Senior Accountant, Avant
$75-110k
+ Bonus
M, T, Th in-office
3+ days a week in office (Merchandise Mart, Chicago)
Personal credit FinTech
Posted today
Personal credit FinTech
501-1000 employees
Posted today
$75-110k
+ Bonus
M, T, Th in-office
3+ days a week in office (Merchandise Mart, Chicago)
501-1000 employees
Company mission
To move financial lives forward.
Role
Who you are
- Bachelor’s degree in accounting or finance; CPA preferred
- 4–7 years of progressive accounting experience, including experience owning complex accounting processes and month-end close responsibilities
- Public accounting, FinTech, lending, financial services, or high-growth company experience are strongly preferred
- Strong understanding of the U.S. GAAP and financial reporting requirements
- Demonstrated ability to independently analyze accounting issues, recommend solutions, and execute with limited supervision
- Proven experience leading process improvement initiatives and leveraging technology to increase efficiency and accuracy
- Advanced Excel skills and experience with ERP and close-management systems such as NetSuite, FloQast, or Workiva (Wdesk)
- Strong project management, organizational, and prioritization skills in a fast-paced environment
- Excellent communication skills with the ability to influence and collaborate across departments and levels of the organization
- Experience reviewing work, mentoring team members, and serving as a resource for less experienced accountants
- Strong analytical mindset, professional skepticism, attention to detail, and commitment to continuous improvement
- We believe that a diverse set of backgrounds and experiences helps us create the most innovative solutions for our customers. We invite you to apply to our positions even if you do not meet 100% of the qualifications listed in the description. If you’re passionate about our mission and aligned to our values, we hope you’ll come contribute to our awesome culture
What the job involves
- Behind every loan, card, and transaction at Avant is an accounting team dedicated to accuracy, supporting millions of middle-income Americans in accessing credit
- We're looking for a Senior Accountant who wants to do more than close the books
- You'll own complex operational accounting processes end to end, become the go-to expert for the areas you run, and lead the push to automate the manual work that slows accounting down, bringing AI and emerging technology into reconciliations, exception review, and variance analysis with the controls and auditability to back it up
- If you're the kind of accountant who spots the broken process before it becomes an audit finding and would rather rebuild it than work around it, you'll fit here
- Own complex operational accounting processes and month-end close activities, including preparation and review of journal entries, account reconciliations, variance analysis, and supporting documentation, ensuring accuracy, completeness, and timely execution
- Serve as the subject matter expert for assigned operational accounting areas, developing a strong understanding of end-to-end processes, systems, data flows, and upstream and downstream dependencies
- Identify, investigate, and resolve accounting issues, unusual transactions, reconciliation differences, control exceptions, and process breakdowns, partnering with relevant stakeholders to drive timely and sustainable resolution
- Support the continued development and execution of the company’s SOX control environment, including process documentation, control execution, evidence retention, testing support, and remediation activities
- Partner with Accounting, Finance, IT, and business stakeholders to strengthen internal controls over financial processes and embed effective, scalable controls into evolving workflows and systems
- Lead cross-functional collaboration with business partners to improve data quality, clarify process ownership, resolve operational issues, and strengthen the accuracy and reliability of accounting processes
- Drive continuous improvement across accounting workflows by identifying opportunities for automation, standardization, simplification and operational efficiency, with a focus on reducing manual effort and increasing scalability
- Identify and implement appropriate uses of AI and emerging technologies within accounting workflows, including reconciliations, transaction review, exception identification, variance analysis, and other repetitive or data-intensive activities
- Partner with Finance Systems, IT, and other stakeholders to ensure new systems, automation, and AI-enabled processes incorporate appropriate controls, governance, validation, and auditability by design
- Develop and maintain accounting process documentation, standard operating procedures, desktop procedures, and control documentation to promote consistency, knowledge transfer, and operational resilience
- Review and approve selected journal entries, reconciliations, controls and workpapers prepared by junior team members, ensuring quality, consistency, and adherence to established accounting and documentation standards
- Mentor, coach, and develop staff accountants through knowledge sharing, feedback, and training, including strengthening capabilities in operational accounting, internal controls, systems, and process improvement
- Lead or participate in strategic projects, system implementations, and process transformation initiatives impacting accounting operations, with an emphasis on scalability, control maturity, automation, and operational efficiency
- Support internal and external audits through timely preparation of schedules, process documentation, control evidence and responses to auditor inquiries; proactively address findings and identified process improvements
- Promote a culture of ownership, strong controls, continuous improvement, and thoughtful adoption of technology across accounting operations
Our take
Many Americans with below average credit scores are caught in a bind: they're unable to improve their score, and simultaneously cannot access traditional loans. Avant's alternative is to offer credit options that are powered by machine learning and based upon a large database that helps to manage risk.
For its users, the company offers a quick credit decision and speedy access to any allotted funds. It has issued over $8 billion in loans to date, and has also expanded its business through the acquisitions of ReadyForZero in 2015 and Zero Financial in 2021.
This expansion has enabled Avant to reach towards its goal of offering a whole suite of products in a single platform, such as loans, credit cards, and deposits. Although there are many FinTechs looking at ways to remove the barriers that people with low credit scores face when trying to take out loans, this expansion to banking products should help Avant to stand out.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
-3% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 6 rounds)
Dec 2022
$125m
GROWTH EQUITY VC
Sep 2015
$325m
SERIES E
Total funding: $779m
Company benefits
- Choice of great medical, dental, and vision insurance plan options
- 401(k) Match
- Unlimited paid time off
- Flexible work environment
- Generous paid parental leave
- Lunch allowance (Fooda) and in-office snacks
- WFH stipends for our remote employees
- Access to LinkedIn Learning for professional development
- No meeting wednesdays - (a.k.a. planned time to Get Sh!t Done)
- Summer fridays
- Fun in-office and virtual social events
- (And who doesn’t love the swag)
Company HQ
River North, Chicago, IL
Leadership
Al Goldstein
(Co-Founder, Chair & CEO)They worked for a year at Deutsche Bank before founding Pangea Properties in 2008, and Avant in 2013. They have been Chair since, alongside founding Amount, Spring Labs, and StoicLane.
Paul Zhang
(Co-Founder & CIO)Having studied at the University of Illinois, they spent a year as a Software Engineer at CashNetUSA and Enova Financial. They founded Debteye in 2011, before starting Avant in 2013, serving first as CTO then Chief Architect, CTO again and finally CIO.
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