CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER
Position Overview
Asia School of Business seeks an accomplished and strategic leader for the role of Chief Financial Officer (CFO).
As a partner together with the rest of the School’s leadership team, the role calls for strategic oversight across the diverse functions within the Finance Office. The impact of the CFO extends to critical areas including budgeting, accounting, tendering, procurement, financial reporting, treasury management, funding, and risk management.
As the School’s CFO, this position requires collaborative leadership to ensure both short and long-term fiscal health. Key responsibilities include overseeing the School’s financial practices and ensure their alignment with the School’s strategic plans. Additionally, the CFO is instrumental in establishing a direct link between the budget and the School’s overarching objectives, with a focus on enhancing internal controls for strong financial governance.
Principal Duties and Responsibilities
The CFO will helm in leading the finance function, overseeing financial strategy and the associated operational frameworks to underpin and advance the School’s strategic plans. This involves:
1. Strategic Leadership
- Lead and mentor the finance team, as well as providing advice to the management team, to foster a culture of accountability, innovation and continuous improvement.
- Support and provide counsel to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) all aspects of financial planning, management and operations as well as procurement and risk management thereby providing assurance of the School’s financial stability.
- Collaborate with Department Heads to align resource allocation with the School’s strategic objectives.
- Establish and maintain open communication channels with Bank Negara Malaysia to provide updates and to seek advice on alignment of financial strategies, performance, challenges, and opportunities.
2. Financial Planning, Management and Operations
- Optimise allocation of financial resources to support academic and administrative priorities.
- Oversee budgeting, financial planning, forecasting, cash flow management, working capital, and budgetary control.
- Implement scenario analysis to ensure the School’s long-term financial sustainability.
- Manage the day-to-day financial operations, ensuring efficiency and compliance with relevant standards, applicable legislation and guidelines.
- Oversee the management of working capital and investment portfolios, ensuring sustainable, prudent and disciplined investment strategies.
- Evaluate investment and business opportunities and make recommendations to enhance financial performance.
- Develop, manage, evaluate, and interpret financial forecasts and operating results whilst ensuring accurate and timely financial reporting.
- Implement innovative and efficient financial systems and processes to optimize operational efficiency within the finance function.
- Lead projects such as ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) enhancements, system upgrades, as well as interfacing with other applications.
- Focus on enhancing internal controls to strengthen financial governance.
3. Procurement
- Develop and implement a comprehensive strategy for the establishment of a centralized procurement unit for the School
- Formulating and operationalising practical and effective procurement policies, guidelines and procedures adopting best practices in tenders, evaluation, award and monitoring.
4. Risk Management
- Enhance the risk management framework of the School aligning it with relevant standards and industry best practices.
- Reviewing and improving the risk mitigation plans, risk indicators, and undertake regular risk impact analysis.
5. Integrity, Governance and Compliance
- Safeguard the integrity of financial reports of the School.
- Establish and monitor internal controls to protect the School’s financial integrity.
- Develop and implement policies and procedures to comply with statutory requirements and industry best practices.
Position Requirements
Qualifications & Skills
- Holds a university degree in Accounting and/or Finance, complemented by membership and professional qualification in the same field(s).
- Demonstrates extensive and comprehensive knowledge, coupled with practical experience in both Accounting and/or Finance.
Experience
- Extensive professional and management experience at a senior level, ideally with exposure to the higher education institutions or publicly funded organizations.
- A well-rounded background, including external audit and commercial experience, demonstrating a focus on stakeholder engagement.
- Strong analytical skills with excellent interpersonal, presentation, and influencing capabilities.
- Demonstrable expertise in financial control and analysis, showcasing a deep understanding of fiscal management.
- Experience in spearheading the development and implementation of centralized procurement units, demonstrating a proven ability to optimize purchasing strategies, enhance operational efficiency, and ensure cost-effective resource allocation.
- Proven track record in risk management, encompassing identification, comprehensive assessment, and highly effective mitigation of financial risks.
- Familiarity with Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems, with a demonstrated ability to leverage on technology for enhanced financial management.
Minimum Qualification and Skills Required
- Excellent command of English and Malay (spoken and written) – both in research writing and also on business writing.
- Excellent general administration and Project Management skills.
- Excellent skills in using Microsoft office software and other project planning tools.
- Excellent organisational and collaboration skills, strong team player that can lead and delegate to teams.
- Self-motivated to initiate, operate and manage multiple different operations in the research project and research center.
- Timely and detailed-oriented in managing operations and administration.
Required Qualifications
Minimum 5 years working experience in relevant field.
Remuneration
The base salary will be in the range of RM5,500 to RM6,500, and EPF, SOCSO and insurance will be included.