Finance Controller LATAM, Essential Home

About Essential Home

At Essential Home, we know that people invest a lot of energy, time and money in transforming their houses into a place they can call home: somewhere to connect with family, friends and themselves a place where they feel protected and are proud of.

We have a portfolio of market-leading brands mainly in high margin, low penetrated categories with an opportunity for enhanced growth, driven by renewed focus and investment, and funded through meaningful cost optimization opportunities.

Each day, we strive to create a range of superior products and solutions across our current focus of air care, surface, laundry and pest with a conscious use of resources, to best serve our consumers in partnership with our customers. Join us in in our goal for consumers - Making a House Your Home.

​Finance​

Within the wider controllership team, the Regional Financial Controller LATAM is responsible for leading and overseeing all financial controller activities in the region, ensuring financial integrity, regulatory compliance and operational efficiency. This position aims to ensure that accounting and financial practices in the are aligned with corporate policies and local regulations, in addition to providing strategic support to decision making at senior management level. This would be achieved through mature stakeholder management with both internal (such as Tax, Treasury, Shared services centers) and external parties (such as compliance service providers, auditors, banks and tax authorities). The position reports to the local Finance Director and Global Corporate Controller.

About the role

The role forms part of the newly created Essential Home Finance Controllership, who, as a team, will be challenged with setting up the overall Corporate Finance and Finance Controlling function of the Essential Home business.  
 
We are creating an agile, entrepreneurial and results-oriented team with an emphasis on action, accountability, local ownership and care for each other. The team will be responsible for designing, implementing and managing the end-to-end finance controllership function of the Essential Home group in  businesses across Europe, North America and LATAM.  This includes the design and directing of: 
•    Record to report, Procure to Pay, Order to Cash functions of the group companies in collaboration with the shared services center
•    Group Finance Policies, Standards and Procedures 
•    Internal financial controls framework 
•    Group consolidation, reporting and audit processes 
•    External financial and statutory reporting and compliance requirements 
•    Other financial related compliance such as local taxes
 

Your responsibilities

Ensure monthly financial reporting aligns with IFRS and group policies across regional entities.
Prepare annual statutory accounts and meet local compliance requirements.
Maintain accurate monthly accounts by managing shared service providers.
Review key balance sheet reconciliations and approve high-risk financial assumptions.
Final sign-off on regional trial balances and balance sheets.
Analyze trends and deviations in financial results vs. forecasts and budgets.
Manage reconciliation between statutory and management accounts.
Coordinate internal and external audits and implement recommendations.
Ensure consistency between external consolidated reports and internal systems.
Cash Flow, PTP & OTC
Lead cash flow forecasting, identify insights, and drive improvements.
Oversee PTP (Procure to Pay) and OTC (Order to Cash) processes and KPIs from shared services, ensuring proactive issue resolution.
Controls & IFRS Compliance
Develop and maintain strong internal financial controls in collaboration with other departments.
Stay updated on IFRS changes and group developments (e.g., M&A) affecting reporting and consolidation.
Tax & Adjacent Processes
Review and approve VAT and indirect tax submissions, managing relevant service providers.
Support adjacent processes like payroll, insurance, and FX management.
Stakeholder & Team Management
Build strong relationships with internal and external stakeholders (e.g., Corporate Finance, auditors, banks, fiscal authorities).
Monitor service quality and resolve bottlenecks with providers using KPIs.
Lead and mentor finance teams across local, corporate, and shared service functions.
Transformation to Standalone Group
Drive transformation from Reckitt to Essential Home, implementing new processes and tools.
Focus on designing and deploying standalone ERP and consolidation systems.
Contribute to building a new central finance shared service function.
Promote proactive thinking to standardize, simplify, and optimize financial controlling for a dynamic future operating model.

The experience we're looking for

•    Accountancy qualification - Higher education in Accounting, Finance, Economics or related areas;
•    Strong experience in financial in controllership, with a senior leadership position;
•    In-depth knowledge of international accounting standards (IFRS) and local accounting standards;
•    Experience in managing and achieving results through working with outsourced service providers related to financial controlling (such as central shared service centers, tax and internal audit advisors);
•    Experience in operating within group reporting requirements and timetables, as well as matrix-based reporting lines;
•    Experience in external audit processes;
•    Experience in SAP, other financial reporting software (such as Hyperion, S4H consolidation platform) and Microsoft Office applications;
•    The business language in Essential Home is English, therefore fluency in English is essential.

The skills for success

Have a “can do” attitude, positive outlook and remain consistent under pressure
•    Believe that building trust is important in team co-operation
•    Are excited by the opportunity to build new processes from scratch and keen to simplify or standardise existing processes
•    Are keen to “roll up your sleeves” and be involved in a diverse portfolio of work
•    Are a team player with a “big picture” approach – able to win confidence and deal with a wide range of stakeholders
•    Are a logical thinker with ability to organise, sequence and break down complex activities. 
•    Have the ability to prioritise and identifying the “things that matter” which should be focused on
•    Are a natural problem solver and you work collaboratively & cross-functional to find solutions.
•    Want to be a change agent. You are inspired by change and want to reshape the way we build and innovate the Finance controlling function.
•    Respect other points of view, while not being afraid to share your thoughts and views
•    Are comfortable working in changing environments with the inherent ambiguities
•    Are a clear communicator, comfortable in interacting and influencing senior stakeholders
•    The candidate will be achievement focused and able to work in a direct and often pressurised environment. Entrepreneurial skills in terms of innovation and problem solving are key along with tenacity, tough-mindedness and ability to influence and demonstrate strong team workin