Practice Manager / Accounting Operations Manager

The Role

Our client is looking for a highly capable, hands-on Practice Manager / Accounting Operations Manager to take responsibility for the day-to-day management and continued development of a growing accounting practice.

This is a senior operational role for someone who can take ownership, manage people and clients, solve problems independently and build the systems and structures needed to support growth.

The successful candidate will initially manage a team of approximately five employees, with the team expected to grow over time.

The core objective of the role is to take increasing responsibility for the operational running of the practice, allowing the business owner to focus more heavily on strategy, growth and business development.

Key Responsibilities

Take ownership of the day-to-day running of the accounting practice

Manage, lead and develop an existing team of approximately five employees

Recruit and build additional teams or departments as the business grows

Allocate work and manage team capacity and workflow

Ensure deadlines, client commitments and internal targets are consistently achieved

Implement and improve processes, workflows, controls and accountability

Train and develop employees to improve technical capability and performance

Monitor team and individual performance against agreed targets

Work directly with clients and take ownership of client queries and concerns

Deal confidently with escalated client matters and operational issues

Ensure work is accurate, complete and delivered on time

Identify bottlenecks and implement practical solutions

Improve systems and processes to make the practice more efficient and scalable

Take increasing responsibility for operational matters currently managed by the business owner

Support accounting, tax, payroll, company secretarial and related practice requirements where needed

Maintain appropriate quality, compliance and professional standards

Build a culture of ownership, accountability and delivery

Systems & Technology

Strong exposure to accounting practice technology is important.

Experience with several of the following systems will be highly advantageous:

GreatSoft

Draftworx

Xero

Karbon

Dext

SimplePay

Sage Accounting / Sage One

SARS eFiling

CIPC

Candidates do not need experience with every platform but must be highly comfortable working with accounting technology and learning new systems quickly.

Minimum Requirements

Qualified CA(SA) or SAIPA Professional Accountant

Completed articles

Approximately 5–10 years' post-articles experience

Strong accounting practice or professional services experience

Proven experience managing and developing staff

Experience managing multiple clients, priorities and deadlines

Strong client-facing experience

Experience training, mentoring and developing employees

Strong understanding of accounting, taxation and compliance processes

Excellent organisational and operational management ability

Comfortable working remotely while maintaining high levels of accountability and performance

Ideal Candidate Profile

The successful candidate must combine strong technical accounting knowledge with leadership, operational ability and commercial judgement.

We are looking for someone who is

Stable and dependable

Highly accountable

Practical and solutions-driven

Comfortable making decisions

Calm under pressure

Confident and appropriately assertive

Highly organised

Commercially minded

Comfortable managing different personalities

Willing to address poor performance directly

Confident dealing with clients

Able to resolve problems without constant supervision

Able to create structure where it does not yet exist

This is an outcomes-driven environment. Performance will be measured against agreed deliverables, deadlines and targets.

What Success Looks Like

The successful person will progressively

Take significant operational pressure off the business owner

Build a strong, capable and accountable team

Ensure client work moves through the practice efficiently

Improve delivery against deadlines and targets

Create clear and scalable systems and processes

Develop employees so that responsibility can be delegated effectively

Reduce the need for owner involvement in daily operational matters

Build the operational infrastructure required for continued growth

Remuneration

R80,000 – R110,000 per month, depending on experience and qualifications.

A 13th cheque / performance-related component may form part of the remuneration structure and will be linked to agreed performance targets.