Senior Financial Management Specialist

Do you want to build a career that is truly worthwhile? Working at the World Bank Group provides a unique opportunity for you to help our clients solve their greatest development challenges. The World Bank Group is one of the largest sources of funding and knowledge for developing countries; a unique global partnership of five institutions dedicated to ending extreme poverty, increasing shared prosperity, and promoting sustainable development. With 189 member countries and more than 120 offices worldwide, we work with public and private sector partners, investing in groundbreaking projects and using data, research, and technology to develop solutions to the most urgent global challenges. 

East Asia and the Pacific (EAP) Region 

EAP is a large and diverse region, ranging from Small Island States of the Pacific to the Philippines and China. Despite substantial economic growth and poverty reduction, the EAP region faces huge development challenges. Growth has been uneven across and within countries, institutions still need strengthening, and most countries are heavily affected by climate change. The Bank plays a significant role on global public goods, including climate, biodiversity, water pollution, and health. The COVID pandemic, and more recently food and energy price increases are compounding the impact of the global economic slowdown. The World Bank Group is seen as a premier development institution in the Region, with a leadership role on analytical and advisory services as well as financing. 

Prosperity

The Prosperity Vertical provides support to low- and middle-income countries to build the economic and institutional foundations for inclusive and sustainable growth and, thereby, make progress towards achieving the World Bank Group’s twin goals of reducing poverty and boosting shared prosperity.  The Prosperity Vertical includes the WBG Global Practices of Finance Competitiveness and Innovation (FCI); Governance (GOV); and Macroeconomics Trade and Investment (MTI); Poverty and Equity (POV); and Jobs.

Governance Global Practice (GP) Context

• Our GP helps developing countries build capable, efficient, open, inclusive, and accountable institutions to support economic growth, reduce poverty, deliver needed services, and earn citizens’ confidence. Our work encompasses fiduciary assurance, public financial management, public procurement, civil service reform, open government, anti-corruption, and the use of technology to improve quality and access to government services.

Unit Context

The Governance-Financial Management (FM) unit in EAP, is responsible for the implementation of the Bank’s FM framework for Bank-financed operations, delivering high quality FM services, throughout the project cycle. The Unit also undertakes analytical FM work and country fiduciary assessments. The services provided by the unit include (i) fiduciary assurance; (ii) FM risk management, oversight and monitoring; (iii) quality assurance of FM services; (iv) country portfolio reviews; (v) contributions to country engagement products; (vi) supporting partner countries in enhancing their fiduciary and public financial management systems performance and capacity; (vii) supporting partner countries in developing their professional accountancy institutions, and corporate financial reporting performance (including accounting and auditing standards); (viii) supporting partner countries in developing their internal and external oversight institutions e.g Internal Audit Departments and National Audit Offices. The unit works collaboratively with other Global Practices (GPs), regional and corporate Bank units.

Duties and Accountability

The Senior Financial Management Specialist (SFMS) will be based in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, will be required to support the Bank’s program in Cambodia,  Laos and Vietnam  and will report to the Practice Manager of the Unit. The SFMS is responsible and accountable for operation-level FM support and monitoring FM arrangements throughout the project cycle and is expected to take a proactive role in providing advice and support to clients and for producing agile and innovative approaches to strengthening fiduciary assurance over the use of funds. Specific duties include:

• assessing the adequacy of project financial management arrangements;
• carrying out FM-related risk assessments and proposing appropriate FM arrangements for the operation;
• providing implementation support and supervising projects financed by loans and grants;
• monitoring the implementation of risk mitigation measures and contributing inputs to corporate risk reviews as required;
• implementing Bank FM operational systems;
• reviewing unaudited interim financial reports, taking appropriate action on any issues arising from the reviews and recommending actions in case of non-compliance;
• reviewing audit reports, taking appropriate action on any issues arising from the audits and recommending actions in case on non-compliance;
• ensuring compliance with the Bank’s audit and other FM requirements;
• ensuring that the project operations are carried out in accordance with sound financial management practices;
• providing FM Quality Assurance support;
• supporting the Practice Manager in work program discussions and monitoring of deliverables on fiduciary assurance;
• providing substantive technical input into policy and strategic work related to country engagement products;
• contributing to the development and implementation of approaches to make greater use of country systems for Bank- Financed operations;
• supervising, mentoring and coaching of junior staff and consultants;
• performing analytical work on financial accounting, reporting and and accountability issues;
• carrying out capacity building activities as part of the Governance team;
• contributing to corporate tasks such as the preparation of country briefs, policy and thematic notes, corporate, global and regional knowledge products; and
• supporting partner countries in enhancing their fiduciary systems performance and capacity.

Selection Criteria

The position requires:

• A highly motivated and passionate financial management professional with strong client orientation, interpersonal and integrative thinking skills.
• A qualified professional accountant (CPA (Certified Public Accountant), CA (Chartered Accountant), ACCA (Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) or equivalent membership of an internationally recognized professional accountancy body).
• A Master’s degree in a relevant field (e.g., accounting, public financial management, finance, public policy) or another related field.
• At least 8 years of relevant professional experience.
• Financial Management knowledge and experience in supporting the strengthening of accounting, financial reporting and accountability systems.
• Project management knowledge and understanding.
• Public Financial Management Systems knowledge and ability.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills in English.

Source: https://worldbankgroup.csod.com/ats/careersite/JobDetails.aspx?id=29719&site=1