Group Finance Chief, Digital Business Combination — Interim

The mandate

Acquisition close has combined two digital services businesses but left the enlarged group without its intended finance chief because the nominated executive withdrew before taking the seat. Two capable entity teams remain, but their reporting definitions and cash routines differ. The interim Group Finance Chief assumes executive ownership of the combined finance perimeter before those differences compromise the first board reporting cycle.

Start is 26 October 2026 for a six-month assignment, with a permanent group CFO search proceeding in parallel. The immediate agenda covers combined close integrity, liquidity decision rights and control of integration financial claims. Extension can be considered if the successor timetable changes, subject to written approval and an overall twenty-four-month limit on total engagement length.

Handover requires three accepted combined monthly closes, a reconciled opening position, an approved liquidity responsibility map and an inducted permanent CFO who can operate the next board review. Material unresolved accounting positions must have qualified ownership and a documented resolution route. Finance integration is not finished if the combined result reconciles only through unexplained manual adjustments controlled by the interim alone.

The finance chief may direct the group finance team, establish close controls and prioritise cash inside approved delegations. Changes to accounting policy, material integration expenditure and external funding commitments require authorised executive or board decisions. Independent valuation, legal deal interpretation and specialist tax positions are separately owned. The role must preserve those boundaries while making their consequences visible in combined reporting and funding recommendations.

The assignment excludes renegotiating the acquisition, imposing a complete enterprise system replacement and taking over commercial integration delivery. Limited finance interface repairs belong in scope where they are necessary to make reporting and cash ownership reliable. The executive bridge should close with usable controls, transparent residual decisions and a functioning group leadership relationship, not a finance empire expanded around every integration difficulty.

What you will own

• Establish the combined close responsibility map with source owners and review duties, identifying where entity definitions differ before their totals enter a group result that directors assume is comparable.
• Decide immediate consolidation controls and material reconciliation priorities, protecting the first reporting cycles while preserving an issue trail for accounting questions requiring specialist or executive approval.
• Build a combined cash outlook that distinguishes entity obligations, integration expenditure and accessible funds, preventing one business's apparent liquidity from being used to support commitments without authorised transfer conditions.
• Challenge synergy reporting through approved actions and observed financial evidence, keeping unimplemented integration assumptions separate from the operating forecast and the board's assessment of realised progress.
• Govern finance interface repairs through proportionate control tests, requiring business owners to demonstrate reliable data transfer rather than approving broad technology change during a short executive bridge.
• Lead joint finance reviews that develop accountable group-team behaviour, resolving duplicate duties and unclear escalations without eliminating useful entity expertise or independent specialist judgement.
• Transfer the seat through a permanent-CFO-led combined close and board preparation rehearsal, securing steering acceptance of residual positions, liquidity duties and the final executive authority record.

Candidate qualifications

• Bring previous CFO or substantial executive finance leadership in digital services, technology or a comparable multi-entity business. Demonstrate control of a material reporting-boundary change, finance-ownership transfer or recovery of an unreliable close. Identify conflicting entity definitions, the reconciliation evidence and decisions you personally owned. Show how that method would secure opening-position integrity and dependable combined reporting while entity specialists retain their qualified accounting responsibilities.
• Demonstrate technical accounting and consolidation judgement supported by a recognised professional qualification. Evidence should include opening positions, intercompany reconciliation and escalation of complex reporting matters to the proper specialists. Candidates must preserve unresolved positions transparently, not use a short assignment timetable as justification for unsupported treatment that the permanent CFO later has to unwind.
• Show liquidity and integration-economics leadership, including careful treatment of shared costs and synergy claims. Describe a cash transfer or integration benefit that required a different decision from the original management assumption, the evidence you used and the operating action assigned. Investor or board communication must distinguish realised progress from plans that remain conditional.
• Availability and transfer discipline are central to this executive assignment. Establish readiness for five-day ownership, leadership of experienced entity finance teams and overlap with a permanent successor. Provide an example of a witnessed close or board-review rehearsal used to test handover, including a residual issue the accepting executive knowingly retained rather than being told it had disappeared.

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 10 October 2026. Mandate reference CVU-INT-2026-IND-203.