.

Job Responsibilities

• Identify themes and trends within area of responsibility, appreciate inherent risks and highlight change opportunities.
• Clarification and communication to ensure alignment on focus areas and problems worth solving.
• Liaise with domain stakeholders to determine priorities and effective solutions to meet business requirements.
• Design usable, elegant, practical, and scalable solutions to meet business needs.
• Conduct Joint Application Development (JAD) sessions with developers, business users or testers.
• Document system solutions (e.g. process flows, requirements, and functional specifications).
• Plan and manage implementation of solutions.
• Train and facilitate end user adoption of solutions.
• Manage business expectations and proactively mitigate any risks of production releases by conducting impact analysis, user acceptance testing, software testing, and relevant user training.
• Conduct post implementation reviews to ascertain value added and address any post release issues.
• Support team members in achieving delivery objectives.
• Help with domain quality and performance continuous improvement efforts.
• Collaborate with system architects to define infrastructure supporting the domain requirements.
• Design and coordinate IT and Business testing.
• Maintain the backlog and coordinate sprint planning.
• Maintain production solutions and provide timely resolution of production support logs.
• Proactively understanding why production support is happening and impact on business processes.
• Provide technical and business support to users at critical business periods.
• Determine the importance and priority of problems and requests raised.
• Coordinate and manage production defects to closure.

Skills
Skills and Competencies

• Strong analytical skills and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to analyse complex problems spanning multiple areas/system.
• Comfortable with change.
• Ability to lead a team effectively.
• Curiosity.
• Conscientiousness.
• Driven to implement efficiencies.
• Ability to deal with and influence senior stakeholders.
• Determined and persistent / ability to perform well under pressure.
• Self-motivated.
• Ability to manage personal workload and delivery expectations.
• Flexible approach to working hours.
• Ability to work effectively as part of a team.
• Good communication and coordination skills.
• Ability to accept responsibility for all tasks done.
• Flexible, energetic, trustworthy, organised, self-disciplined
• Independent thinker.

Expertise

• Demonstrate leadership qualities.
• Understands how applications are constructed.
• You know how to structure tests and to test interfaces and integrated systems.
• You are passionate about great software.
• People management (advantage)
• Project management capabilities (Advantage)
• You make timely decisions that add long term value

Require a good understanding of

• Asset Management Business.
• System Development Life Cycle / SCRUM methodology.
• Problem solving techniques.
• Release Processes and IT environments.
• Testing Methodology.

Qualification

• Relevant tertiary qualification (e.g. BComm, B Bus Science degree) with strong academic performance.
• Sound understanding of asset management processes (Advantage)
• Min of 8 years’ experience in an IT business analysis role (preferably in asset management).