Senior Manager, Industrial Advisory - Inventory Cost & Domestic Content

Baker Tilly•Madison, WI

14d•$179,850 - $340,970

About The Position

Baker Tilly’s Industrial Advisory team works with manufacturing and distribution clients to address operational and financial challenges through data-driven insights and strategic advisory services. The Senior Manager collaborates with Baker Tilly teams and clients to improve operational performance, evaluate capital investments, optimize profitability, and use technology to support business decisions. The role requires hands-on experience developing and executing manufacturing cost accounting, inventory costing, and related systems and processes, as well as comfort working with detailed product, manufacturing, purchasing, and inventory data. The Senior Manager provides subject matter expertise on how products are manufactured, how costs flow through an organization, and how accounting processes, ERP systems, operational data, and management reporting interact. The position also provides senior leadership for cost-accounting and data-analysis components of domestic content consulting services. The successful candidate takes ownership of engagements, exercises sound professional judgment, and advances work with limited day-to-day oversight. Responsibilities include leading inventory and manufacturing cost advisory projects; assessing and improving client cost-accounting methods, systems, processes, controls, and data; and developing practical analytical approaches when client systems or data are insufficient. The role also leads cost-accounting and financial-data work for domestic content engagements, including analysis of product, supplier, sourcing, manufacturing, and inventory information and development of supportable methodologies and documentation. The Senior Manager leads engagement planning and delivery, manages client relationships and teams, reviews analyses and deliverables, and translates complex accounting, manufacturing, and data issues into actionable recommendations. The position includes coaching team members, supporting business development and practice growth, contributing to thought leadership, and traveling to client offices and manufacturing facilities as needed. Baker Tilly describes the opportunity as offering upward career trajectory, flexibility in how and where work is done, and relationships with clients, teammates, and leadership that support employee development. Work location requirements should be discussed with a Baker Tilly talent acquisition professional.

Requirements

Four-year degree.
At least 8 years of professional experience.
Deep understanding of manufacturing cost-accounting concepts, including standard and actual costing, inventory valuation, bills of material, routings, material and labor costs, manufacturing overhead, allocations, and manufacturing variances.
Experience obtaining, validating, and analyzing detailed cost and operational data from manufacturing facilities, suppliers, or other third parties.
Experience designing, implementing, or improving cost-accounting processes and methodologies within manufacturing organizations.
Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, including the ability to develop practical solutions when available data is incomplete or inconsistent.
Experience building pro forma financial models incorporating income statements and cash flows to support business decisions.
Entrepreneurial mindset and ability to identify client needs and build, plan, and manage services to support those needs.

Nice To Haves

Bachelor’s degree or above in accounting or finance.
10 or more years of experience in the accounting or finance department of manufacturing companies or consulting firms supporting inventory cost projects.
Certified Public Accountant (CPA) and/or Certified Management Accountant certification.
Experience building processes within SAP or Oracle Finance and Inventory Management platforms.
Prior experience with domestic content, manufacturing incentives, government contracting, tax incentives, country-of-origin analysis, or similar product-level cost and sourcing requirements; beneficial but not required.

Responsibilities

Lead consulting engagements involving inventory costing, product costing, manufacturing cost analysis, and related financial and operational processes.
Assess client cost-accounting methodologies, systems, processes, controls, and data, and identify opportunities to improve accuracy, efficiency, transparency, and management decision-making.
Advise on standard and actual costing, inventory valuation, bills of material and manufacturing routings, direct material and labor costs, manufacturing overhead and allocations, variances, inventory controls and cycle counting, product and component cost structures, ERP costing and material flows, and cost and profitability reporting.
Work with clients and ERP or technology teams to evaluate and improve cost-accounting processes and system configurations, including material-flow logic and product-costing methodologies.
Design and oversee analyses of manufacturing costs, purchasing activity, inventory, variances, product profitability, and other financial and operational information.
Develop practical methodologies for complex costing situations where client systems or available data do not provide the needed information.
Document and analyze client processes, internal controls, data flows, and workflows, and recommend improvements.
Provide senior leadership for cost-accounting and financial-data components of domestic content consulting engagements.
Work with manufacturers, suppliers, and client teams to obtain product, cost, and sourcing information for domestic content analyses.
Evaluate and analyze bills of material, supplier information, purchasing records, labor and routing data, manufacturing overhead, inventory records, product costs, and other manufacturing information.
Develop methodologies to identify, categorize, and calculate domestic and non-domestic manufacturing costs or content according to the requirements applicable to each engagement.
Identify gaps, inconsistencies, and limitations in manufacturer or supplier data and develop reasonable, supportable approaches to address them.
Help clients develop repeatable processes, controls, and documentation for collecting and maintaining information needed to support domestic content requirements.
Coordinate with Baker Tilly professionals in tax, incentives, government contracting, engineering, supply chain, legal, technology, and other specialties as appropriate.
Review analyses and supporting documentation to ensure conclusions are accurate, consistent, and defensible to client management and other stakeholders.
Develop engagement approaches, work plans, staffing models, budgets, milestones, data requests, and deliverables.
Manage multiple concurrent engagements while maintaining quality, timeliness, and engagement economics.
Serve as a senior client contact and build relationships with finance, accounting, operations, procurement, supply-chain, engineering, and executive leaders.
Lead client interviews, working sessions, data discussions, executive presentations, and findings meetings.
Translate complex manufacturing, accounting, and data issues into clear business implications and actionable recommendations.
Exercise professional judgment when client data is incomplete, inconsistent, or unavailable and guide teams in developing appropriate analytical approaches.
Review team analyses and deliverables for technical accuracy, quality, clarity, and completeness.
Coach and provide technical guidance to team members in manufacturing cost accounting, inventory costing, data analysis, and domestic content methodologies.
Identify opportunities to expand services and deliver additional value to manufacturing and distribution clients.
Identify emerging client needs and develop new service offerings and solutions.
Participate in business development, including prospect discussions, scopes of work, proposals, presentations, and fee estimates.
Build relationships across Baker Tilly to assemble appropriate technical and industry expertise for client engagements.
Contribute to thought leadership, articles, presentations, and other market-development activities.
Travel as needed to client offices and manufacturing facilities.