Key Responsibilities
1. Commercial Finance Business Partnering
- Serve as the primary financial co-pilot to the executive leadership teams in Malaysia and Singapore.
- Work cross-functionally with Retail Operations, Merchandising, Marketing, Real Estate, Supply Chain, HR, and Shared Services to drive strategic initiatives forward.
- Offer financial analysis and recommendations geared toward boosting revenue, optimizing costs, and expanding margins.
- Assess the financial viability and business cases for new store openings, store relocations, renovations, marketing investments, and other key projects.
- Utilize scenario planning, sensitivity analysis, and advanced financial modeling to guide business decisions.
- Foster cross-functional ownership and accountability regarding financial targets across the company.
2. Retail Performance & Profitability Management
- Track and evaluate profitability across specific stores, sales channels, and product categories to uncover growth areas and performance gaps.
- Cooperate with Retail Operations to enhance sales productivity, conversion metrics, average transaction values (ATV), and location-level profitability.
- Support Merchandising units in tracking product performance, maximizing gross margins, assessing markdown efficiency, and optimizing stock productivity.
- Analyze marketing campaigns, pricing setups, and customer promotions to maximize return on investment (ROI).
- Deliver actionable data to boost operational success across both brick-and-mortar and digital platforms.
3. Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A)
- Manage annual budgeting, quarterly forecasting cycles, and long-term strategic planning for the specified regions.
- Oversee Business Investment Planning, evaluating capital expenditures (Capex) and site profitability to ensure sustainable growth.
- Establish and track essential KPIs across sales performance, gross margins, operating expenses (Opex), inventory health, and cash flow.
- Lead monthly business reviews with leadership teams to review performance metrics and outline corrective measures.
- Conduct data-driven analysis to back strategic growth initiatives and market opportunities.
4. Financial Control & Governance
- Act as the finance control champion for retail operations, ensuring rigid compliance and governance standards across all retail locations.
- Supervise cash management, inventory control, stock reconciliation, and store audit processes to protect company assets.
- Strengthen internal risk controls and implement improvements to elevate compliance and operational efficiency.
- Guarantee alignment with internal corporate policies, accounting standards, and local regulatory laws.
- Coordinate with both internal and external auditors to resolve findings and complete audits on time.
5. Inventory & Working Capital Management
- Collaborate with Merchandising and Supply Chain partners to optimize stock investments and inventory productivity.
- Keep track of inventory health metrics, including stock turnover, aging, sell-through rates, and markdown impacts.
- Champion efforts to optimize working capital efficiency and preserve strong cash flow tracking.
- Evaluate inventory risks and execute strategies to improve stock utilization and minimize obsolescence.
6. Process Improvement & Digital Transformation
- Lead transformation projects within the finance function to automate reporting, improve data accuracy, and enhance decision-support systems.
- Continuously improve internal financial processes, management reporting tools, and control environments.
- Assist in optimizing commercial incentive structures, corporate governance, and performance frameworks.
- Advocate for digitalization and data-centered choices across commercial and finance teams.
7. Executive Reporting & Stakeholder Relations
- Cultivate trusted partnerships with country management teams and core internal stakeholders.
- Produce high-quality financial reviews, management presentations, and board-level reporting documents.
- Direct weekly and monthly performance updates for local leadership and regional stakeholders.
- Clearly articulate financial impacts, operational risks, and potential opportunities to facilitate sound decision-making.
- Ensure corporate financial goals are seamlessly aligned with commercial priorities across the business.
Experience & Qualifications
Professional Experience
- Requires 8 to 12 years of progressive advancement within Commercial Finance, FP&A, Business Controlling, or Retail Finance.
- Background within retail, fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG), consumer products, footwear, apparel, fashion, or lifestyle sectors is highly preferred.
- Demonstrated expertise in managing budgets, financial planning, rolling forecasts, and business performance tracking.
- Prior experience supporting multi-outlet retail operations and evaluating store-level financial metrics.
- Strong familiarity with retail-specific KPIs (e.g., sales productivity, gross margins, stock turn, markdown management, store profitability).
- Proven history of driving finance transformation, process enhancements, and commercial growth initiatives.
- Multi-market or international coverage experience is considered an asset.
- Solid stakeholder management capabilities with an ability to guide and influence senior leadership.
Education & Technical Skills
- Hold a Bachelor's Degree in Finance, Accounting, Business Administration, Economics, or a closely related discipline.
- Possession of a recognized professional accounting credential (such as ACCA, CPA, CA, CIMA, or equivalent) is preferred.
- Advanced expertise in Microsoft Excel, financial modeling, and data analytics tools.
- Familiarity with modern ERP platforms, retail management applications, and specialized planning software is a plus.
