Chief Accountant (Manufacturing) – Tigoni

How to Apply: Interested and qualified candidates should apply through the Summit Recruitment and Search website at summitrecruitment-search.com.

Prove You Can Close Books in 10 Days and Cost Dairy Products

This Chief Accountant role is not a generic finance job. The hiring team will screen for evidence that you have owned a general ledger in a manufacturing setup, handled product costing across raw materials and finished goods, and kept receivables under 60 days. Your CV and interview stories need to show those exact realities, not just years of experience.

1. Lead with manufacturing close speed: The posting demands month-end and year-end close within 10 days. On your CV, replace 'managed month-end close' with a bullet like 'Delivered month-end close in 8 days for a dairy manufacturer with KES 500M turnover.' In interviews, be ready to explain how you sequence reconciliations, cut-off procedures, and team reviews to hit that deadline without errors.

2. Show product costing depth: You will drive costing for raw materials, work-in-progress, and finished goods across dairy, agrovet, retail, and events. Prepare a one-page example of a product cost build-up you have done, including how you treated overhead absorption and stock valuation. Hiring managers often ask candidates to walk through a margin analysis they performed and what action it triggered.

3. Quantify receivables control: The role requires receivables below 60 days. Bring a concrete story of how you reduced DSO in a previous company, including the credit control policies you introduced and how you worked with sales teams. Avoid vague claims like 'improved cash flow'—use numbers such as 'reduced DSO from 75 to 52 days in six months.'

4. Map your IFRS and tax compliance wins: Strong IFRS knowledge and hands-on VAT, PAYE, WHT, corporate tax, NSSF, SHA, eTIMS, and KRA compliance are non-negotiable. Create a compliance matrix on your CV listing each area and a specific achievement, such as 'Led eTIMS integration across three entities with zero penalties.' Interviewers will probe your process for handling KRA audits and resolving audit issues within agreed timelines.

5. Demonstrate ERP and Excel muscle: The job requires hands-on ERP experience and advanced Excel. Name the ERP systems you have used (e.g., SAP, Oracle, Microsoft Dynamics) and describe a report or automation you built in Excel that saved time or improved accuracy. Be ready for a practical test where you manipulate large data sets or build a costing model on the spot.

6. Prepare for internal controls scenarios: You will design and strengthen controls across finance, stock, procurement, payroll, and banking. Think of a time you identified a control weakness, proposed a fix, and measured the impact. Interviewers may give you a scenario like 'stock counts keep differing from system records' and expect a structured response covering segregation of duties, cycle counts, and reconciliation frequency.

7. Show you can lead and mentor a finance team: The role explicitly includes leading, mentoring, and developing a high-performing team. Prepare examples of how you have coached junior accountants, handled underperformance, and built succession. Avoid saying you are a 'team player'—instead, describe a specific development plan you created for a team member and the outcome.

8. Connect finance to operations: The description stresses partnering closely with operations to drive business performance. Bring an example where you used financial analysis to influence an operational decision, such as changing a production schedule or renegotiating a supplier contract. Explain how you communicated complex numbers to non-finance managers and what changed as a result.