North America Finance Business Partner - Create Division

As the North America Finance Business Partner for the Create Division, you will be responsible for delivering high quality Finance Business Partnering (FBP) support to the Create Leadership team. The role will support the Create Finance Director (Create FD) in reporting North American regional performance, leading budgeting and forecasting and providing advice on commercial and strategic decision making. You will bridge the gap between complex data and executive decision-making. Your role is not just to report on the past, but to forecast the future—driving profitability, identifying risks, and helping to ensure the NA Create’s financial health aligns with objectives.

The NA Region consists of around 650 artists and game developers across studios in numerous cities in Canada, US and Mexico working as a partner on some of the largest titles in the video games sector. This is an opportunity to shape a new role in the business, working with both finance controlling teams and studio teams as we look to enhance the commercial finance support in the Region. 

As part of a small team of Regional FBPs across the Division, reporting into the Create FD, the NA FBP will ensure that all financial analysis in the region is prepared in line with Divisional standards and to the highest level of accuracy and insightfulness. The role will work alongside other Finance team leaders, both in and outside of the Division and be a strong advocate for our Finance Excellence vision to be trusted business partners that champion growth, create value and manage risk.

The NA FBP, Create Division will deliver the following key activities:

Partnering with Divisional Executives

• Provide insightful and high quality decision support to the Create FD and North American Regional Director (Create) to drive growth and business performance
• Support Regional studio heads with their financial decision making process and embed unified tools and process and where relevant, support on pricing for RFP responses and partnership discussions 
• Help to develop the financial framework to enable studios to collaborate more effectively within the region and enable global shoring initiatives, including new locations, pricing and tracking of performance
• Contribute to major Create Division projects, including capital allocation decisions around expansion plans into new verticals and geographies and track delivery against, and evolution of, existing value creation plans
• Participate in projects sponsored by Create FD to drive growth and performance improvement

Strategic Planning, Forecasting and Monthly Reporting

• Based on the approach, targets and timelines set by GroupFP&A, the FBP will lead the NA region’s annual budget and monthly forecasting process, ensuring high accuracy and alignment with the Create FD, NA Regional Director and Create Business Controlling team 
• Collaborate closely with the Local Finance team on month-end process to ensure accuracy and commercial validity of forecasts at a studio and regional level  
• Support delivery of Divisional Board Packs and Regional reviews that highlight trends, risks, and opportunities.
• In conjunction with the Finance Manager Create and their team, perform deep-dive analysis into monthly actuals to identify underlying trends, bridge the gap to budget and forecast and provide the story behind the numbers, on any over- or under-performance  
• Manage the delivery of Regional "Flash" results, in collaboration with the Finance Manager Create, shortly after month-end to provide Create FD with an early look at key performance indicators and expected critical variances before the full month-end close
• Maintain a range of Financial and Non Financial operational KPIs, KLIs, and measures that help benchmark and drive the performance of the Region
• Champion the use of BI tools, AI, automation and standardisation of process to reduce duplication and move toward real-time financial visibility

Leadership & M&A Support

• Share best practice with other Regional FBPs on delivering high impact business partnering and associated skills and mindsets
• Continue to partner closely with Local Finance Teams in the Region and across the world to adopt a “One Keywords” approach to high quality Financial Accounting and Reporting. 
• Support the onboarding of newly acquired studios into the NA Region, ensuring their financial reporting integrates seamlessly with Keywords’ global standards.
• Provide guidance and mentorship to junior finance team members, fostering a culture of continuous improvement and commercial curiosity.

This is a high profile role in the organization and candidates are expected to have proven leadership experience in managing Finance Business Partnering activities in organizations that are fast moving and project based. It is essential that the preferred candidate will bring with them a range of skills, experience and mindsets necessary to be successful in the role:

• Fully qualified accountant with demonstrable experience working as a senior manager within a Global Finance function
• Strong Finance business partnering and influencing skills and experience, including high levels of commercial acumen, organizational savvy, a bias for action, problem solving and appreciation of how to manage change and influence strategic decision  
• Experience working in organizations that have high levels of project driven revenues and require careful attention to revenue forecasting and managing the drivers of project margins (e.g. staff utilization), including but not limited to professional services, business and technology consulting, media and broadcasting sectors
• Knowledge of the game development industry would be a benefit
• FP&A process expertise with experience of operating best practices processes in organizations and Finance teams that have traditionally operated with high levels of autonomy
• Strong results orientations, with ability to challenge existing mind-sets
• Advanced financial analysis and scenario modelling skills
• Experience of driving automation, dashboarding and delivering tangible benefits to processes from integration of AI  
• Ability to communicate effectively with Senior Executives, bringing Financial concepts to life in a way that can drive growth and performance improvement
• Comfortable operating across diverse cultures and time zones 
• Collaborative and inclusive approach to working with team members and colleagues