Team Lead

Role Overview

The Team Lead – Outsourced Accounting & Bookkeeping Services is responsible for managing end-to-end delivery of outsourced finance operations across multiple domestic and international clients (US/UK/Canada/India). The role involves leading delivery teams, ensuring statutory and regulatory compliance, maintaining delivery quality, managing client expectations, improving processes, and driving high-performance culture.

Key Responsibilities

1. Delivery & Operations

• Manage a team of accountants
• Manage delivery of outsourced accounting, bookkeeping, AR/AP, reconciliations, payroll inputs, inventory accounting, and MIS.
• Review journals, ledgers, trial balance, P&L, balance sheet, audit schedules, and monthly packs.
• Drive timely month-end / quarter-end / year-end closure.
• Ensure compliance with applicable frameworks (India GAAP, US GAAP basics)
• Support audits (statutory, internal, tax) with documentation and clarifications.

2. Compliance Support

• Ensure timely compliance deliverables: GST returns, TDS returns, PT, PF/ESI Payroll, (India).
• Support state / local tax filings for clients
• Maintain compliance calendars and trackers to avoid delays and penalties.
• Escalate non-compliance risks proactively.

3. Team Leadership

• Lead, mentor, train, and supervise a team of accountants.
• Allocate tasks, balance workload, monitor productivity, and ensure SLA adherence.
• Conduct training on tools, accounting standards, and internal SOPs.
• Conduct periodic performance evaluations and improvement plans.

4. Client Relationship Management

• Act as the primary point of contact for assigned clients.
• Hold weekly/bi-weekly review calls and status updates.
• Gather client requirements and convert them into actionable tasks.
• Handle escalations and ensure client satisfaction and retention.

5. Process & Quality Management

• Implement and enforce accounting SOPs, templates, and workpapers.
• Conduct quality checks and second-level reviews to minimize rework.
• Introduce process improvements, workflow automation, and documentation hygiene.
• Identify and mitigate risks in delivery.

6. Reporting & Documentation

• Maintain working papers, review checklists, internal documentation, and audit trails.
• Prepare weekly MIS on utilization, quality scorecards, and issue logs.
• Support onboarding of new clients including tool setup, COA structuring, workflow design.

Required Skills & Competencies

• Strong command of accounting principles, reconciliations, closing processes, and financial reporting.
• Hands-on experience in outsourced delivery models (KPO/BPO/Shared Services).
• Excellent written/verbal communication; exposure to global stakeholders.
• Leadership, conflict management, training & mentoring.
• High discipline with data integrity and documentation.

Technical Skills & Tools (Preferred)

• Cloud Accounting: QuickBooks Online, Xero, Zoho Books, NetSuite, Sage Intacct, Tally Prime.
• Productivity: Excel/Google Sheets (Pivot Tables, VLOOKUP/XLOOKUP, automation formulas).
• BI Exposure: Power BI/Sheets dashboards (optional but good to have).

Education & Experience

• B.Com/M.Com/BBA/MBA (Finance) or equivalent.
• CA Inter/ACCA/CMA (Preferred).
• 5–8 years total experience, with at least 2–3 years supervising delivery teams.
• Prior outsourced finance/shared services experience strongly preferred.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

• Delivery accuracy & timeliness of monthly/quarterly deliverables.
• Ensuring timely compliance support and statutory adherence (Payroll, GST/TDS/PF/ESI/ROC, sales tax/state filings for international clients, etc.).
• SLA adherence & turnaround time commitment adherence.
• Client satisfaction, retention, and feedback scores.
• Reduction in review-level errors and audit points.
• Month-end close cycle quality and completeness of working papers.
• Compliance calendar adherence and proactive escalation of due dates.
• Team productivity, utilization, quality scores & retention.
• Audit preparedness and elimination of documentation gaps.

Soft Skills

• Empathetic leadership and people handling.
• Multi-tasking and prioritization ability under deadline pressure.
• Analytical thinking and structured problem solving.
• Cultural flexibility for global client communication.
• Continuous learning and process improvement mindset.