Band

Level 5

Job Description Summary

Location: Basel, Switzerland

The Project & Strategy Lead primary focus is project management. In this role, you will lead cross-functional initiatives to drive operational excellence, compliance, governance, and strategic execution. Furthermore, you will partner closely with the Senior Manager Group BPA to align with group finance policies and performance management. You will own the annual budgeting and support the forecast cycle, finance models, and internal reporting. Also, you will identify and manage financial risks and opportunities, translating insights into strategic initiatives in collaboration with relevant stakeholders.

Job Description

Key Requirements:

• Derive strategic initiatives from financial insights; align with relevant stakeholders on prioritization, and governance.
• Lead problem-solving sessions for deep-dive strategic topics, counselling leaders and providing guidance around problem structuring, interpretation of analyses, action planning, and recommendation synthesis.
• Develop and mobilize project plans, defining scope, selecting tools, estimating resources, and assigning responsibilities.
• Maintain proactive stakeholder communication to ensure timely delivery and address issues or trade-offs to deliver the solution in the agreed timeframe.
• Drive the end-to-end annual budget cycle, including calendar, stakeholder alignment, submissions, and approvals; align methodologies and targets with the Senior Manager Group BPA.
• Provide comprehensive overview for the P&L, by coordinating month/quarter/year-end close activities and variance analysis,
• Prepare and optimize internal management reporting (monthly data, KPIs, dashboards), ensuring accuracy, timeliness, and compliance; harmonize reporting templates with Group BPA.
• Identify, quantify, and support the management of financial risks and opportunities; drive corrective actions and capture value through cost optimization, and productivity initiatives, suggesting prioritizing actions
• Support and improve business case proposals, including capital appropriation requests (CARs).
• Act as a trusted business partner, providing advice, decision support, and training on relevant processes and tools

Essential Requirements:

• University degree in Finance, Accounting, or Economics; MBA desirable
• PMO experience setting clear schedules and governance for cross-functional projects, with milestone tracking, risk and issue logs, RAID management, and concise status reports for leaders.
• Significant working experience in FP&A/Finance with demonstrated P&L ownership, leading annual budgets, rolling forecasts, and long-range planning.
• Strong SAP proficiency, cost center/accounting structure understanding; month/quarter/year-end close coordination experience.
• Proven track record in R&O identification and management, variance analysis, and performance improvement initiatives paired with business case development and CARs.
• Exceptional planning/organization and stakeholder management; ability to influence senior leaders.
• Proficiency in English (written and spoken); German or French is a plus

Desirable Requirements:

• Strong interpersonal skills with the ability to build trust and effective partnerships.
• Demonstrated initiative, creativity, and ability to work in a dynamic environment.
• Basic knowledge, or interest in the Aviation industry.

Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion:

Novartis is committed to building an outstanding, inclusive work environment and diverse teams representative of the patients and communities we serve.

Accessibility and Accommodation:

Novartis is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodation to all individuals. If, because of a medical condition or disability, you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the recruitment process, or in order to receive more detailed information about the essential functions of a position, please send an e-mail to diversity.inclusion_ch@novartis.com and let us know the nature of your request and your contact information. Please include the job requisition number in your message.

Skills Desired