Executive Director Controller

About the role

The Executive Director, Corporate Controller is a key finance leader responsible for core accounting operations ensuring accuracy, compliance with U.S. GAAP, delivering timely financial and statutory reporting. This strategic, yet hands-on role will report to the Chief Accounting Officer working closely with peers, cross-functional executives, corporate enabling functions, and key external partners.

Responsibilities

• Manage the day-to-day operations of the accounting department to support the needs of a publicly traded company, including timely and accurate month-end, quarter-end, and year-end close processes and compliance with regulatory requirements (i.e. SEC filings, statutory financial statements etc.)
• Collaborate with various internal and external partners, including non-finance operating teams, to provide financial data timely, share relevant insights and strategic recommendations to senior management and cross functional stakeholders
• Key Areas Of Oversight Include:
• Revenue Recognition (gross To Net Accounting)
• General Ledger
• Cost Of Goods Sold (COGS)
• Clinical Trial Accruals
• Payroll
• Travel And Expense
• Accounts Payable
• Specifically Oversee revenue accounting in compliance with ASC 606, gross to net accounting and government pricing calculations and compliance.
• Partner with supply chain teams to ensure accurate COGS reporting and inventory valuation.
• Direct the collaboration with R&D FP&A partners to ensure accurate and timely accruals for clinical studies and R&D activities.
• Maintain, update and create global accounting policies and position papers to support US GAAP; review that underlying processes, systems and the broader control environment to support compliance with global accounting policies and other regulatory requirements.
• Collaborate with technical accounting team to review complex accounting transactions, proposed accounting treatments and approach to operationalize policies; partner with global accounting talent to ensure that operational aspects of any policy and systems implementations are compliant with applicable standards and requirements.
• Lead the engagement with external auditors in support of annual audits, quarterly financial reviews, and internal controls testing, partnering with internal and external stakeholders as appropriate.
• Ensure that internal controls over financial reporting are designed and operate effectively.
• Serve as the business owner for relevant accounting systems supporting financial reporting, including ERP and adjacent systems; collaborate with members IT leadership to evolve and develop a financial systems roadmap and infrastructure that will support significant growth and effectively scale with increased complexity.
• Identify opportunities for automation of manual processes and lead system implementations to streamline accounting, reporting processes and controls.
• Collaborate with other finance teams such as Financial Planning and Analysis, International Finance, and Tax to ensure that actual results for responsible areas are consistent with expected or forecasted results; understand key differences and validate that differences related to different applications of accounting-US GAAP vs management reporting-are identified and reconciled.
• Partner with FP&A and assist in the preparation of annual budgets and quarterly forecasts.
• Collaborate with Human Resources to deliver payroll processing and enable related control activities.
• Manage treasury activities including cash management, banking relationships and reporting, and broader risk management programs (i.e. insurance).
• Manage staff to ensure smooth transfer of knowledge for key positions, and support, hire and train to ensure appropriate succession planning and staff development.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's or master's degree in Accounting, Finance, or a related field
• CPA certification is required.
• 18+ years of experience in finance and accounting, with at least 3 years of experience in a leadership role
• Strong knowledge of GAAP and financial reporting requirements
• Experience With The Application Of Sarbanes Oxley (SOX) Required.
• Experience in the biotech or life sciences industry is strongly preferred.
• Excellent leadership and communication skills, with the ability to collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams.
• History of productive and collaborative relationships with assorted audit teams and other necessary third parties
• Strong analytical skills and the ability to provide strategic recommendations based on financial data.
• Ability to work in a fast-paced environment and manage multiple priorities, while filling gaps as needed.
• Experience with financial software, such as NetSuite or similar solutions, as well as experience overseeing systems/application implementations, integrations and migrations preferred.
• Ability to deliver thoughtful and clear work products to a high standard and communicate this effectively in writing and orally.
• Strong understanding of commercial business, ideally in the pharmaceutical sector
• Ability to be productively assertive and able to lead without direct authority to problem-solve collaboration and program issues with cross-functional teams.
• Track record of excellent judgment: an ability to make decisions independently and to know when it is appropriate to partner with senior management to enable decision-making.
• Demonstrated ability to combine attention to detail with big picture perspective, operationalizing via excellence in project management and effectively managing multiple projects/priorities.
• Acts to surpass goals, is proactive, hands-on, takes initiative, and seizes opportunities.
• Ability to benchmark own performance against industry best practices and the ability to build the functional roadmap to deliver against functional performance metrics and enterprise priorities.
• Continuous improvement mindset addressing talent capabilities, end to end processes and incorporating automation and best-in-class technology solutions, raising quality and productivity in a strategic way.