JOB DESCRIPTION:
PROJECT MANAGER
Established in 2013, Avati Consulting Solutions (P) Ltd., India along with Avati Consulting Solutions FZC LLC UAE, is a niche company providing specialized products, implementation and consulting for financial services industry in Risk Management domain, with special focus towards banking industry. Our proprietary software platform caters to strategic transformation programs in financial institutions covering IFRS 9 provisioning implementation, Basel II/III/IV program implementation, regulatory reporting, Market Risk & related analytics, Credit Risk Rating Models, Score-cards and validation analytics, Asset Liability and Liquidity Management, Derivatives valuation, Hedging framework, Portfolio Management and dashboards, Data Warehouse, General Ledger Reconciliation, ICAAP, Pillar 2, Stress Testing & Integrated reporting dashboards. Currently our primary target market is Middle East & Levant region, however the company plans to aggressively explore Indian, US and South East Asian (non Singapore) markets in the near future. We currently have clients in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan and UAE where our platform and services are implemented and well supported. The founding team has rich experience leading risk consulting, product development and implementation programs for numerous clients in Middle East for over a decade and half. Clients include Arab Banking Group Jordan, Al Rajhi Bank KSA & Jordan, Jordan Kuwait Bank, InvestBank Group Jordan, Mashreq Bank UAE, Arab Petroleum Investments Corporation – Bahrain and KSA, Jordan Commercial Bank, Ahli United Bank – Bahrain, Qatar Islamic International Bank Doha, The Arab Investment Company – Bahrain and KSA, Banque Saudi Fransi KSA, Al Hilal Bank UAE, Arab Bank group and Housing Bank Trade Finance (Jordan) to name a few.
A brief regarding domain, education background, experience and skills required for the role is mentioned below:
- Domain: Any from Banking, Risk Management, Credit, market, operational risk, Asset Liability Management, interest rate and liquidity risk, balance sheet management, IFRS 9 ECL, stress testing, risk modeling, data / retail analytics, Data Warehouse, data management & product implementations.
- Relevant Experience: 2-15 years’ experience ideally in risk management or finance or risk analytics / modeling in banking / financial institutions / IT companies. Candidates having experience in banking core business, risk analysis, operations, project management, business support, having domain expertise or implementation of banking platforms for finance or risk, software products, systems, and data warehouse with handling of customer / products / transaction data are also welcome to apply. Additionally candidate having experience in product development / implementation services in risk management for banking financial services industry are also invited to apply. Independent handling of function, project or module is preferred.
- Education: MBA with specialization in Finance, Marketing or Master’s in Economics, Mathematics, Statistics, Finance, Banking, Data Science, Information Technology or related field or Chartered Accountant, Cost Accountant or equivalent.
- General Skills: Good client management skills, project management ability, skills to multi task across multiple project, ability to conduct data management activities including gap analysis & resolution, project resource planning, deliverables management, ability to understand functional requirements, understand or work with subject matter experts to deliver project scope, manage project teams across vertical and horizontal hierarchies, plan, conduct UAT, timely project closure, project documentation and progress communication.
- Soft Skills: Presentable, friendly personality, ability to connect and influence, strong oral presentation and written communication skills, persistent and determined, inter personal and networking skills, strong project management skills, ability to work across hierarchies, attention to details and understanding scope, client requirements.
- Primary market: Middle East: GCC countries and Levant region: Jordan, Lebanon, etc.
- Secondary market: India, propose to explore US, South East Asia (non-Singapore)
- Industry: Banking, Financial Services: Function Risk Management, Finance, Wholesale & Retail Banking, Treasury
Following are key roles and responsibilities for the proposed position. The candidate will work in the area of providing functional consulting for strategic client facing Risk Management assignments also involving delivering and implementation of intellectual property systems. The candidate with work with senior subject matter senior experts, project management, product and technical implementation teams along with founding members who are equally hands on. The role involves some amount of overseas travel for project management for brief periods during post COVID times. Some key areas of responsibilities include -
- Functional understanding of risk management and accounting guidelines, regulatory rules / global best practices on risk management for financial institutions. Example of domain areas - Credit, market and operational risk management, Asset liability Management, Liquidity & Interest Rate Risk, Early Warning Signal methods, Basel III / IV Capital calculation process, Counterparty Credit Risk, ECL and provisioning, rating models, retail scorecards, model validation Stress Testing etc.
- Project management, client management, development and management of specific business rules, business data mapping, reporting, dashboarding, functional UAT, development of new products, modules and functionalities etc.
- The role also involves thorough understanding Avati proprietary software platform, its functions, and implementation process of various product models related to risk and finance etc.
- Prepare project charter, scope, roles responsibilities and communicate with the client for setting terms of engagement as per contractual scope
- Role requires strong domain understanding of banking, risk management concepts mentioned above. Handling of large datasets including business analysis is important.
- Ability to understand functional and business requirements based on the scope of the project. Prepare business frameworks to be used for product configuration and parameterization of business rules within software platform.
- As a projects are related to banking and financial services industry, exposure and experience in managing business requirements within overall risk / finance / data analytics domain is expected
- Ability to understand data requirements and mapping the same with available data within overall technical architecture of the bank
- Broad understanding of data flow (financial and non-financial) across various core systems in financial institutions.
- Review project deliverables to ensure these are in line with scope and client expectations.
- Manage client change requests for minor and major modifications to existing systems during and post project implementation / go live.
- Assist in Product platform enhancement by suggesting new modules, functionalities and user experience based on client interactions and feedback.
Following are key skills required for the above role:
- Understanding of banking / financial services industry, preferably in the area of risk management, balance sheet management, data analytics or similar
- Understanding of key risk management guidelines issued by regulators or Basel Committee Banking Supervision (BCBS) guidelines on various topics covering risk, finance, modeling, data analytics, or similar.
- Skills for project management, planning, deliverables and milestones management. Ability to understand and articulate scope, manage client expectations,
- Understanding of financial services / banking industry in Middle East / India / USA will be an advantage.
- Preferably have and enhance at least one area as subject matter expert and ability to deploy senior expertise in project implementations.
- Assist in setting up project management and communication tools, effectively ensure project progress and issues are reported to all stakeholders during implementation and post go live.
