Senior Financial Planning & Analysis Partner I (MDG)

Company Description

At Nielsen, we are passionate about our work to power a better media future for all people by providing powerful insights that drive client decisions and deliver extraordinary results. Our talented, global workforce is dedicated to capturing audience engagement with content - wherever and whenever it’s consumed. Together, we are proudly rooted in our deep legacy as we stand at the forefront of the media revolution. When you join Nielsen, you will join a dynamic team committed to excellence, perseverance, and the ambition to make an impact together. We champion you, because when you succeed, we do too. We enable your best to power our future.

Job Description

About the Role

As a Senior Analyst in Master Data Governance within our FP&A organization, you will serve as the critical bridge between finance operations, commercial/supply chain teams, system architecture, and strategic planning. You will play a pivotal role in designing, implementing, and maintaining SAP Master Data Governance for both Financial and Enterprise Data. By ensuring absolute data integrity across financial structures, materials, and business partners, managing workflows, and acting as the centralized gatekeeper for data sanity, you will directly enable accurate financial reporting, profitability analysis, forecasting, and cross-functional business transformation.

Qualifications

Key Responsibilities

1. Data Governance & Maintenance

Process Design & Implementation: Design and execute governance processes, data standards, and definitions for core financial and enterprise master data within systems like SAP S/4HANA. This includes:

Financial Data: Cost Centers, Profit Centers, General Ledgers, and Chart of Accounts.

Commercial & Supply Chain Data: Material Codes, Business Partners (Vendor Names, Customer Names), and Sales Groups.

Centralized Gatekeeping: Act as the central control point for all master data updates before they are released to controllership or procurement/sales, ensuring strict adherence to global financial and business standards.

Workflow Management: Streamline request intake workflows, standardize templates, and refine exception-handling procedures utilizing SAP MDG, S/4HANA, and internal IT ticketing systems.

Execution: Execute complex master data creation, extension, and modification requests across all relevant domains within the MDG tool to support evolving business needs seamlessly.
 

2. Data Quality & Hygiene (Data Sanity)

Business Partnership & Pushback: Actively challenge business stakeholders on requests for new data creation (e.g., unnecessary Profit Centers, duplicate Vendor/Customer records, or redundant Material Codes) to prevent data bloat.

Cross-Functional Alignment: Play a critical role in ensuring financial structures align perfectly with operational data. Guarantee accurate mapping of Material Codes and Sales Groups to the correct Profit Centers and financial dimensions to ensure flawless downstream profitability reporting.

Audits & Root Cause Analysis: Establish data quality KPIs and conduct regular data audits. Lead proactive data cleansing initiatives and execute root-cause analyses for recurring data anomalies across the P2P (Procure-to-Pay), O2C (Order-to-Cash), and R2R (Record-to-Report) value chains.
 

3. System Implementation & Enhancements

Technical Translation: Collaborate closely with IT and business stakeholders to translate complex financial and FP&A requirements into technical MDG solutions spanning finance, material, and business partner domains.

Project Leadership: Lead workshops, map future-state data architectures, and support the testing and deployment of system enhancements.

Automation & Transformation: Continuously evaluate the MDG landscape to outline and champion areas for workflow automation and process transformation.

User Empowerment: Develop training materials and conduct workshops to educate end-users on new processes, governance standards, and system enhancements.
 

4. Reporting & Stakeholder Management

Documentation: Maintain comprehensive, up-to-date documentation regarding data standards, workflow rules, process flows, and system configurations for all data objects.

Subject Matter Expertise: Act as the primary SME for enterprise MDG, guiding end-users, managing Service Level Agreements (SLAs), and resolving master data-related escalations effectively.

Additional Information

Qualifications & Requirements

• Education: Bachelor’s degree in Finance, Accounting, Information Technology, or a related field. An MBA, CA, or CPA is highly preferred.
   
• Experience: [Insert, e.g., 5–7] years of professional experience in master data governance.
• Deep, hands-on experience utilizing SAP MDG, with exposure across multiple domains including SAP MDG-F (Finance), MDG-M (Material), and MDG-BP/C/S (Business Partner/Customer/Supplier).
   
• Strong foundational understanding of FP&A processes (budgeting, forecasting, variance analysis) and how upstream data (materials, vendors, customers) impacts downstream financial reporting.
   
• Technical Skills:
   
• Expert proficiency in SAP S/4HANA Master Data frameworks.
   
• Strong knowledge of data modeling, data quality management tools, and workflow configurations.

Soft Skills:

• Exceptional analytical and problem-solving capabilities.
   
• Strong stakeholder management skills, with the confidence to push back on non-compliant business requests across various departments (Finance, Sales, Procurement).
   
• Ability to work independently in a fast-paced, highly compliant, and matrixed environment.

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