Finance Lead - Inventory & Stock Optimisation

takealot.com, a leading South African online retailer, is looking for a highly talented Finance Lead: Inventory & Stock Optimisation to join our Head Office in Cape Town.

We are a young, dynamic, hyper-growth company looking for smart, creative, hardworking people with integrity to join us. We offer a market-related, Total Remuneration Package which allows full flexibility according to your needs, a great work environment and a promise that you won’t be bored as long as you are prepared for a challenge and want to build something great.

This position reports to: Head of Finance: General

Purpose of the role:

The Finance Lead: Inventory and Stock Optimisation is responsible for the full financial ownership of inventory across Takealot's 1P and 3P businesses. This includes maintaining accurate stock valuations and reconciled positions, managing system integrations into the accounting environment, driving automation and process overhauls, and acting as the primary Finance business partner to the commercial heads of Retail and Marketplace. The role requires an equal balance of deep technical accounting rigour and commercial, AI-driven strategic thinking.

Key Responsibilities:

Inventory Financial Management

• Full financial ownership of inventory across 1P (retail-owned stock) and 3P (marketplace and consignment stock positioning)
• Maintain accurate, timely, and reconciled stock positions across all warehouses, fulfilment centres, and in-transit nodes
• Manage and report on stock cost — including landed cost, cost of sales, provisions, and write-downs
• Own the month-end inventory close process: ensure completeness, accuracy, and speed of reporting with zero tolerance for late or incorrect numbers
• Ensure correct accounting treatment of all inventory movements and associated costs in line with IFRS, with specific application of IAS 2 (Inventories)
• Maintain and continuously improve internal controls over the full inventory cycle

WACP Management and Valuation

• Manage, maintain, and update Weighted Average Cost Price (WACP) calculations to ensure inventory is accurately valued at all times
• Own the WACP automation project end-to-end: design, development, testing, and implementation of automated WACP calculation processes
• Investigate and resolve WACP discrepancies and ensure alignment between operational stock systems and the accounting ledger
• Maintain fully documented WACP calculation models with audit-ready supporting workings
• Own fully landed cost prices and associated costs related to imported goods

System Integrations and Reconciliations

• Manage and oversee the stock integration between operational systems and the accounting system, ensuring accurate and timely posting of all stock transactions
• Investigate and resolve failed or erroneous stock integrations — identify root causes and implement corrective measures to prevent recurrence
• Work with IT, Data, and Operations teams to improve data quality and system integration architecture across all inventory touchpoints
• Build and maintain automated reconciliation frameworks that flag exceptions in real time, without reliance on a fully integrated ERP

Stock Loss and Shrinkage

• Identify, quantify, and investigate stock losses across the fulfilment network
• Build robust loss-attribution frameworks — distinguish between theft, damage, system error, and process failure
• Perform and review shrinkage and obsolescence provision calculations; ensure all provisions are adequately supported, documented, and correctly recorded
• Partner with Operations and Logistics to drive root cause resolution and financial recovery
• Track shrinkage trends and surface financial risk to leadership before it becomes a P&L problem
• 1P and 3P Stock Positioning
• Support Retail and Marketplace teams with the financial implications of stock positioning decisions — open-to-buy, liquidation, aged inventory, and excess stock
• Provide financial modelling and scenario analysis to guide stock optimisation trade-offs: holding cost vs. markdown risk vs. stockout cost
• Monitor and report on slow-moving, aged, and excess inventory — drive commercial conversations with Buyers and Category Managers
• Support budgeting and forecasting processes with robust inventory assumptions and cost modelling

Cost Management

• Track and analyse all inventory-related costs: storage fees, inbound logistics, fulfilment costs allocated to inventory, write-offs, and provisions
• Challenge cost structures and identify savings opportunities
• Ensure correct IFRS treatment of all inventory-related costs and movements

Reporting and Analytics

• Design and own the inventory finance reporting suite — dashboards, KPI scorecards, exception reports, and executive-level summaries
• Build reporting infrastructure that works in the absence of a fully integrated ERP — using data pipelines and BI tools to connect fragmented data sources into coherent financial views
• Provide weekly, monthly, and ad hoc stock reporting to the Head of Finance, CFO, and Commercial leadership
• Develop and maintain comprehensive inventory health reporting: stock levels, movement, ageing, and risk — providing management with actionable insight, not just numbers

Audit and Compliance

• Lead and manage the year-end stock count process: planning, coordination with operational teams, counting supervision, and full reconciliation of count results to accounting records
• Manage and respond to external and internal audit queries related to inventory — maintain audit-ready working papers and supporting documentation at all times
• Ensure all inventory accounting policies and procedures are compliant and consistently applied
• Own the inventory controls environment; design and enforce policies that prevent loss, misstatement, and system error

Process Overhaul and Automation

• Conduct a full audit of existing inventory finance processes — identify manual, duplicated, or high-risk steps
• Design and implement automated replacements: reconciliation bots, automated exception alerts, scheduled reporting pipelines, AI-assisted anomaly detection
• Champion a culture of continuous improvement — no manual process should survive if it can be automated
• Lead automation projects within the finance context from design through to implementation and handover
• Accurate and timely stock integration reconciliations between operational and accounting systems — delivered on schedule, every month
• Fully documented and automated WACP calculation model
• IAS 2-compliant inventory accounting policies and procedures
• Monthly and year-end inventory financial reports submitted within agreed deadlines
• Completed and fully reconciled stock count files
• Audit-ready working papers and responses to all audit queries
• Automated month-end inventory reporting packs
• Supported and documented shrinkage and obsolescence provision calculations
• Live inventory health dashboards and KPI scorecards for management and CFO
• Minimum Required Qualification
• Bachelor's degree in Accounting, Finance, or a related field
• Strong working knowledge of inventory management at scale-essential
• CA(SA) or CIMA advantageous

Minimum Required Experience

• 4 to 7 years' experience in e-commerce, retail, FMCG, or a data-intensive commercial environment
• Demonstrable experience in inventory accounting, cost accounting, or supply chain finance
• Hands-on experience with stock and ERP system integrations and reconciliations
• Proven track record of working in environments without fully integrated ERP systems — you know how to build financial rigour from imperfect data
• Experience designing or managing automation projects within a finance context
• Experience as a Finance business partner to commercial or operational teams

Minimum Required Competencies

• AI-driven and automation-obsessed — you automate first and ask questions later
• Moves fast without breaking things — you value speed AND accuracy
• Comfortable operating in ambiguity and building structure where none exists
• Strong bias for action — you don't wait for a perfect system before improving the current one
• Deadline-driven and results-oriented; high personal accountability
• Excellent communicator — able to hold a room with Buyers, challenge a Head of Marketplace, and present to the CFO
• Detail-obsessed but strategically aware — you see the tree and the forest
• Proactive in identifying process improvements and driving them through to completion

Skills, Knowledge & Abilities

Technical Skills

• Advanced data analytics: SQL, Python (highly advantageous), Power BI / Looker / Tableau
• Experience building or working with data pipelines, API integrations, or automated reporting tools
• Familiarity with AI tools and their application in finance workflows: AI-assisted forecasting, anomaly detection, process automation
• Strong Excel and Google Sheets modelling skills — but viewed as a last resort, not a default
• Understanding of ERP and WMS integrations and data architecture is a strong advantage

Commercial and Financial Acumen

• Solid understanding of inventory management principles
• Understanding of both 1P (owned inventory) and 3P (marketplace and consignment) business models and their distinct financial dynamics
• Ability to translate financial data into commercial insight and communicate it clearly to non-finance stakeholders
• Project management skills — particularly for automation and process improvement initiatives

The Environment:

• takealot.com employees are entrepreneurial and dynamic, smart, customer- centric, fun and have the shared ambition of takealot.com being the leading e- commerce company in Africa.
• We have fun, work hard, take ownership, work in teams to create solutions, and are always open to direct feedback/new ideas on where we can improve.
• We are short on ego and high on output.
• We are doers and not only thinkers, its all in the execution after all.
• We love what we do and what we are creating.
• We seek to employ an Extra Ordinary Mind who is Smart, has Integrity, and is Hardworking.