Financial Controller at Publicis Groupe

Job Description

• The key responsibilities of a Finance Controller include overseeing the preparation and analysis of financial reports, managing budgets and forecasts, ensuring compliance with regulatory guidelines and internal policies, optimizing cash flow management, conducting financial risk assessments, implementing effective internal controls, and providing strategic financial guidance to support decision-making and business growth initiatives. They lead financial audits, manage relationships with external auditors and stakeholders, and continuously strive to improve financial processes and operational efficiencies within the organization.

Local Management Reporting

• Prepare and present monthly financial reports to the FD of the agency.
• Prepare and present monthly client profitability reports and follow up key findings in the reports.
• Ad-hoc financial analysis for FD or senior management
• Monitor monthly spend vs budget.
• Maintain and monitor the New Business Pipeline report
• Reporting to PGA
• Monthly actuals reporting to Groupe:
• checking balance sheet recons to ensure items are cleared promptly.
• Approve non-recurring journals, 3- way payroll recons and VAT recons
• Checking allocation of house costs in NAV and ensuring relevant accruals are raised.
• Prepare analytical review of monthly results and balance sheet.
• Periodic Budget preparation
• Collating the revenue forecasts from the Client service heads
• Prepare the payroll costs forecasts with input from the Agency Head of Talent and FD 
• Forecast overhead costs.
• Analyse variances vs Commit/previous Forecast
• Complete the agency FTE every quarter.
• Revenue
• Complete monthly revenue reconciliation and ensure all necessary take-ups are done/journals are processed so that NAV ties up to revenue recon prior to flash reporting at 12 noon on the first working day of each month.
• Monitor retainer billings during each month to ensure that all retainers are billed prior to billing cut off.
• Prepare analysis of revenue overs/unders vs forecast by client and revenue type.
• Monitor accrued and deferred revenue to ensure cleared on a timely basis.
• Resource planning
• In collaboration with the Ops/ talent and the MD of the agency, prepare the annual Commit resource plan and monitor actuals vs plan continually so that productivity remains positive even when revenue drops.
• Manage the reforecasting of resource requirements at each new Forecast
• Approve freelance appointments provided these are within budget

Job Management

• Monitoring work in progress to ensure that:
• No external cost is incurred prior to client approval.
• Non-billable costs are written off to Income Statement timeously.
• finished jobs are reconciled and closed promptly.
• Perform final check of all jobs marked for closure and send workflow to Resources to close.

Overhead Cost Control

• Approve variable cost expenditure prior to spending to ensure that overheads stay within budget.

Payroll

• Review and approve monthly payroll prepared by SSC and approve monthly payroll journal prior to processing.
• Working with talent and the payroll team to resolve any issues.
• Approve weekly wage payments and journal allocations.

Accounts Receivable

• Monitor Debtors Age Analysis and ensure effective follow up of overdue balances is being done by the finance team and resources

Accounts Payable

• Monitor Creditors Age Analysis and ensure the age is clean and does not consist of credit balances and overdue payments.
• Review and approve weekly payment list.
• Monitor the open PO list and ensure Pos are captured timeously.
• Review and approve supplier recons.

Ad Hoc Duties

• Co-ordinate with FMC auditors and Internal audit to provide them with the prework requested, support documentation and explanations required.
• Submit monthly input to PGA in order that they can prepare the monthly PiCT report (self-analysis of adherence to Internal control requirements)
• Provide finance training to the Client Service team so that they understand their financial responsibilities in terms of job management, client management and revenue forecasting.
• Monitor cashflow and approve early payment requests where necessary.
• Monitor performance of the Shared Service Centre and feedback to senior management
• Develop, document and communicate processes to Agency.

General troubleshooting....
 

• Qualifications
• Accounting /Finance degree
• +5 years of finance experience in mid-level role
• Demonstrated abilities and track record writing high-quality reports.
• MS Excel, MS Word and MS PowerPoint - Advanced level
• Excellent command in written and spoken English is essential.
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills
• Ability to work under pressure and stressful situations.
• Logical thinker, strong analytical, reporting and writing abilities.
• Good creativity and ability to take initiative.
• Good experience producing analytics reports.