Head of Finance & Operations (CA/SA)
Cape Town, Western Cape, South Africa
Full Time
1 day ago
Key skills
AIAnalyticsLookerSaaSCRMLeadershipRisk ManagementNegotiation
About this role
This organization is a
high-growth EdTech SaaS business currently serving over 2,500 schools across South Africa.
With active expansions underway into Ghana, Zambia, and Botswana, alongside an international holding structure through a Netherlands BV, they are scaling rapidly.
Operating a multi-product subscription revenue model and backed by prominent institutional investors, this organization runs a lean, high-output team of approximately 100 employees where technology, not headcount, provides the ultimate leverage.
We are recruiting for a
Head of Finance & Operations.
This is far from a traditional, pure-finance controller position. As the Head of Finance & Operations, you will hold the keys to the company's engine room, enabling the CEO to drive strategic growth forward. You will own the full financial strategy, multi-jurisdictional compliance, legal frameworks, and human resources from both a transactional and cultural perspective. This role is designed for a strategic business partner who ensures operational and financial integrity across all active markets.
(Open to Pretoria-based candidates with the ability to travel to the Western Cape when required)
Key Responsibilities;
- SaaS Financial Leadership: Drive SaaS-native financial strategy using operational levers like ARR, MRR, NRR, CAC, and LTV.
- Multi-Jurisdictional Reporting: Lead financial reporting, forecasting, and the creation of board-ready financial packs that translate numbers into strategic insights.
- Forex Risk Management: Strategically manage cash flow and forex risk across ZAR, EUR, GHS, and other relevant African currencies.
- Legal Contract Management: Handle contract drafting, review, and negotiation across commercial, supplier, and employment relationships.
- IP Corporate Governance: Protect company IP across active markets and oversee corporate governance, including shareholder agreements, board resolutions, and statutory filings across jurisdictions.
- Data Privacy Ownership: Own compliance frameworks for POPIA in South Africa and GDPR through the European holding structure.
- Cross-Border Privacy Controls: Oversee data transfer protocols, processor agreements, and breach response readiness.
- HR Transactional Oversight: Manage payroll, employment contracts, and compliance with BCEA, LRA, or local equivalents as the business scales.
- Equity Administration: Accurately and fairly administer a live long-term incentive (LTI) share option scheme.
- People & Culture Partnership: Partner closely with the CEO on workplace culture, employee engagement, and organizational health.
Requirements
- Essential Education: A CA(SA) qualification is strongly preferred, though CIMA will be considered.
- Desirable Education: An MBA or Master’s in Financial Management or International Business is highly advantageous.
- Post-Articles Experience: A minimum of 8 years of post-articles experience is required.
- Industry Background: Meaningful leadership experience must be spent in a growth-stage technology or SaaS business.
- Geographic Scope: Hands-on operational finance experience across multiple African markets is essential.
- Language Advantage: Fluency in both English and Afrikaans is a practical advantage for this operating environment.
- Location & Travel: Open to candidates based in Pretoria who are fully capable and willing to travel to the Stellenbosch head office as needed to interface with the executive team.
- Personal Productivity: You must be personally productive with technology, as leadership in this business requires direct execution rather than just supervising.
- Hands-on AI Use: You will actively embed and use AI tools directly to build financial models, generate board packs, and perform compliance research.
- Systems Knowledge: Familiarity with Zoho Books, Zoho CRM, Zoho Subscriptions, and Zoho Analytics or Google Looker Studio is highly desirable.
Leadership & Cultural Fit
- CEO Synergy: Work closely with a commercial, fast-moving, and people-first CEO who is also a CA(SA).
- Complementary Strengths: Bring operational financial depth, process governance, and commercial anchoring to complement the visionary leadership style of the executive team.
- Constructive Pushback: Demonstrate the courage to push back constructively when numbers do not support the vision.
- Learning Agility: Possess extreme ownership, intellectual curiosity, and the drive to close your own knowledge gaps fast without waiting to be told.