Cost Accountant

The Senior Cost Accountant is responsible for leading cost accounting operations within a multi-site manufacturing environment. This position plays a critical role in inventory valuation, standard costing, cost of goods sold analysis, labor and overhead allocation, cost roll ups and capital expenditure justification & tracking. The Senior Cost Accountant will partner closely with operations, supply chain, and plant leadership to ensure accurate product costing, improve gross margins, and drive financial performance. This is an on-site role supporting multiple manufacturing locations.

ESSENTIAL DUTIES & RESPONSIBILITIES:

COST ACCOUNTING

• Manage and maintain standard costing systems, including material, labor, and overhead allocation methodologies.
• Perform cost roll ups, bill of materials analysis, and routing reviews to maintain accurate product costing structures for over 5,000 individual SKU’s.
• Analyze cost of goods sold, manufacturing variances, purchase price variances, and production variances.
• Review and update standard costs, labor rates, and overhead rates to reflect operational changes.
• Track, analyze and reconcile job costing of major tooling projects
• Become a subject matter expert on production reporting processes to better understand their correlation and impact to the financial results.

INVENTORY CONTROL

• Oversee inventory accounting for raw materials, work in process, and finished goods, ensuring accurate inventory valuation.
• Lead monthly, quarterly, and annual inventory reconciliations and support physical inventory counts.
• Analyze slow moving and/or obsolete inventory & prepare reserves accordingly.
• Monitor the cycle count program – if weaknesses are noted, make suggestions as needed.

FIXED ASSETS

• Maintain the company’s fixed asset records ensuring that additions & disposals are accounted for accurately and timely.
• Ensure that depreciation schedules are accurate and consistent with assigned useful lives
• Maintain the company’s capex approval models and collaborate with requestors to draft justifications that include ROI, IRR & Payback analysis.

SALES & MARGIN ANALYSIS

• Analyze cost of product sales (margin analysis), investigate unusual items, and recommend changes in BOMs, or potential for margin improvements (i.e., need for price increases)
• Assist Sales department with pricing reviews and product costing inquiries.

BUSINESS SYSTEMS

• Become a power user of the ERP system as it relates to product costing, BOM & routing structures, variance reporting, project accounting, production reporting and general ledger.
• Become a power user of ERP reporting including an in-depth knowledge existing reports as it relates to databases, parameter settings, formulas & calculations, etc.
• Become a “go to” source for developing BI analytics & reporting for both the ERP system and other third party software.

GENERAL ACCOUNTING

• Prepare and post journal entries
• Analyze and reconcile accounts
• Month end closing & analysis
• Assist in the completion of annual budgets & periodic forecasting
• Assist with annual audits and tax returns

CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT

• Identify continuous improvement opportunities in both accounting and non-accounting processes.
• Be prepared to lead and/or be an active participant on continuous improvement projects
• Be a resource to CI project leads to calculate and validate cost savings opportunities
• Promote & utilize CI & Problem solving techniques including LEAN & Six Sigma

QUALIFICATIONS (KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS & ABILITIES):

• Bachelors or Associates Degree in Accounting
• Experience working in a manufacturing environment
• General accounting experience including processing journal entries, account accruals & reconciliations, month end closing, annual budgets, etc.
• Manufacturing accounting experience (Std Costing, Mfg Variances, Inventory Control, Fixed Assets)
• Experience using an ERP system that integrates production with accounting; IQMS experience a plus
• Power user of Excel and other report writing software
• Experience working in a continuous improvement environment that utilizes LEAN/Six Sigma concepts; OR has a desire to learn and apply these concepts.
• Excellent written & verbal communicator with cross functional teams & colleagues
• Analytical thinker with demonstrated problem-solving skills and attention to detail
• Ability to work independently and as part of a team.