Senior IFRS 9 Implementation Specialist

🏗 We're Hiring: Senior IFRS 9 Implementation Specialist

📍 Location: United Arab Emirates (Remote)

🕒 Employment Type: Full-Time

💼 Experience Level: Mid-Level to Senior

🌐 Work Arrangement: Fully Remote

About Us

We are a construction-focused organization committed to delivering complex projects through disciplined financial management, effective accounting practices, robust risk controls, and collaborative project execution. Our multidisciplinary teams work across Project Management, Construction, Engineering, Procurement, Commercial, Legal, Finance, Human Resources, Design, Quality, HSE, Consultants, Contractors, Suppliers, Logistics, Administration, Information Technology, and Executive Leadership to strengthen financial governance, improve reporting accuracy, and support sustainable business growth.

We recognize the importance of reliable financial reporting, consistent accounting policies, and effective implementation of international accounting standards. Through sound financial controls, accurate data management, and continuous process improvement, we aim to maintain transparent financial records, manage credit risk appropriately, and ensure compliance with applicable accounting and regulatory requirements.

The Role

We are seeking an experienced Senior IFRS 9 Implementation Specialist to lead and support the implementation, enhancement, and ongoing maintenance of International Financial Reporting Standard 9 (IFRS 9) across relevant financial instruments, impairment processes, classification and measurement activities, and hedge accounting arrangements where applicable.

The successful candidate will coordinate with Finance, Treasury, Risk Management, Information Technology, Internal Audit, and other stakeholders to translate IFRS 9 requirements into practical accounting policies, system configurations, calculation methodologies, reporting processes, and internal controls. The role will focus on expected credit loss (ECL) implementation, financial asset classification and measurement, impairment model governance, data integrity, accounting disclosures, and implementation project management.

The ideal candidate will possess strong technical accounting knowledge, practical IFRS 9 implementation experience, financial instrument expertise, and the ability to manage complex cross-functional projects while maintaining compliance with applicable United Arab Emirates reporting requirements.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead and coordinate IFRS 9 implementation, enhancement, and remediation initiatives across relevant financial reporting and risk management processes.
• Assess existing accounting policies, systems, data structures, and operational procedures against IFRS 9 requirements.
• Develop detailed implementation plans, project milestones, deliverables, dependencies, and governance arrangements.
• Coordinate with Finance, Treasury, Risk Management, IT, Compliance, and external advisers to ensure consistent implementation across relevant functions.
• Interpret IFRS 9 requirements and translate technical accounting provisions into practical policies, procedures, calculation methodologies, and system requirements.
• Assess the classification and measurement of financial assets and financial liabilities under the applicable IFRS 9 framework.
• Support the assessment of business models for managing financial assets and the contractual cash flow characteristics of relevant instruments.
• Evaluate the application of amortized cost, fair value through other comprehensive income (FVOCI), and fair value through profit or loss (FVTPL), as applicable.
• Review the accounting treatment of loans, receivables, debt instruments, investments, deposits, and other relevant financial instruments.
• Support the assessment and documentation of the contractual cash flow characteristics of financial assets, including the solely payments of principal and interest (SPPI) assessment where applicable.
• Review financial instrument recognition, derecognition, modification, reclassification, and measurement procedures.
• Lead or support the implementation of expected credit loss methodologies for financial assets and other exposures within IFRS 9's impairment scope.
• Develop and maintain procedures for calculating 12-month and lifetime expected credit losses.
• Coordinate the design, implementation, and monitoring of probability of default (PD), loss given default (LGD), and exposure at default (EAD) methodologies.
• Establish processes for identifying significant increases in credit risk and determining appropriate impairment stages.
• Support the application of Stage 1, Stage 2, and Stage 3 impairment requirements.
• Review default definitions, credit-impaired assessments, delinquency indicators, and other criteria used in impairment staging.
• Develop and document methodologies for incorporating forward-looking economic information into ECL calculations.
• Coordinate the selection, weighting, and governance of macroeconomic scenarios used in impairment models.
• Evaluate the impact of economic forecasts, industry conditions, customer risk profiles, and portfolio characteristics on expected credit losses.
• Assess the appropriateness of management overlays and post-model adjustments, ensuring they are supported by evidence and subject to appropriate approval.
• Support model validation, calibration, back-testing, sensitivity analysis, and ongoing performance monitoring.
• Document ECL methodologies, assumptions, data sources, model limitations, adjustments, and approval requirements.
• Review impairment calculation outputs and reconcile results with accounting records and financial reporting systems.
• Assess the IFRS 9 implications of financial assets such as trade receivables, contract assets, loans, deposits, and intercompany balances where applicable.
• Work with Commercial and Project Management teams to evaluate credit risk factors affecting construction-related receivables, contract balances, retention amounts, and customer payment obligations.
• Coordinate with Accounts Receivable and Finance teams to assess aging profiles, overdue balances, collection trends, and impairment indicators.
• Support the implementation of simplified approaches for eligible trade receivables and contract assets, where applicable.
• Review the accounting implications of loan modifications, renegotiated payment terms, distressed exposures, and other changes to contractual cash flows.
• Assess the accounting treatment of relevant financial liabilities, including applicable recognition, measurement, modification, and derecognition requirements.
• Support hedge accounting implementation and documentation where the organization applies IFRS 9 hedge accounting requirements.
• Coordinate the identification and documentation of hedging relationships, eligible hedged items, hedging instruments, and risk management objectives where applicable.
• Assist with the assessment of hedge effectiveness requirements, hedge documentation, and related accounting entries.
• Review the accounting treatment of derivative instruments and other relevant financial contracts in coordination with Treasury and Finance.
• Evaluate the impact of IFRS 9 requirements on existing financial reporting policies, account mappings, chart of accounts, and closing procedures.
• Develop and maintain IFRS 9 accounting policies, technical position papers, implementation manuals, and operational procedures.
• Prepare accounting guidance covering classification, measurement, impairment, modifications, derecognition, and relevant hedge accounting matters.
• Establish controls over data extraction, model inputs, calculation processes, journal entries, and financial statement disclosures.
• Ensure implementation procedures are supported by adequate documentation, approvals, and audit trails.
• Coordinate with IT and system vendors to translate accounting requirements into functional specifications and system configurations.
• Support the implementation or enhancement of financial systems, ECL engines, risk platforms, data warehouses, and reporting applications.
• Define data requirements, field mappings, calculation rules, validation checks, and output specifications for IFRS 9 processes.
• Perform data gap assessments and coordinate remediation of missing, inconsistent, inaccurate, or incomplete information.
• Validate financial instrument data, customer information, contractual cash flows, credit risk parameters, market data, and accounting classifications.
• Support system integration testing, user acceptance testing, parallel runs, and controlled deployment of IFRS 9 solutions.
• Investigate implementation defects, calculation discrepancies, reconciliation differences, and system configuration issues.
• Coordinate with data governance teams to establish ownership, quality standards, lineage, and retention requirements for IFRS 9 information.
• Develop and execute implementation testing plans to confirm that accounting rules and calculations operate as intended.
• Compare legacy accounting outputs with IFRS 9 results and explain material differences arising from changes in classification, measurement, or impairment methodology.
• Support opening balance adjustments, transition assessments, and comparative reporting considerations where relevant to an implementation or modification project.