Senior Director, Finance Transformation (Versant Media)

Company Description

VERSANT (Nasdaq: VSNT) is an industry-changing media and entertainment business and home to trusted brands that shape culture, inform audiences, and build lasting connections. It operates across four core markets: political news and opinion, business news and personal finance, golf, and sports and genre entertainment. These markets are served through a powerful portfolio of iconic and innovative brands, including CNBC, MS NOW, USA Network, Golf Channel, Oxygen, E!, SYFY, and Versant's sports division USA Sports, along with complementary digital assets including Fandango, Rotten Tomatoes, GolfNow and GolfPass.

Job Description

Versant is seeking a Senior Director, Finance Transformation to lead the controllership and finance workstreams for the Company’s finance transformation agenda. Reporting to the CAO & Controller, this leader will serve as a senior business partner to Finance and Technology and will play a central role in the design, implementation, and adoption of next-generation finance processes, data, controls, and systems, including the Company’s ERP modernization program.

This role will help translate business and reporting requirements into scalable, fit-to-standard solutions; establish governance and execution discipline across the finance transformation portfolio; and help ensure that the future-state operating model supports accurate financial reporting, strong internal controls, efficient close processes, and sustainable growth as a newly independent public company.
The Senior Director will serve as a critical bridge between finance, technology, business units, and external partners, ensuring that finance requirements and strategic priorities are effectively translated into scalable processes, systems, data, and ways of working.

The ideal candidate combines finance process and controllership expertise with deep ERP transformation experience, strong program leadership, and the ability to influence senior stakeholders and lead through change in a dynamic media environment.

Key Responsibilities:

Finance Transformation Strategy & Program Leadership

• Lead the finance transformation roadmap and associated workstreams, aligning priorities, sequencing, operating-model decisions, and delivery plans with the Company’s strategic, financial reporting, and control objectives.
• Serve as the senior finance liaison to the ERP core team, O&T, system integrator, BU finance leaders, and other transformation partners from design through deployment and stabilization.
• Establish clear workstream governance, decision rights, milestones, risk and issue management, and executive-level reporting to support timely, well-controlled delivery.
• Drive stakeholder alignment around core design principles, fit-to-standard decisions, and the future-state finance operating model; identify and resolve cross-functional dependencies and escalations.
• Champion digital enablement, automation, AI, and continuous improvement across Finance, ensuring investments deliver measurable improvements in efficiency, controls, scalability, and business value.
• Support transformation-driven savings and efficiency targets aligned to the Company’s financial commitments.

Finance Process, Data & Systems Design

• Translate finance, accounting, reporting, and control requirements into fit-to-standard ERP process, master data, and reporting designs across Record to Report, Procure to Pay, Order to Cash, and related finance processes.
• Participate in design workshops covering business process analysis, process reengineering, chart of accounts and code block design, organizational structures, master data, and workflows.
• Help identify opportunities to simplify and standardize and ensure business critical requirements are incorporated into the future state technology enabled processes with optimized organizational structures leveraging centralized onshore and offshore delivery centers.
• Guide data conversion, validation, reconciliation, and readiness activities across legacy and future-state environments, ensuring completeness, accuracy, and integrity of master / transactional data
• Support integration architecture decisions between the ERP and boundary systems (e.g., billing, revenue management, etc.), ensuring requirements are met across the technology landscape.
• Ensure future-state solutions accommodate Versant’s complex, multi-stream revenue models spanning advertising, subscriptions, content licensing, and ancillary revenue.
• Controls, Reporting & Close Enablement
• Embed financial reporting, SOX, and internal-control requirements into process and system designs, in partnership with Corporate Controllership, Technical Accounting, Internal Audit, Risk & Compliance, and external auditors.
• Ensure future-state solutions support timely, accurate, and efficient close, account reconciliations, journal entry governance, consolidation, management reporting, and external reporting processes.
• Design sustainable documentation, test plans, control evidence, and operating procedures that enable audit readiness and effective ownership following implementation.

Delivery, Adoption & Continuous Improvement

• Act as a change agent for finance by helping teams understand the rationale for new processes and controls, adopt standard ways of working, and build long-term capability.
• Define and monitor transformation KPIs, adoption measures, and business outcomes to ensure initiatives achieve intended objectives and enable sustained improvement.
• Support the relationship and service integration with third-party partners, ensuring alignment between operations and the future-state operating model during and after the ERP transition.
• Serve as the primary Finance counterpart to the system integrator throughout the implementation lifecycle, managing scope, deliverables, and quality expectations on behalf of finance leadership.
• Partner with the Finance AI Center and enterprise AI governance to identify, prioritize, and adopt AI and agentic solutions within Finance processes, supporting the AI enablement roadmap.
   

Qualifications

Required Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Accounting, Finance, Information Systems, Business, or a related field.
• CPA, MBA, or comparable advanced finance, accounting, or technology credential preferred.
• 12+ years of progressive experience in finance transformation, controllership, finance systems, accounting operations, or related roles, including significant leadership responsibility within a large, complex organization.
• Significant experience leading enterprise ERP or finance-system transformation programs, preferably including SAP S/4HANA or another modern cloud ERP platform.
• Strong understanding of end-to-end finance processes, including Record to Report, Procure to Pay, Order to Cash and master data governance.
• Strong knowledge of U.S. GAAP, public-company reporting, internal controls, and SOX requirements, with the ability to translate those requirements into scalable process and system designs.
• Demonstrated experience with business-process redesign, data conversion and reconciliation, testing, cutover, organizational change management, and post-go-live stabilization.
• Experience working effectively with technology organizations, system integrators, and third-party implementation partners in a matrixed environment.
• Experience in media, entertainment, digital, advertising, networks, streaming, technology, or another complex, high-volume industry preferred.
• Proven ability to influence senior stakeholders, lead and develop teams, manage competing priorities, and drive execution in a fast-paced environment.
• Deep analytical, organizational, communication, presentation, and problem-solving skills.
• Experience managing BPO/managed services relationships and integrating outsourced operations into a transformed finance operating model.
• Experience applying AI, automation, analytics, or emerging technologies within Finance.

Leadership Competencies:

The successful candidate will demonstrate:

• Strategic, enterprise-minded leadership paired with strong execution discipline
• Deep understanding of finance and data processes, balanced with practical ERP and transformation delivery experience.
• Ability to build alignment across finance, technology, business units, and external partners while navigating ambiguity and competing priorities.
• A continuous improvement orientation with a passion for simplification, standardization, automation, and scalable operating models.
• High integrity, sound judgment, and commitment to financial stewardship, strong governance, and sustainable change.
• A collaborative leadership style focused on developing talent, building accountable teams, and fostering an inclusive, performance-driven culture.

Why Join Versant?

This is a unique opportunity to shape the finance transformation agenda of a newly independent public media company. As a senior leader within the Controllership organization, you will help define and deliver the future-state finance operating model, modernize core systems and processes, strengthen governance, and create the capabilities that support Versant’s next stage of growth.

The role will be instrumental in Versant’s upcoming ERP transformation and in building a modern Finance organization designed for scalability, strong controls, operational excellence, innovation, and continued growth. Reporting directly to the Chief Accounting Officer, the Senior Director will have significant visibility across Versant and the opportunity to influence major decisions regarding the company’s future Finance processes, technology landscape, and operating model.

This role is based at Versant’s CNBC headquarters in Englewood Cliffs, NJ, offering the opportunity to collaborate with executive leadership in a highly dynamic and evolving environment. The office is easily accessible from New York City, Westchester County, and throughout New Jersey, with a complimentary daily shuttle service from Manhattan.

Additional Information:

• Hybrid: This position has been designated as hybrid, generally contributing from the Englewood Cliffs, NJ office a minimum of three days per week.
• Travel: Must be able to travel domestically for business meetings, trainings, transformation activities, and team events as needed.
• This position is eligible for company sponsored benefits, including medical, dental and vision insurance, 401(k), paid leave, tuition reimbursement, and a variety of other discounts and perks.
• Salary Range: $160,000-$200,000 (bonus & LTI eligible)

Additional Information

As part of our selection process, external candidates may be required to attend an in-person interview with a VERSANT Media employee at one of our locations prior to a hiring decision. VERSANT Media's policy is to provide equal employment opportunities to all applicants and employees without regard to race, color, religion, creed, gender, gender identity or expression, age, national origin or ancestry, citizenship, disability, sexual orientation, marital status, pregnancy, veteran status, membership in the uniformed services, genetic information, or any other basis protected by applicable law.

If you are a qualified individual with a disability or a disabled veteran and require support throughout the application and/or recruitment process as a result of your disability, you have the right to request a reasonable accommodation. You can submit your request to candidateaccessibility@versantmedia.com.

VERSANT Media is committed to fair and equitable compensation practices. We include a good faith pay range for each position to comply with applicable state and local pay transparency laws and to promote equity across our organization. Actual compensation will be based on factors such as the candidate's skills, qualifications, experience, and location and may include additional forms of compensation and benefits such as health insurance, retirement plans, paid time off, etc.

VERSANT Media is not accepting unsolicited assistance from search firms for this employment opportunity. All resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at VERSANT via-email, the Internet, or in any form and/or method without a valid written Statement of Work in place for this position from VERSANT's Talent Acquisition team will be deemed the sole property of VERSANT. No fee will be paid in the event the candidate is hired by VERSANT as a result of the referral or through other means.