State Street - AVP - Close/Consolidation & Maintenance COE Lead

Background :

Driven by the Beacon initiatives, functionalization of the corporate functions and re-alignment of the Finance Operating Model, State Street has established the Global Accounting Operations (GAO) organization in 2017. GAO is a process-focused organization responsible for the majority of the record-to-report (R2R) activities performed at State Street. Organizationally, it combines all groups performing these activities Globally and also includes Accounting Centers residing in State Street Shared Service locations in Poland, India and China. GAO organization is established on principles of Global Process Ownership and process excellence, owning all aspects of business-as-usual activities within R2R areas and driving process improvements and automation Globally.

To achieve this objective, GAO has been structured into several distinct global units each is responsible for all aspects of selected major groups of R2R activities, such as Close & Consolidations, Revenue/Expense Accounting, Payroll Accouting, Intercompany Transactions, Specialized/Producting Accounting, Cash/Deposit governance and others. Each global unit will be responsibe for all aspects of business-as-usual activities within their group of processes, as well as process re-engineering and automation activities - this includes leading process assessments; driving process design and process re-engineering work; co-owning technology initiatives bringing automation to GAO organization, working in close collaboration with the teams in Finance Technology, Finance Re-Engineering, Data Management, and other partnership organizations.

Basic Purpose of Job::

The Close, Consolidation and Maintenance Lead will be responsible for Close activities across various geographies and legal entities and day-to-day management of a team of 5-20 experienced Accounting professionals (the level specialists and analysts) that provide support to Global Accounting Controllers and Finance Controllers group.

In addition to Business As Usual (BAU) responsibilities as described below, this role will lead the process re-engineering, standardization, and automation efforts.

Responsibilities & Tasks Include:

Business As Usual (BAU) Activities:

- Transition the various Close activities across geographies into the Center Of Excellence (CoE) to ensure consistent, controlled, accurate and timely production of financials for the various legal entities

- Working in close collaboration with the onshore teams, coordinate the Close process for various geographies across different time zones and teams, taking into account the local regulatory and organizational needs

- Assist the onshore teams in managing the monthly consolidation process aggregating legal entity transactions into top of the house financials. This includes managing local legal entity financials, consolidation systems, eliminating intercompany transactions, equity and minority interest pick up, foreign exchange calculations and accounting adjustments (e.g. IFRS to US GAAP)

- Assist the onshore teams in maintaining the General Ledger including defining and owning a common chart of accounts, managing and understanding the centralized repository of financial data, managing the associated tools including the Oracle Hyperion Financial Management and the Data Relationship Management (DRM)

- Support the monthly and quarterly SOX and other certification processes

- Ensure execution of appropriate controls supported by documented policies and procedures across the relevant groups

- Provide timely data, reporting and needed analytics to senior management and other key stakeholders

- Support regulatory requests and associated regulatory reporting

- Inculcate a culture within the CoE of ongoing self-assessment to continuously better the effectiveness and the efficiency of the Close process

- Ensure significant attention to Risk Excellence to ensure compliance with internal policies and regulatory standards during the monthly Close process

- Develop and maintain a high performing CoE team that is highly motivated to effectively deliver on the business as usual activities and support the transformation efforts

Transformation:

- Assist the GPO in defining a strategic end-state that not only significantly improves the speed of the current Close process, but also enhances control and governance mechanism, increases transparency and reliability of data, is nimble enough to timely react to changes in the regulatory standards, is efficient and effective in its use of resources across locations and is well supported by a technology platform (- best in class- )

- Work with the GPO in executing critical aspects of the multi-year transformation effort to transform the Close process into a - best in class- global process

- Assist in evaluation of the current Close process for various geographies and legal entities including the underlying activities, policies, infrastructure, and control and governance mechanisms to assess areas of improvement and transformation

- Develop an implementation plan to execute on the strategic vision and partner with key internal technology resources and external vendors to ensure the - best in class- process is well supported by a comprehensive technology solution

- Develop reporting framework to provide periodic updates to senior management on the status of the transformation efforts and escalate issues, as needed

- Support development of a change management process to ensure changes to accounting standards and internal processes are reflected timely in the Close process

- Support identification and implementation of appropriate controls including the four-eyes review to ensure accuracy of financials

Job Requirements:

Education and Experience:

- Master's Degree in Accounting, Chartered Accountant (CA) and Certified Public Accountant (CPA)/MBA-Finance with 10-12 years of progressive experience in the Close and Consolidation process with a large financial services firm or advisory/consulting firm

- Extensive experience and knowledge of US GAAP close and step-consolidations, IFRS required, experience with other accounting standards (German, etc.) a plus.

- Detailed understanding of the end-to-end company-wide Close, Consolidation and GL Maintenance process.

- Demonstrated leadership in build-out of the Close and Consolidation process for multiple geographies and business.

- Understanding of international regulatory landscape, experience with statutory accounting/reporting groups across several major international geographies

- Experience of building and maintaining strong control environment (risk excellence, experience with SOX, RCSA controls, etc.), establishing policies, procedures and strong internal controls

- Extensive experience of managing teams performing day-to-day accounting operations, month-end and quarter-end activities for the above areas of accounting

- Experience of leading re-engineering of R2R (record-to-report) processes and driving similar centralization of the end-to-end activities for the major financial institutions

Skills required :

- Proficiency in Microsoft Office suite (Excel, Access, PowerPoint, Word, Visio), advance levels of Excel (pivot tables, formulas, excel workbook maintenance best practices)

- Knowledge of Hyperion Essbase, Oracle Financials

- Knowledge of Spotfire, Tableau, Cognos data analytics and visualization (or similar) a plus

- Conceptual understanding of company-wide financial architecture (GL, sub-GL technology, specialized tools) applicable to the above process groups of processes

- Senior-level communication skills, presentation skills, prior experience of interacting with multiple stakeholders (Legal Entity and Geography controllers) in NA, EMEA, APAC.

- First or second level management expertise required

- Independent decision-making capabilities, demonstrated thought leadership

- Pride of ownership with the ability to deliver high quality results timely

- Self-motivated, self-assured, and self-managed

- Strong analytical and ability to analyze and summarize complex financial transactions

- Strong attention to details

- Problem solving skill

- Highly organized with ability to multi-task and work under high pressure deadlines

- Must be able to work in a fast paced environment