THE OPPORTUNITY
The Senior Manager of ERP & Process Excellence for the Group will be responsible for the standardization and harmonization of finance processes across the group. You will be responsible for designing, standardizing and embedding world-class finance processes across the group.
You will act as the primary owner and guardian of the process templates, ensuring a single harmonized way of working is adopted across all opcos while also acting as the functional authority on the ERP configuration and design. You will have deep functional finance process expertise along with knowledge of ERP functionalities.
You will be expected to build strong relationships with key stakeholders, including ERP vendor teams, functional and implementation consultants, country teams, internal IT factory and corporate functions (Finance, Procurement, IT, HR, Risk & Compliance, Audit and Business Controls).
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
- Process Standardization and Ownership
- Design and own the Group-wide finance process template covering Record to Report (R2R), Procure to Pay (P2P), Order to Cash (O2C), Acquire to Retire (A2R) Treasury to bank(T2B) and Tax processes in line with best practices.
- Produce and maintain high-quality process documentation including process flows, standard operating procedures (SOPs), RACI matrices, and control frameworks.
- Define and enforce the principle of standardization and adoption of best practices.
- Minimize customizations - distinguishing genuine statutory local requirements from habits or preferences.
- Maintain and govern the process template throughout the program lifecycle, managing change requests through a formal governance process.
- Lead current-state process mapping across all operating entities, identifying variations, gaps, and opportunities for harmonization
- Ensure Finance processes align with reporting, financial control and audit requirements
- Business Process Optimization
- Define KPIs, review and continuously optimize end to end finance processes.
- Continue to identify new ERP functionality adoption, automation opportunities and eliminate inefficiencies
- Ensure accurate integration between ERP and other systems
- Monitor system performance and recommend improvements
- Provide ongoing functional support and troubleshooting
- ERP Functional Lead
- Act as the senior functional lead for ERP Finance modules including General Ledger, Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, Cash Management, Fixed Assets, and Expenses.
- Lead the design of the Chart of Accounts, accounting field structure, period close calendar, and consolidation framework.
- Work closely with the implementation partners to translate process designs into system configurations, ensuring adherence to the agreed template.
- Review and challenge configuration decisions, ensuring they support standardisation objectives and long-term scalability.
- Lead functional testing including SIT and UAT, ensuring test scenarios reflect real business processes across all entities.
- Stakeholder engagement
- Work with OpCo CFOs and finance teams for ERP deployment and engage them in designing processes.
- Facilitate design workshops and process validation sessions with country finance teams and driving consensus.
- Serve as the key liaison between Group Finance, the implementation partner, ITCo and Group IT on all functional and process matters.
- Support the change management workstream by contributing to training design, communications, and readiness assessments.
- Data & Reporting Standards
- Define master data standards for key financial data entities including the chart of accounts, cost centres, supplier master, customer master etc to support a standardized one ERP data structure across the group
- Establish Group-wide ERP reporting requirements, defining what reports every entity produces, in what format, and to what timelines to monitor each process and KPIs.
- Define Dashboards and KPIs for Finance processes and analytics to gain visibility of such processes across the group and optimize processes
- Work with the data migration team to ensure mapping from legacy systems to the new CoA and data structures is accurate and complete.
- Programme Governance
- Represent process and functional workstreams in programme governance forums, providing clear status updates and escalating risks and issues promptly.
- Manage a small team of functional analysts and process specialists, providing direction, quality oversight, and development support.
- Contribute to the phased rollout strategy, supporting the design, pilot, and replication approach across operating entities.REPORTING LINES
- You will report to the Group Director of Finance Transformation
- COMPETENCIES &
REQUIREMENTS
- Professional accounting qualification (ACA, ACCA, CIMA or equivalent).
- Minimum 8 years of post-qualification experience in finance, with at least 5 years in a process design, ERP implementation, or finance transformation context.
- Demonstrable experience as a functional lead on at least one full-cycle ERP implementation.
- Deep knowledge of core finance processes: R2R, P2P, O2C, and Treasury.
- Experience working in or with multi-country, multi-currency group structures.
- Strong facilitation and stakeholder management skills, able to work with Group teams and country CFO and finance teams.
- Highly structured and analytical, able to produce clear, professional process documentation and functional specifications
- Key competencies: Process Leadership, ERP Expertise, Take Ownership, Ability to influence, Structured thinking, Results oriented
- Willingness to travel in Africa
