Business Manager Portugal (Responsável Administrativo e Financeiro) - PART TIME

Job description

## **⌘Role Overview** Timeleft has a Portuguese subsidiary, Hello Stranger Timeleft Portugal, Lda: it carries marketing investment, employs people, works with freelancers, and manages its own bank accounts and accounting with a local certified accountant. You are the person who makes sure the Portuguese entity runs: you close the books on time with the accountant, you deliver P&L and cash position, you pay suppliers and people, you produce reporting for the investors , and when anyone asks a question about this company, you are the one who answers it. This is a **finance and administration role with real ownership of a live entity**. You report to the VP Finance in Paris, and work directly with the Head of People and the CEO. **Your mission:** make the Portuguese entity reliable and documented: financially, administratively and legally. **Employment type: Part-time — 80% FTE (full-time equivalent)** ## **⌘Key Responsibilities** ### 1. Own the monthly close and financial reporting of the Portuguese entity - **Close the month** — accruals, supplier invoices, payroll entries, intercompany elements, bank reconciliations. - **Manage the accountant** — own the relationship with our external accounting provider and our certified accountant: brief them, set expectations, review what they produce, challenge what looks wrong. - **Produce the entity P&L** every month, with month-over-month evolution and comments : material variances, their cause, your recommendations. - **Reconcile the bank accounts** and explain every material movement. - **Prepare the statutory accounts** and annual filings with the accountant, on the Portuguese calendar (financial year closes 31 December). - **Maintain the audit trail** — every euro in and out of this entity must be documented, justified and retrievable. ### 2. Supervise payments and treasury - **Control the payments** made from the Portuguese entity: invoices issued for the correct entity, amount matches spend, payment executed on time, correctly booked. - **Supervise freelancer and supplier payments** — verify invoices, prepare payment runs, confirm execution, resolve disputes. - **Manage the banking relationship** — account setup, payment limits, user rights, onboarding of signatories, escalation when a transfer is blocked. - **Monitor entity cash** — available balance, committed spend, upcoming obligations. Flag any risk of shortfall before it becomes one. - **Maintain the payment calendar** so no deadline (Meta, payroll, tax, social security) is missed. ### 3. Supervise the EOR employees and freelancers on the entity - **Verify monthly** that every EOR employee and freelancer attached to the Portuguese entity has been paid correctly and on time, via Deel. - **Interface with Deel** on contracts, amendments, onboarding, offboarding and invoicing for the Portuguese entity. - **Support the setup of local Portuguese payroll** with the Head of People and the accountant, then run it once live. - **Hold a monthly review with the Head of People**: headcount, contractors, open issues. ### 4. Own local administration, compliance and corporate housekeeping - **Be the Portuguese-language interface** for the accountant, the bank, Autoridade Tributária, Segurança Social and any local counterparty. - **Handle the entity's administrative obligations** — registrations, declarations, certificates, RCBE, certidão permanente renewals. - **Manage the registered office in practice** — collect and process mail, handle in-person steps, keep the corporate file complete. - **Maintain the corporate document set** — statutes, minutes book, powers of attorney, intercompany agreements, contracts: organised, current, retrievable. - **Handle Portuguese contracts and suppliers** — review, track, renew, archive. ### 5. Advise on local budget allocation - **Track budget consumption by cost centre**, with landing forecasts against plan. - **Present variances** and their causes to the VP Finance. - **Produce a formal allocation recommendation each quarter:** where the budget should go next, with the reasoning — plus an ad-hoc one whenever consumption or performance diverges materially from plan. ### 6. Contribute to cross-entity finance and admin projects - **Support FP&A work** with the VP Finance — cost-centre budget reviews, landing forecasts, reporting improvements. - **Take on group administrative work** where capacity allows — finance operations, HR administration, workflow documentation, tooling. - **Document what you build** — every process you set up should be written down so it survives you. ## **⌘Expected Outcomes** - **Monthly close delivered on time, twelve months out of twelve** — target D+5 - **Zero late payment** on Meta invoices, EOR payroll, freelancers, tax and social security. - **Zero unexplained bank movement** at month end. - **A monthly entity report** produced and read by the VP Finance, Head of People and CEO: P&L, cash position, budget consumption, written comments. - **A complete, current corporate and compliance file** — any document requested produced within 48 hours. - **Statutory accounts filed on time**, with no qualification and no penalty. - **Local Portuguese payroll live and running**, with all eligible contracts migrated from EOR to local contracts. - **A documented operating manual for the entity** — close checklist, payment calendar, compliance calendar, supplier list, contact list. - **Budget consumption tracked against plan** with monthly variance analysis, and four quarterly allocation recommendations submitted. ## **⌘Skills & Competencies** ### Must have: - **Accounting fundamentals** — you can build and read a balance sheet and a P&L, and you know what sits behind each line. - **Monthly close experience** — you have been accountable for a close cycle, not just contributed to one. - **Bank reconciliation and treasury basics** — payment runs, cash monitoring, banking platforms. - **Portuguese accounting, tax and social security framework** — working knowledge (SNC, IVA, IRC, Segurança Social). - **Working with an external accountant** — you know how to brief one, review their output and challenge. - **Excel or Google Sheets at a real level** — pivots, lookups, building a model someone else can use. - **Fluent Portuguese and fluent English**, written and spoken. Both non-negotiable. ### Soft skills: - **Rigour** — you reconcile to the cent, and you notice when something does not tie. - **Autonomy** — the deadlines are given, the method is not. - **Direct communication** — you surface problems early, with a proposed solution attached. - **Ownership without a manual** — half of what you need does not exist yet. You build it. - **Discretion** — you handle salary, banking and investor information. - **Comfort with senior exposure** — you present to the VP Finance and the CEO directly, in English, monthly. ### Nice to have: - Experience in a startup or scale-up operating across multiple countries. - Exposure to intercompany flows, transfer pricing or cross-border recharges. - Familiarity with Deel, Qonto, Finthesis - Experience with investor or fund reporting. - Audit background (Big Four or local firm), or a first experience in a chartered accountancy practice. - Automation instinct — you have used scripts or AI tools to remove repetitive work from your own job. ## **⌘**Required experience ### Must have - **4 to 6 years of experience** in accounting, finance operations, or administrative and financial management. - **At least one experience where you were personally accountable for a closing cycle** and for the accuracy of what was filed. - **Direct experience dealing with external counterparties** — accountants, banks, tax authorities. - **Degree in accounting, finance, management or economics**, or an equivalent professional path. - **Based in the Lisbon area**, able to be physically present weekly. - **Fluent Portuguese and fluent English.** ### Nice to have - Experience as the sole finance person in a small entity or a foreign subsidiary. - TOC / Contabilista Certificado qualification, or progress towards it. - Experience setting up payroll, banking or accounting for a new entity. - Experience in a consumer, marketplace, events or hospitality business. ### Deliberately not required - Marketing, growth or commercial experience — this is not that role. - Team management experience — this role has no direct reports. - Prior general management or director-level experience. ## **⌘Objectives for the first 3 months** ### Month 1 — Take control of the file - **Map the entity** — read every corporate, banking, accounting and contractual document. Produce a written inventory of what exists, what is missing, what is out of date. - **Meet every counterparty** — accountant, Joongle, bank contacts, Deel account manager, plus the internal owners (VP Finance, Head of People, CEO). - **Build the calendars** — monthly close, payments, compliance and filings for the next 12 months. - **Deliver a written diagnostic** of the entity's administrative and financial state, ranked by risk. ### Month 2 — Close a month yourself - **Run the monthly close** end to end with the accountant, and deliver the first entity report: P&L, cash, budget consumption, comments. - **Take over payment supervision** — Meta invoice checked and booked, freelancer and supplier payments verified, EOR payroll confirmed with the Head of People. - **Clear the gaps** from the month-1 diagnostic — missing documents obtained, expired items renewed, corporate file completed. - **Set up the monthly rituals** with the VP Finance, the Head of People and the CEO. ### Month 3 — Make it repeatable - **Second close delivered on time**, faster than the first, with a documented checklist anyone could follow. - **First investor reporting pack** prepared and reviewed. - **Budget consumption tracking live** by cost centre, with the first formal allocation recommendation submitted. - **A written operating manual for the entity** — close, payments, compliance, contacts. - **A prioritised list of what you would automate next**, with your reasoning. ## **⌘Recruitment process** **Introduction Interview (30 min)** with Talent Acquisition Lead **Business Interview (30 min)** with VP Finance **Case Study (take-home, ~3 hours)** **Case Study Q&A (45min)** with VP Finance **Final Interview (30min)** with CEO We might ask for references.