Senior Accountant Lead

The Team

We are seeking a Lead Senior Accountant to join the Lease Finance team within American Tower’s Global Business Solutions organization. Lease Finance performs, analyzes, and reports on complex transactions for internal customers in our global markets.  Day to day you will analyze the financial aspects of the Company’s leases and its related assets, liabilities, and proper recording of straight-line adjustments in the general ledger. The Lead Senior Accountant will obtain appropriate supporting documentation, partner cross-functionally, and lead contract-related projects and audits in accordance with internal policies and relevant GAAP guidance. The incumbent will analyze requests to change terms of existing contracts and support internal customers with post-revision financial information in accordance with internal guidelines. The Lead Senior Accountant must be able to understand and interpret high volumes of lease data and summarize those into a value-added analyses and financial close deliverables. Additionally, the incumbent will prepare and review journal entries, reports, and financial presentations by collecting, analyzing, and summarizing contract information to support external reporting requirements and local management requirements and reporting needs.

What You Can Offer Us

• Perform monthly financial close activities, which include performing and reviewing balance sheet reconciliations, booking and reviewing journal entries, and maintaining internal control documentation. This also includes:
• Performing analyses of profit and loss accounts related to tenant and ground leases.
• Reconciling balance sheets to ensure transactions are reported properly to support REIT and securitization reporting; and
• Maintaining internal control documentation, checklists, and audits to comply with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.    
• Coordinate across the organization to understand unusual financial transactions and determine proper accounting treatments.    
• Resolve accounting discrepancies to prevent control deficiencies and data inaccuracies to support SEC, group, standalone, and statutory reporting requirements.   
• Leverage systems’ tools to effectively improve reconciliations, processes, analyses, and reporting and identify process efficiencies within the designated scope areas.
• Ensure financial records are maintained in compliance with GAAP and internal policies and procedures.    
• Review budget v. forecast analyses and trends; produce monthly operating reports.    
• Prepare reports and financial presentations by collecting, analyzing, and summarizing contract information.    
• Stay informed about current internal practices and guidelines, including lease accounting guidance, master lease governance, and commencement date determination, to administer lease documents appropriately in the Oracle system.    
• Train new employees on processes and procedures; update training manuals to reflect current procedures.    
• Develop relationships with the Lease Abstraction, Lease Administration, Land Management, Legal, Landlord Relations, and Finance departments to implement and/or support process improvements and develop best practices.    
• Execute monthly accounting closes in accordance with the required time and quality standards.   
• Ensure all journals and adjustments are supported by underlying analyses.   
• Ensure that group, standalone, and statutory financials comply with GAAP and internal accounting policies.    
• Recruit and manage the performance and career development of Senior Accountants and Accountants. Cultivate a collaborative team dynamic that enables us to meet our business objectives.    
• Review key business terms of various contracts to support internal customers’ needs. This includes:
  • Reviewing and interpreting leases to identify financial clauses that help assess and manage the Company’s financials, including various contract terms such as term, termination rights, and billing amount.
  • Analyzing requests to change the terms of existing contracts.
  • Supporting internal customers with post-revision financial information.
  • Clarifying and resolving contract interpretation and pricing questions with internal teams.
  • Coordinating with other departments on contract terms and provisions; and
  • Performing complex contract research for management.    
  • Prepare reports and financial presentations by collecting, analyzing, and summarizing contract information.    
  • Perform audits on loaded contracts to ensure that financial terms were processed correctly; communicate audit findings to various business partners. Provide data and calculations to support internal and external audit requests.    
  • Lead cross-organizational projects impacting land and tenant lease data; effectively communicate processes and collaborate on best practices.    
  • Identify and review with peers situations when accounting guidelines present multiple interpretations for a particular lease and escalate to the Manager for resolution as necessary; offer ideas for resolution to correct exceptions and prevent recurrence of issues in the future.    
  • Other duties as assigned.    

What You Need to Succeed

• Bachelor’s degree in Accounting or Finance required.
• Minimum of 3 years of experience in a close environment required.
• Oracle experience strongly preferred.
• Supervisory experience preferred.
• CPA preferred.
• Strong organization, planning, and project management skills; ability to prioritize tasks for yourself and a team to meet requirements and deadlines.
• Ability to work with different functional groups and levels of employees to effectively and professionally achieve results.
• Strong leadership skills; ability to drive and motivate team to achieve results.
• Ability to read and interpret complex contracts with multiple amendments and ensure the accounting complies with the master lease agreement and is in accordance with lease accounting guidance.
• Excellent attention to detail and strong system and analytical skills; able to understand complex processes.
• Strong computer skills, including Microsoft Office suite.
• Self-motivated; able to both work independently to complete tasks and respond to requests and collaborate with others to utilize their resources and knowledge to identify high quality solutions.
• Strong written and oral communication skills, including the ability to present ideas and suggestions clearly and effectively.
• Strong organizational skills; ability to accomplish multiple tasks within the agreed upon timeframes through effective prioritization of duties and functions in a fast-paced environment.
• Approximately 5% travel may be required to support the position’s responsibilities.