Global Head of Planning Excellence and Decision Support

The mandate

The Global Head will define what excellent planning looks like and ensure the standard improves decisions rather than creating procedural uniformity. Teams currently possess strong local knowledge, but methods, role boundaries and analytical depth vary. The opportunity is to establish common disciplines while protecting legitimate differences in decision context.

This permanent remit combines planning policy, capability, finance-business partnering, community leadership and quality measurement. It will distinguish mandatory controls from adaptable practices, create an evidence-based maturity path and move specialist knowledge closer to the decisions where it matters.

The Global Head may set FP&A standards, certify critical-role capability, approve deviations and commission quality reviews. The position does not take budget ownership away from executives or centralise every analysis. It defines the conditions under which planning evidence is trusted and finance partners exercise challenge.

First-year work progresses through diagnosis, standard setting, two lighthouse implementations and broader adoption. The result must include stronger succession, shorter planning friction and proof that common methods improve forecast quality or resource decisions. A catalogue of training activity without changed practice will not count as transformation.

What you will own

• Define a planning excellence framework covering purpose, decision rights, drivers, scenario practice, controls, partnering, talent and outcome measures.
• Segment standards into non-negotiable enterprise controls and locally adaptable methods, with a governed deviation route.
• Assess capability through observed work products and decision simulations rather than self-rated skill inventories.
• Select two lighthouse problems where improved methods can produce visible financial and decision outcomes within six months.
• Establish peer reviews for major forecasts and investment papers, recording quality findings and adopted changes.
• Build role-based development pathways for analysts, partners, planning leaders and specialist model owners, linked to live responsibilities.
• Measure cycle time, rework, forecast explainability, challenge quality and realised decision value before and after adoption.
• Create succession depth for critical planning roles and a global practitioner council able to maintain standards independently.

Candidate qualifications

• At least 18 years in FP&A and financial leadership, including global or multi-region responsibility for planning capability.
• Evidence that a planning excellence programme changed forecast performance or allocation decisions, not just training participation.
• Broad technical command of drivers, integrated modelling, scenarios, management reporting, capital appraisal and planning controls.
• Experience balancing enterprise consistency with local decision relevance through explicit deviation governance.
• A case where a maturity assessment identified a structural role or authority problem that process training could not solve.
• Demonstrated development of senior finance partners and specialist successors across multiple markets.
• Executive influence grounded in observed evidence and operating outcomes rather than ownership of a methodology brand.

Working terms and boundaries

• This continuing appointment is reviewed in year one after diagnosis, standard approval, lighthouse delivery and the first global capability cycle.
• Authority encompasses planning standards, deviations and capability certification; operating budgets and local business decisions retain existing owners.
• Mumbai is the primary base, with scheduled international travel around lighthouse work and practitioner-council sessions.
• The programme cannot mandate common tooling or reorganise teams without separate authorised decisions and accountable sponsors.
• Year-one success requires measurable practice change, two evidenced outcomes, succession coverage and an operating global council.

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 FPA-PER-2026-BOM-25.