Head Of Finance
Amazon
Total years of experience :14 years, 3 months
• Leading a finance team of 6 finance managers that has established a process for planning, forecasting and reporting global deals revenue and customer incentive costs worth $50+ billion.
• Leading a Quarterly Business Review (QBR) forum that presents the deals and incentive program performance to the SVP Sales & Marketing and AWS CFO.
• Developed a reporting and governance mechanisms from scratch for $20B+ AWS deal revenue components that were not reported before, allowing the leadership better visibility on the impact of strategic deals and key pricing decisions.
• Pioneered a governance mechanism to manage 65 customer incentives programs to maximize returns on investments and minimize risks, leading to revenue acceleration and overhead cost reduction of $500M+.
• Created a framework for managing headcount investments in the internal AWS organization (comprising of 1000+ heads) that develops enterprise solutions for AWS sales teams.
• Rolled-out a new forecasting process that improved the forecasting accuracy of $20B+ incentive costs by 85%.
• Restructured the process for reporting the Gross-to-net revenue portion of the management P&L.
• Business partner to sales & marketing teams for Amazon’s $20B+ Print & Digital Books business.
• Redesigned the mechanism for forecasting and reporting marketing and promotion budgets for 14 marketplaces.
• Advised the marketing team on creation of a first-of-its-kind loyalty program for Amazon’s book readers that was sustainable and financially profitable.
• Developed analytics dashboard for the books business to identify growth opportunities in underperforming Enterprise and Non-Fiction businesses.
• Partnered with the marketing team to develop a new performance marketing strategy to optimize investment returns.
• Created an executive dashboard that consisted of new metrics to measure and track performance of marketing investments.
• Managed the budgeting and forecasting process for the capital expenditure related to Amazon’s fulfillment operations in North America.
• Led the monthly Budget Review meetings with engineering and finance leaders for tracking the progress of new and existing projects.
• Planned and implemented the concept of project-specific budget Review meetings to ensure rigorous project tracking.
• Created a first-of-its-kind Capital Contingency pool worth $40M to dynamically manage contingent budget requirements.
• As the country head for Unilever's business in Pakistan, I led a team of 7 analysts that managed the strategy and operations including cash management and FX transactions.
• Pioneered Unilever’s cash collection & payments system based on a 100% electronic model - first in the industry.
• Negotiated an alliance with a microfinance bank to create a new channel for selling Unilever’s water purification device.
• Revamped the FX hedging model for Unilever to deliver 20 bps savings on company’s gross margin.
• Led the project for $50M Equity Injection by Unilever Plc (parent company) in the Pakistan subsidiary business to claim corporate tax savings.
• Developed and improved the banking relationships with Unilever's local and regional banking partners.
• Streamlined the operations for Unilever Pakistan's eight retirement Fund that led to reduction in operations and audit costs by 35%.
Part of the Global Controls Excellence team within the Group Chief Accountants Department. This team is responsible for the global control framework which involves designing, embedding and monitoring controls for key processes on a global level. I am responsible for the Order-to-Cash process and perform the following functions:
- Working closely with the process champions to design controls based on risks highlighted in the existing process;
- Supporting the country teams across the globe in understanding and embedding the controls in their country processes;
- Ensuring minimal deviations from the standardized control framework by helping countries in overcome barriers and issues;
- Providing support to the external auditors regarding SOX testing and automated testing for the relevant controls;
- Designing IT reports for routine monitoring of controls on a cluster and country level and ensure minimal deviation;
- Leading the initiatives for Improvement in existing controls following the standardization of global processes;
- Highlighting risks to the management in cases of absence or deviation of controls due to any reason.
I am working as Financial Analyst (Assistant Manager) for the Foods business and, as a senior member of the team, supervising an Analyst. I am primarily responsible for Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) of the business. Reporting directly to the Finance Director, I am performing the following functions:
Financial Planning & Business Partnering
- Managing financial performance of the business by closely partnering with the brands, sales, R&D and Supply Chain teams on a regular basis to drive quality decision making by challenging assumptions and providing actionable information.
- Managing the brand wise P&L which includes managing gross margins, pricing, ensuring profitability and cost controls.
- Carrying out New Product costing, competitor shadow costing and designing business feasibility proposals for new product launches;
- Facilitating strategic business planning with the key stakeholders including preparation of key presentations on business & financial performance.
- Conducting complex Scenario Analyses and assisting top management in business decision making
- Analyzing and prioritizing Capex proposals for business investments.
Forecasting & Reporting
- Preparing budgets and rolling business forecasts on a monthly basis for management & regional reporting.
- Preparing management reports, results and useful analyses for decision making and for business review meetings;
- Ensuring accurate month end closing and sharing variance analyses of monthly performance results with the leadership team;
- Developing and maintaining efficient financial models to assist in forecasting and prompt business decision making;
- prepare financial and business presentations for Board Meetings & Audit Committee Meetings;
Controlling
- Monitoring and optimizing the ROI on Marketing & trade spends on a regular basis and applying appropriate controls to ensure efficient spend management;
- Analyzing & driving Cost Savings projects and presenting recommendations to the management for achieving business targets;
- Closely monitoring cost elements to identify business risks & opportunities and flagging them to the top management,
- Monitoring and controlling of Indirects costs including Travel & Entertainment Costs for business partners;
- Managing Price structures and ensuring accuracy depending on relevant tax laws for different categories & brands;
I joined Unilever as part of the management trainee program and served short periods in various roles as part of my training process which included a field sales project.
I was part of a cross functional team given the task of developing a system to automate the Employee Provident Fund and improving the payroll system. As a finance resource on the cross functional team, I developed the business rules and accounting processes for the PF system. I was also given the responsibility of familiarizing the IT and HR personnel with the working of the system through a series of detailed presentations.
I worked on two projects along during this period. The first was the task of creating a micromarketing plan for a branch to attract new customers and organize at least one event proposed in that marketing plan. The second project involved visiting various banks to prepare a report that explored the different investment alternatives available to investors in comparison to investing in Citibank.
Passed all three levels of the CFA Program in first attempt and may be eligible for the CFA charter upon completion of the required work experience
GPA: 3.25 (Equivalent to 87%) Award/Achievements - Manager (Head) of IBA Sports Society - Directed an adaptation of the musical play 'The Wicked' - Organized a carnival to raise funds for an NGO (attended by 2000 people) - Member of the executive council of "IBA Adventure Society Internships - Citibank N.A (Karachi, Pakistan) - Telenor (Karachi, Pakistan) Scholarship Awarded 50% merit scholarship for the duration of the whole program.
