Executive Manager - Internal Audit

Background

At Great-West Life, we take pride in our history of serving the financial security needs of our customers.  Irish Life and Canada Life provide individuals and their families with a broad range of protection and wealth management products. For more than 100 years, we’ve been helping our clients develop their financial security plans.  Great-West Life (GWL) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Great-West Lifeco Inc., a member of the Power Financial Corporation group of companies.

The Role

We are seeking an experienced and dedicated Executive Manager in Internal Audit based in Dublin, who will be responsible for providing reliable and independent “opinions” on the adequacy, effectiveness and sustainability of the governance, risk management and control processes and infrastructure supporting business units across Irish and German Operations.  In addition, the Executive Manager will work in partnership with business unit Managing Directors and business executives to support and influence continuous improvement in the organisation’s governance, risk management and control processes and practices through the sharing of best practices and insights.   This role is critical in ensuring that our infrastructure supports our strategic objectives and operational efficiency.
 

Key responsibilities include:

• In conjunction with the Chief Internal Auditor, Ireland & Germany, develop and agree risk based internal audit plans for the business units, ensuring that the audit assignments assess key financial, operational and risk management controls across the business units;
• Lead and manage workloads across teams, ensuring delivery of all audit deliverables and insights, on time and within budget;
• Deliver high quality written reports on relevant governance, risk management and control issues;
• Within the context of the audit scope approved by the Chief Internal Auditor, oversee the effective and efficient execution of the audits that will support the audit opinion and in a manner that is consistent with relevant auditing standards, methodologies and processes;
• Establish and maintain high impact personal relationships with a wide range of internal & external stakeholders including the most senior executives across the delegated area and to drive the audit service with business strategy and objectives in mind;
• Preparation, input, review and/or, presentation of reports and dashboards to Audit Committee, Managing Directors and Executive Management Teams;
• Attendance at Steering Committees for relevant projects or initiatives as required;
• Support the Chief Internal Auditor in developing and implementing strategies to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the audit function;
• Provide executive leadership, as part of IA’s Leadership Team, to colleagues, supporting the changes they will need to make in terms of mind-sets, behaviours and practices.
   

The Person

The successful candidate will have:

• A relevant professional qualification (e.g. CMIIA, ACA, ACCA, CIA) and 7+ years post qualification experience operating in an audit role;
• Experience holding a senior management level, or equivalent, position in internal audit or leading audit practice, leading multi-disciplined teams of professional auditors and executing risk-based assurance work, preferably in a Life Assurance company, Investment Management or other financial services organisation;
• Ability to make systematic, rational and compliant judgements based on relevant data
• Sound analytical skills, with the ability to approach a problem by using a logical, systematic, sequential approach
• Strong influence / negotiation skills and the ability to deliver valuable insights and negotiate key audit findings with senior management
• Demonstrates a range of skills including inspirational leadership, communicating with impact, managing and influencing;
• Proven ability to interact effectively at all levels of the organization.
• Experience with Data Analytic / AI tools (desirable) 
• High ethical standards and a commitment to integrity and professionalism.

Key Competencies