Chief Financial Officer

The Role

• The Chief Financial Officer CFO is a key member of the Executive Committee and strategic partner to the CEO, Board, investors, and regulators.
• The CFO is responsible for safeguarding the financial strength of the business while driving sustainable growth, capital optimisation, investor confidence, and long-term value creation.
• The role provides leadership across Finance, Treasury, Financial Planning & Analysis FP&A, Tax, Procurement, Investor Relations, Regulatory Reporting, Capital Management, and Financial Operations.
• The successful candidate will build a high-performing finance organisation that delivers timely insights, enables effective decision-making, strengthens governance, and supports the company's strategic ambitions.

Key Responsibilities

Strategic Leadership:

• Serve as a trusted adviser to the CEO, Board, and Executive Committee on all financial and strategic matters.
• Contribute to the development and execution of the Company's long-term strategy and growth plans.
• Drive enterprise-wide performance management and ensure resources are allocated to the highest-return opportunities.
• Provide strategic challenge and independent insight to support decision-making across all business functions.
• Promote a culture of accountability, transparency, execution excellence, and value creation.

Financial Strategy & Performance:

• Lead the Company's financial planning, budgeting, forecasting, and performance management processes.
• Develop financial models and strategic scenarios to support growth initiatives, product expansion, and investment decisions.
• Deliver insightful management reporting and performance analysis to the Executive Committee and Board.
• Establish clear profitability and return-on-capital metrics across products, channels, and customer segments.
• Drive continuous improvement in forecasting accuracy and financial discipline.

Treasury, Funding & Capital Management:

• Develop and execute the Company's funding and capital strategy.
• Ensure effective liquidity management and maintenance of adequate capital buffers.
• Lead relationships with banks, institutional lenders, development finance institutions, investors, and funding partners.
• Identify and execute opportunities to diversify funding sources and reduce cost of funds.
• Monitor capital adequacy and ensure alignment with regulatory and growth requirements.
• Support fundraising initiatives, including debt and equity transactions.

Investor Relations & Stakeholder Management:

• Build and maintain strong relationships with shareholders, investors, lenders, auditors, rating agencies, and key stakeholders.
• Present financial performance, strategic initiatives, and funding opportunities to existing and prospective investors.
• Ensure timely, accurate, and transparent communication with stakeholders.
• Support future capital raising and strategic partnership opportunities.

Regulatory Compliance & Governance:

• Ensure full compliance with all regulatory, statutory, tax, and reporting requirements.
• Maintain strong relationships with regulators, including the Central Bank of Nigeria and other relevant authorities.
• Lead statutory reporting, annual audits, tax management, and financial governance activities.
• Ensure effective internal controls, policies, and risk management frameworks are maintained and continuously improved.
• Promote a strong control environment and a "no surprises" culture.

Business Performance & Analytics:

• Drive the use of data and analytics to improve commercial decision-making.
• Establish robust business intelligence and management reporting capabilities.
• Monitor business performance, portfolio profitability, customer economics, and operational efficiency.
• Partner with Business, Risk, Product, Operations, and Technology teams to optimise financial outcomes.
• Ensure financial insights are translated into actionable business decisions.

Portfolio & Risk Management:

• Work closely with Risk and Business teams to optimise portfolio growth and profitability.
• Monitor portfolio quality, expected losses, provisioning, and risk-adjusted returns.
• Evaluate the financial implications of credit, liquidity, operational, and market risks.
• Support sustainable growth through disciplined balance sheet management.

Technology & Finance Transformation:

• Drive automation, digitisation, and continuous improvement across finance processes.
• Ensure finance systems and reporting infrastructure support business scalability.
• Improve reporting speed, quality, and accessibility through technology and data.
• Lead finance transformation initiatives that enhance efficiency and effectiveness.

Leadership & Talent Development:

• Build, lead, and develop a high-performing finance organisation.
• Foster a culture of accountability, ownership, continuous learning, and excellence.
• Develop succession plans and strengthen leadership capability across the finance function.
• Mentor and coach future finance leaders within the organisation.
• Collaborate effectively across all business functions to achieve organisational goals.

Requirements

Education & Professional Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in Finance, Accounting, Economics, Business Administration, or a related discipline.
• ACA, ACCA, CPA, CFA, or equivalent professional qualification required.
• MBA or advanced business qualification is an advantage.

Experience:

• Minimum 15 years of progressive finance leadership experience.
• Minimum 5 years in a CFO, Finance Director, Deputy CFO, or equivalent executive role.
• Strong experience within financial services, banking, fintech, lending, payments, or consumer finance.
• Demonstrated success managing large balance sheets, funding programmes, and regulatory relationships.
• Proven experience leading fundraising, investor engagement, and capital management initiatives.
• Experience driving finance transformation and organisational growth.

Key Competencies:

Strategic & Commercial:

• Strong strategic thinking and business acumen.
• Ability to connect financial performance with business strategy.
• Strong understanding of growth, profitability, and value creation drivers.

Leadership:

• Executive presence and credibility with Boards, investors, regulators, and senior stakeholders.
• Proven ability to build and lead high-performing teams.
• Strong influencing and stakeholder management skills.

Technical Excellence:

• Deep knowledge of financial reporting, treasury, taxation, capital management, and regulatory requirements.
• Strong financial modelling and analytical capability.
• Experience with modern finance systems and data-driven decision-making.

Personal Attributes:

• High integrity and sound judgement.
• Strong accountability and ownership mindset.
• Resilient and adaptable in fast-paced environments.
• Results-oriented with a bias for execution.
• Collaborative and able to work effectively across multiple functions.

Success Measures:

Within the first 6–12 months, the CFO will be expected to:

• Strengthen profitability and forecasting accuracy.
• Improve capital efficiency and liquidity management.
• Enhance management reporting and business insights.
• Successfully execute funding and capital initiatives.
• Strengthen investor, Board, and regulatory confidence.
• Improve finance operational efficiency through automation and transformation.
• Build a high-performing finance leadership team capable of supporting the Company's long-term growth ambitions.