Financial Controller

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Why This Role Matters

The Financial Controller plays a critical leadership role in ensuring the integrity, transparency, and long-term sustainability of The Washington Post's financial operations as a privately held media organization. Reporting to the Acting CFO, this role provides enterprise-wide stewardship of global accounting, financial reporting, governance, and systems evolution-supporting informed decision-making and responsible growth.

• Leading financial stewardship in a privately held media organization where integrity, discretion, and long-term thinking are essential
• Challenging legacy processes and assumptions to reimagine how accounting work can be performed and delivered
• Driving transformation that goes beyond incremental improvement to reshape operating models, team culture, and ways of working
• Serving as both a strategic leader and a hands-on expert when the work or moment requires it
• Building strong, capable teams through active coaching, clear expectations, and a commitment to continuous development

• Provide enterprise leadership for global accounting operations, including general ledger, close, consolidation, and statutory reporting.
• Establish and advance a long-term vision for the controllership function aligned with organizational strategy and the needs of a privately held media company.
• Assess, redesign, and modernize accounting processes, operating models, and organizational structure to support scale, resilience, and effectiveness.
• Operate as a "player-coach," moving seamlessly between strategic leadership and hands-on accounting work as needed during periods of transformation, team development, and systems change.

• Maintain final accountability for the accuracy, completeness, and timeliness of all internal and external financial reporting.
• Own the worldwide consolidation and end-to-end accounting close process.
• Develop, maintain, and enforce global accounting policies and standards to ensure consistency and compliance, including revenue recognition.
• Design, implement, and maintain a strong internal control environment appropriate to a privately held enterprise.
• Oversee financial reporting controls and internal audit activities.
• Prepare and present financial reports, analyses, and insights to senior leadership.

• Lead the evaluation, selection, and migration of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, including assessment of tradeoffs, risks, and long-term implications.
• Own the future-state accounting systems architecture and ensure alignment with business strategy, scalability needs, and data integrity standards.
• Provide hands-on leadership during system migrations, recognizing and mitigating change and execution risk.
• Drive optimization of existing and new systems to improve automation, accuracy, and transparency across accounting operations.

• Serve as the primary liaison with external auditors, including coordination of pension and 401(k)-related audits.
• Partner with internal stakeholders to deliver high-quality, timely, and informative financial reporting.
• Collaborate with FP&A to ensure reporting supports internal decision-making and provides meaningful operational insights.
• Assume leadership of enterprise Risk functions as the role evolves, strengthening governance and risk awareness across the organization.

• Build, develop, and lead a high-performing global accounting organization, recognizing that the current team is capable and still developing.
• Actively coach and mentor leaders and individual contributors, setting a high bar for performance, accountability, and growth.
• Establish a strong team culture and identity grounded in excellence, trust, inclusion, and continuous improvement.
• Create clarity around roles, expectations, and development pathways to support both near-term transformation and long-term capability building.

• Deep technical accounting expertise with the ability to apply standards in complex, real-world business environments
• Demonstrated experience leading ERP evaluation, selection, and migration initiatives, including ownership of future-state system design
• Proven ability to lead and sustain transformation, including rethinking operating models and ways of working
• Comfort operating as both a strategic leader and hands-on practitioner during periods of change
• Strong judgment, integrity, and discretion in handling sensitive and confidential information
• Ability to translate accounting and financial concepts into clear, actionable insights for non-finance stakeholders
• Experience operating effectively in highly visible leadership roles with critical deadlines and competing priorities

• Bachelor's degree in Accounting or Finance
• CPA designation
• 5+ years of experience leading teams to include people managers
• 10+ years progressive experience in accounting or financial management, including senior-level leadership responsibility at Big 4 or similar organization with revenue and systems complexities
• Experience leading ERP system evaluations and migrations
• Experience with global accounting operations, financial reporting, and audit coordination
• Experience in media, advertising, or directly related industries.
• Experience with automation or leading automation strategy and implementation
• Strong written and verbal communication skills

• Public accounting experience
• Experience in a privately held, multi-entity, or complex organizational environment
• Prior responsibility for or partnership with risk management, internal audit, or governance functions
• Experience leading accounting or finance transformations during periods of organizational or systems change

• Competitive medical, dental and vision coverage
• Company-paid pension and 401(k) match
• Three weeks of vacation and up to three weeks of paid sick leave
• Nine paid holidays and two personal days
• 20 weeks paid parental leave for any new parent
• Robust mental health resources
• Backup care and caregiver concierge services
• Gender affirming services
• Pet insurance
• Free Post digital subscription
• Leadership and career development programs