Ogilvy

Senior Commercial Accountant

Business area: Enablement

Team: Commercial Finance

Location: Sea Containers, London 

Full Time/Part time: Full-Time

Reporting into: Commercial Controller

Our Vision 

Our vision is to inspire brands and people to impact the world. To create big ideas that make a significant contribution to the planet, society, and the bottom line. We believe in today’s world this is the best way for our clients to achieve sustainable growth. 

We achieve this by breaking down the barriers that restrict talent and ideas, we call this Borderless Creativity. 

Which is why our teams work fluidly across five capabilities: Advertising, Consulting, Experience, PR and Influence, and Health. This allows us to not only operate but innovate at the intersection of capabilities and talent. We believe impact and magic lie at this intersection. Ogilvy scales this by seamlessly connecting and accessing the deep and diverse cultural expertise of 132 offices in 83 countries in a way that celebrates our commitment to inclusion. 

Our mission: We inspire brands and people to impact the world 

How we do it: We innovate and operate at the intersection of people and capabilities 

What we do: Borderless creativity 

About this role: 

This role will report into the Commercial Controller and will be a key part of the Commercial Finance team.

You will work with the Commercial Controller to improve the level of commercial acumen across the Commercial Finance and wider Agency teams.

You will have a close working relationship with your client leads and with the other Commercial Accountants.

You will be responsible for challenging your client leads, in terms of revenue growth opportunities, both within the existing Business area, as well as cross-selling opportunities across the other businesses.

You will be responsible for driving client margin improvement and leading change and best practice in relation to finance in your client teams and assisting/training others to do the same on other clients.

You will be part of a dynamic team which strives to ensure best commercial practice is at the heart of all agency business transactions.

Key Responsibilities:

• Thought Leadership and Propagating Best Practice
• Manage our approach to conflict management and ensure adherence
• Provide thought leadership/ guidance on Pricing to agency and Commercial Finance teams
• Identify and suggest alternative pricing mechanisms – e.g., output based rates for existing clients
• Review and feedback on contracts and NDA’s and prepare commercial submissions for pitches (integrated new opportunities)
• Represent the Commercial team in meetings as required
• Help lead the internal roll-out and management of bespoke finance training to the business
• Lead best practice on internal/external reporting, compliance & NWC
• Ensure Management Information is understood and used by finance and client teams, including the management and monitoring of all margin improvement plans
• Provide ad-hoc support to Commercial Controller on special targeted projects across key functions
• Partnership with the Client Leads
• o Ensuring timely reporting in adherence with internal timetables
• o Reviewing and challenging the business pillar allocations with the client leads
• o Identifying and flagging potential cross-selling opportunities on clients
• o Working with the client leads on resource reforecasting and ensuring this is recorded in the capacity planning tool, advising on best practice and margin improvement
• o Building a margin improvement plan for specific accounts and monitoring progress against it.
• o Regular catch-up with the client project managers to understand the latest scopes, staffing, capacity planning and job progress on clients
• o Main point of contact for your client leads on financial best practice and commercial discipline
• Overseeing all margin plans and advising on progress
• Reviewing the KPIs with the client leads and providing narrative on areas as appropriate and making an improvement plan
• Client Reporting
• o Leading client negotiations on your portfolio of clients and being the key contact for the client procurement departments
• o Preparing accurate and timely client reconciliations
• o Lead any client audits on your accounts
• o Understand your client contracts and ensure all are aware of contractual points
• o Accounting for foreign exchange in line with the client contract and Ogilvy policies
• o Ensuring the revenue tracker is kept up to date at all times and matches exactly to
• o Posting any revenue accrual or deferral journals in a timely manner for month-end reporting
• o Providing narrative for any revenue accruals and deferrals, particularly those over 30 days
• Maconomy reporting each month-end
• Managing Staff
• o Managing and mentoring a Commercial Accountant
• o Setting objectives and targets for yourself and the Commercial Accountant and assisting with the overall target setting process
• o Participate in annual appraisals and regular catch-ups and follow up on action points as agreed
• o Providing constructive feedback to ensure job satisfaction and company objectives are met, including working closely with Ogilvy management to ensure own requirements are fulfilled
• Compliance
• Ensuring compliance with ICFR regulations in relevant areas, particularly in relation to revenue recognition
• Assisting in any ICFR or other audits (external/internal)
• Raising queries if ICFR regulations are not clear or require interrogation
• Job Management
• o Working closely with the Commercial WIP Managers to ensure all jobs are opened, maintained and closed efficiently and effectively.
• o Working closely with the Commercial WIP Managers to ensure regular timely billing and review of all jobs to ensure NWC is managed effectively.
• o Ensuring best commercial practice (including use of Maconomy) in all areas of job management
• o Tracking jobs regularly and highlighting areas of over service
• o Ensuring rate cards and estimate are up-to-date and accurate
• o Ensuring best practice in relation to foreign exchange hedging
• NWC Management
• o Regular review of aged debtors and accrued revenue balances
• o Chasing up debtors directly with the client where necessary
• o Liaison with Finance Plus as appropriate, including monthly phone calls to review overdue invoices
• o Ensuring Provisions are kept at WPP acceptable level for Accrued Revenue, WIP and Debtors.
• o Training the finance and non-finance teams in respect of best commercial practice
• Client Profitability
• o Tracking jobs and proactively challenging your client teams on overruns
• o Reviewing all SOWs and push back where necessary
• o Regular review of rate cards and standard practice
• o Ensuring efficient planning of staff at appropriate levels
• o Preparing and analyzing reports for the Commercial Controllers and the client teams in respect of client profitability, over servicing, recoverability across all clients
• Ad-hoc
• o Client analysis as requested by Commercial Controller or Finance Directors
• o Liaise with client needs on day-to-day client procurement requests
• o Ensuring that all queries are responded to with accurate and timely information

A bit about you: 

A qualified and experienced, commercially focused qualified accountant who will drive change in the business . The individual will be expected to lead meetings, lead by example and positively influence others in the team

• An individual who is self-motivated and deadline driven with an excellent track record of accuracy
• A combination of excellent attention to detail and the ability to step back and see the bigger picture from a commercial perspective
• Excellent communication and people management skills
• Proven ability to improve margins and improve processes to drive efficiency whilst constantly keeping in mind the commercial impact on the business
• An individual who works well with both finance and non-finance staff, who is approachable, very well organized and has a desire to succeed
• An individual who is able to work with independence, and able to interact with and influence the wider business to put commercial best practice at the heart of their business
• Experience of working in the Media industry is preferable but not mandatory
• Experience of Maconomy is preferable but not mandatory. Strong Excel skills are essential

At Ogilvy UK, we want to make sure that you’re set up to grow and develop in your role and enjoy some of the best times of your working career. Our learning and development team are on hand to provide training for you, to help you excel in every aspect of your role. So, if you think you may not have experience in some aspects of this position, don’t worry, and apply away. We’re here to help you grow and nurture your skills. 

How we help you Thrive: 

• 25 days annual leave + 1 Volunteer Day
• Bupa Healthcare (including Bupa health assessment and menopause support)
• Enhanced leave policies or parents and carers
• We have a flexible working policy with core working hours between 10am – 4pm. We also operate a 3:2 hybrid working structure
• A 1.5:1 matching pension structure
• Up to £25.00 per month towards physical or online exercise class membership
• Opportunity to sign up for Unmind membership, LifeWorks tool and annual eye tests
• Learning and development budgets plus enhanced and ongoing wellbeing incentives and activities throughout the year
• Season ticket loan and cycle to work scheme 
• Life Assurance x4 salary 
• Inclusion@Ogilvy – our employee networks Ogilvy ReWired, Roots, Equals, PROUD and Parents and Carers. See here for more information 

Dedicated to our people, we provide additional perks to help support your work life balance 

If this sounds like the right role and company for you, we’d love to hear from you. 

Our ambition is to attract the very best diverse talent to Ogilvy, and to be the employer of choice in the UK. We want everyone to feel welcome when they join us, and once they’re here, for them to want to stay with us, grow their career, and to feel they belong with us. 

We are an equal opportunity employer and we’re committed to creating an inclusive, welcoming environment for everyone who wants to work at Ogilvy. For us, diversity, equity and inclusion is integrated into everything that we do. We believe that for creativity to flourish, everything about how we work must have diversity at its core. Your race, colour, ethnic, religion, gender, gender identity, national origin, sexual orientation, age, marital status, disability, have no bearing on our hiring decisions, but we encourage everyone to feel free to express their true selves in an environment we are consistently striving to make as inclusive as possible. 

We aim to facilitate an accessible and positive application experience for all candidates. If you require any adjustments from us to support you through the process or expect to require any adjustments to working conditions to be able to best perform in the role, please let us know. We are happy to consider all reasonable adjustments. 

Ogilvy is an equal opportunity employer and considers applicants for all positions without regard to race, color, religion or belief, sex, age, national origin, citizenship status, marital status, military/veteran status, genetic information, sexual orientation, gender identity, physical or mental disability. We believe in creating a dynamic work environment that values diversity and inclusion and strives to recruit a diverse slate of candidates to help us achieve that goal.