Working Capital Operating Council Director

The mandate

Working capital is being managed through separate inventory, receivables and payables initiatives whose benefits cannot be reconciled to cash. The adviser will help create an operating council that makes cross-functional choices without turning treasury into the owner of commercial, supply or procurement execution. The persistent question is which actions release durable cash and which merely move timing or risk elsewhere.

At two days a week, the director will review analytical packs, coach the council secretariat and join a fortnightly meeting with accountable process leaders. A quarterly executive session will test unresolved trade-offs and the quality of realised benefits. The cadence is designed to improve management judgement rather than build a parallel programme office.

The adviser will require bridges from operational drivers to cash movement. Receivables improvement must distinguish collection, billing correction, write-off and portfolio change. Payables claims must account for lost discounts, supplier continuity and overdue exposure. Inventory actions must separate demand, policy, obsolescence and simple reclassification. One cash movement may not be claimed by several initiatives.

Influence is advisory only, with no line authority. The director will not set customer or supplier terms, direct collection activity, approve purchasing policy, change inventory parameters or move cash. Management owns execution and consequences. The adviser may recommend that a benefit claim be rejected or that an initiative stop until its accounting and operating effects are evidenced.

By month seven, the council should run with a common value ledger, explicit decision rights and a reliable view of sustainable cash release. The final review will show where cash improved, where exposure was transferred, which behaviours remain unresolved and whether the council can continue without external challenge.

What you will own

• Establish a driver tree connecting receivables, inventory and payables operating measures to reported cash and balance movements.
• Create a single value ledger with baseline, owner, mechanism, timing, reversibility and rules preventing duplicate benefit recognition.
• Define council decisions and escalation thresholds so cross-functional trade-offs reach the right executive before value erodes.
• Challenge timing-only actions, balance reclassifications and unsupported opportunity estimates before they enter executive reporting.
• Introduce counter-metrics for customer dispute, supplier distress, stock availability, obsolescence and control deterioration.
• Recommend intervention sequencing based on durable cash, operating consequence and execution capacity rather than headline opportunity.
• Coach owners to present disconfirming evidence and reconcile realised actions to treasury cash bridges.
• Issue a final sustainability assessment; management retains all commercial, purchasing, inventory and treasury approvals.

Candidate qualifications

• Demonstrate leadership of enterprise working-capital governance spanning receivables, inventory and payables rather than a single process campaign.
• Show how you distinguished durable cash release from timing movement or transferred operating risk.
• Provide an example of rejecting an overstated benefit claim and the reconciliation evidence that changed executive reporting.
• Evidence influence with commercial, supply, procurement and finance leaders while leaving execution accountability intact.
• Bring fluency in cash bridges, working-capital balances, operational drivers and counter-metrics that protect enterprise value.
• Describe a council or governance rhythm that continued after your advisory involvement ended.
• Disclose relationships with finance providers, collection firms or working-capital solution vendors that may create conflicts.

Working terms and boundaries

• The retainer covers two days a week, preparation and attendance at one fortnightly council and one quarterly executive session.
• Additional workshops or urgent attendance require prior written approval and separate pricing.
• The adviser cannot change commercial terms, approve inventory policy, direct suppliers or customers, or execute treasury transactions.
• Management owns data, operating actions, accounting treatment and reported benefit decisions.
• Independence and conflict disclosures are continuing requirements throughout the seven-month term.

Application

Applications for this mandate are received in one way only: through the India Board Terminal's application process. It is automated end to end. Your Executive Passport travels to the mandate holder in its confidential form, your answers to the three questions below are read before anything else in your file, and every stage that follows is recorded on your applications page.

There is no address to write to and no intermediary to call. The mandate holder reads what the Terminal delivers and nothing else, which is what keeps the process the same for every applicant and keeps your name out of it until you release it. Applications close on 5 October 2026. Mandate reference FNA-ADV-2026-ZRH-12.