SAP Finance Transformation Lead

multi-year SAP Implementation (ECC to S/4 RISE Private Cloud), at a Food & Beverage company.

Must have worked for a large SAP Consulting / Professional Services firm, and lead Finance Transformation Programs at large clients.

Position Summary

This role must own the Finance decisions on behalf of the program, while partnering with the Digital Transformation Leader to ensure alignment with the overall Enterprise Transformation strategy.

SAP Finance S/4HANA Transformation Leader is responsible for representing the Finance function within the Enterprise Transformation program and driving the Design, Governance, and adoption of future-state Finance processes enabled by SAP S/4HANA.

Reporting to the Digital Transformation Leader, this role ensures that Business requirements, Compliance needs, and Operational objectives are translated into scalable, standardized, and fit-for-purpose solutions. The role partners closely with Finance Leadership, Business Process Owners, IT, and System Integrator teams to deliver successful business transformation outcomes.

Key Responsibilities

• This role is more of Solutioning, scenarios, gaps, working with stakeholders, understanding requirements, and some configuration.

Finance Transformation Leadership

• Own and drive Finance process decisions across the SAP S/4HANA program.
• Challenge existing ways of working and champion Best-practice processes.

Process Design Ownership

• Lead future-state Design across SAP Record-to-Report (RTR) and related Finance processes.
• Drive decisions relating to General Ledger, Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable, Financial Close, Banking integration, Intercompany Processing, Compliance and Controls, Tax and Statutory Requirements.
• Evaluate the Design options and make recommendations based on business value, risk, and scalability.

Stakeholder Management

• Serve as primary liaison between Finance, Digital Transformation, IT, and System Integrator partners.
• Facilitate the Design workshops and decision forums.
• Build consensus across regional and global stakeholders.
• Escalate critical decisions, risks, and dependencies to Program leadership.

Program Governance & Delivery

• Review and approve Finance requirements, Solution designs, and Process changes.
• Support the data, testing, training, cutover, and go-live activities.
• Ensure Finance readiness for deployment and adoption.
• Drive issue resolution and risk mitigation throughout the Program lifecycle.

Change & Adoption

• Act as a change champion for Finance teams.
• Drive process standardization and simplification.
• Promote Clean Core principles and SAP Best practices.

Qualifications

• 15+ years of SAP Finance Transformation experience.
• Experience leading Finance workstreams in large SAP S/4HANA Programs.
• Strong understanding of SAP Record-to-Report (RTR) functional processes, Financial Accounting (FI) & Management Accounting (CO), Financial Controls & Compliance
• Experience in General Ledger, Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable, Advanced Financial Close, Banking integration/MBC/BCM, Intercompany Processing, Accrual Engine, Universal Allocation, Journal Entries and related Workflows.
• Exposure to these areas are a plus -- FSCM (Credit, Collections), Revenue Recognition/RAR, Product Costing, Group Reporting, OpenText VIM, Vertex Tax, DRC Document & Reporting Compliance, BlackLine tool integration.
• Experience working with global and cross-functional teams.
• Strong stakeholder management and decision-making capability.

Critical Success Factors

The ideal candidate will:

• Be comfortable making Business Process decisions, not just documenting requirements.
• Balance global standardization with local business and statutory needs.
• Influence the senior Finance, IT, and Business stakeholders.
• Operate in a complex SAP Transformation environment.
• Focus on business outcomes, simplification, and value realization.

What Good Looks Like

This person can Lead discussions and make recommendations on questions such as:

• What should the future-state Chart of Accounts look like?
• Which Legacy processes should be standardized or eliminated?
• Where should SAP standard functionality be adopted versus local exceptions?
• How can Financial close, reporting, and controls be simplified through S/4HANA?
• What Design decisions best support long-term scalability, compliance, and business growth?