Director Finance Business Partner

About the Role

Mastercard (KSA) is seeking a Director, Finance Business Partner to join their team in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. This full-time role involves a broad range of finance responsibilities, acting as a key finance business partner for the West Arabia Division. The Finance Business Partner team is responsible for planning, operating performance, and management reporting for the Division and Cluster, and collaborates with the business on strategy development and execution.

Key Responsibilities

• Serve as the primary finance liaison for the West Arabia division, working closely with management, account managers, marketing, services, and the West Arabia Finance team.
• Lead profit and loss (P&L) management and results analysis to support business performance, identify risks and opportunities, and provide actionable insights.
• Drive forecasting and budgeting processes across markets, customers, and product lines.
• Contribute to the development, assessment, and implementation of Sales Incentive Plans (SIP), including setting plan objectives and calculating individual results.
• Ensure local investment and fund allocation align with fund objectives, customer requirements, and country strategy.
• Assess the financial impact of new Customer Business Agreements (CBAs) in partnership with account managers, maintain a robust pipeline of CBA opportunities, and monitor deal performance.
• Promote controllership excellence by educating business teams on relevant accounting principles, policies, and procedures.
• Oversee ad-hoc strategic projects related to pricing and P&L by product and segment.
• Lead evaluations of special initiatives, including partnerships, non-traditional deals, and mergers & acquisitions.
• Cultivate strong relationships with the DFO, West Arabia Finance team, and the broader EEMEA Finance organization.
• Contribute to core finance functions such as FP&A, Controller’s Group, Pricing, Business Planning, and Deal Management, advocating for continuous improvement.

Stakeholder Engagement and Influence

• Influence and negotiate with market business unit heads, challenging assumptions to shape account management strategies and business plans to achieve revenue targets and implement disciplined forecasting.
• Support the resolution of customer service issues, addressing concerns related to billing, waiver requests, and business case targets.
• Ensure Finance is integrated with and supports the business, providing managers with information to maximize revenue, profitability, and efficiency, and contributing financial inputs to strategic and tactical plans.

Key Relationships

This position reports to the Vice President, East and West Arabia DFO. Key internal stakeholders include Country/Cluster General Managers, Sales teams, Regional FP&A and CFO, and Product management. Global interactions involve Global Finance, GBSC, and Billing Services. External relationships include customers, suppliers, and regulators.

Candidate Profile

• High intellect with strong commercial aptitude and a creative approach to problem-solving.
• Effective influencing skills, capable of communicating and presenting to management with a persuasive yet firm approach.
• Assertive, adaptable, and resilient team leader able to collaborate with diverse personalities.
• Strong work ethic, meticulous, hands-on, with the ability to understand the broader strategic picture.
• Ambitious, highly driven, motivated, and capable of driving change.
• Maturity to challenge ideas and balance opportunities with potential threats.