Senior Finance Manager - Category Finance - Duesseldorf

At Arla, we do so much more than make some of the world’s favourite dairy products. We make special moments worth savouring and healthy tasty breakfasts worth waking up to.

With brands like Arla Buko®, Kærgarden®, Arla Skyr ® and Castello® we are a natural part of modern life in over 100 countries around the world and a favourite in many German households.

This challenging role is focused on the full finance support for brands and categories in the German market. The job holder will have the category marketing teams and, especially the VP Marketing GE as key stakeholders.

The role will also have links into Europe and the Global Marketing and Innovation team so matrix working is extremely important.

The role is one out of two category finance positions in the German commercial finance team located in Düsseldorf.

The successful applicant will need to be able to work independently, have the ability to positively challenge and influence and needs to be able to communicate effectively at all levels.

Your responsibility

• Key finance business partner and trusted advisor to the relevant category
• Key driver of preparing sound business cases and following up on performance e.g. new innovation
• Working closely with category and with sales teams on pricing and promotional strategies
• Provide relevant reporting, review business performance, KPIs and highlight issues and trends
• Support and challenge the category team in all areas of investments and profit improvement e.g. marketing spend efficiency, portfolio management
• Represent finance at Category meetings, innovation forums etc. and provide challenge and financial insight
• Review monthly volume, TM and marketing spend forecasts and challenge areas of concern
• Ensure proper governance of all marketing spend including full utilization of purchase order process / Ariba system
• Support tracking and updates of German strategy in the area of category building blocks / initiative concepts
• Support competitive analysis and ad hoc analysis requests
• Track and monitor SG&A spending (as support to junior category finance colleague)
• Potentially support global stronghold projects

Your profile

• At least 5-7 years of experience in Corporate Finance strategy, strategic finance planning and change management
• University degree on Master Level with specialization in finance; foreign experience is preferred
• Strong international and open mindset and excellent skills in working in a global matrix organization
• Business fluent German mother tongue and other languages strongly preferred

What we offer

• Work-life balance : A 38.5 hour week, as well as time recording with flexible working hours - also from home and 30+ days holiday
• Culture : Our unique, Scandinavian corporate culture with flat hierarchies and short decision-making paths within our cooperative structure, as well as a high degree of appreciation, especially through our feedback culture, for example with 1 : 1 meetings
• Further development : access to our learning library for online training and global career opportunities
• Employee benefits : Discounts on our entire product portfolio and access to the Corporate Benefits Programme with attractive discounts at gyms, for example
• Sustainability : High standards of our strong sustainability concept
• Location : Culinary catering in our in-house company restaurant with daily fresh meals - enhanced with our Arla products and a Starbucks corner.

Our office is also easy to reach thanks to good transport links and we offer free employee parking