Finance Transformation Manager (Project Hire)

The Walt Disney Company; Burbank (CA); On-site; USD 139,000 - 170,000; Full time

Job summary

The Walt Disney Company in Burbank, California seeks a Finance Transformation Manager to lead enterprise data strategy and the Finance Data Layer implementation. You will coordinate cross-functional teams across finance, data engineering, and analytics to deliver scalable, governed data solutions that support EPM, BI reporting, and AI/ML use cases.

You will translate finance needs into data product requirements, manage roadmaps, ensure data quality, and drive end-to-end delivery in a fast-paced

Qualifications

• 5+ years in enterprise data strategy, data platform implementation, or Finance Transformation.
• Experience delivering cross-functional data initiatives from strategy to delivery.
• Knowledge of modern data stack, data lakehouse patterns, and cloud architecture.
• Understanding of Finance processes including planning, forecasting, and reporting.

Responsibilities

• Lead the data strategy and implementation roadmap for enterprise Finance data capabilities.
• Drive Finance Data Layer / data lakehouse implementation to support EPM and BI.
• Translate Finance needs into requirements, user stories, and data product specs.
• Partner with stakeholders to deliver scalable, governed data solutions.
• Guide end-to-end delivery from data source discovery to deployment and support.
• Define priorities and manage delivery governance and risk.
• Establish success measures for data capabilities and user adoption.
• Communicate complex data concepts to executives and technical audiences.

Skills

Data strategy

Data platform

Data product delivery

Finance Transformation

Cross-functional leadership

Stakeholder alignment

Cloud data architecture

ETL/ELT pipelines

Data governance

Communication with execs

Education

Bachelor's degree

Tools

Snowflake

Databricks

SAP S/4 / BW / HANA

Tableau / Power BI

dbt / Airflow

SQL / Python

Job description

Finance Transformation Manager (Project Hire through April 1st 2028)

At Disney, we're storytellers. We make the impossible, possible. The Walt Disney Company is a world-class entertainment and technological leader. Walt's passion was to continuously envision new ways to move audiences around the world- a passion that remains our touchstone in an enterprise that stretches from theme parks, resorts and a cruise line to sports, news, movies and a variety of other businesses. Uniting each endeavor is a commitment to creating and delivering unforgettable experiences - and we're constantly looking for new ways to enhance these exciting experiences.

About the Role & Team

The Finance Transformation mission is to deliver technology solutions that align to business strategies while enabling enterprise efficiency and promoting cross-company collaborative innovation. The team drives competitive advantage by enhancing consumer experiences, enabling business growth, and advancing operational excellence.

The Finance Transformation Manager plays a pivotal role in coordinating and managing global finance integration and transformation efforts, contributing to the company's Future-Fit Finance Organization. This role leads the strategy, design, and implementation of enterprise data capabilities that enable Finance Transformation across Disney Entertainment and the broader enterprise.

The position sits at the intersection of business architecture, data strategy, product ownership, technical delivery, and finance process transformation. The initial focus is implementing a Finance Data Layer, a scalable data lakehouse that provides trusted, governed, and analytics-ready data to Finance systems and applications, including Enterprise Performance Management, business intelligence reporting and analytics, and AI and machine learning use cases.

What You Will Do

• Lead the data strategy and implementation roadmap for enterprise Finance data capabilities, ensuring alignment to Finance Transformation priorities, company-wide data strategies, and long-term technology architecture.

• Drive the implementation of a Finance Data Layer / data lakehouse to support EPM, BI reporting and analytics, AI/ML applications, and other Finance platforms and services.

• Translate Finance planning, forecasting, reporting, and operational needs into business requirements, technical requirements, user stories, data product specifications, and implementation plans.

• Partner with business stakeholders, product teams, delivery managers, solution architects, engineers, analytics teams, and support operations to deliver end-to-end data solutions that are scalable, governed, and fit for business use.

• Support cross-functional project teams through the full delivery lifecycle, from data source discovery and ingestion design through modeling, transformation, validation, UAT, deployment, and operational support.

• Coordinate and guide engineering efforts required to build large-scale data platform capabilities, including ingestion pipelines, medallion architecture, dimensional models, data quality frameworks, security standards, and ready-to-use datasets.

• Define and manage platform and program priorities, balancing business value, delivery timelines, technical debt, platform stability, cost optimization, and ongoing enhancement needs.

• Establish success measures for data capabilities, including data quality, data availability, query performance, user adoption, delivery milestones, cost efficiency, and business outcomes.

• Support Finance Transformation initiatives by connecting process optimization, business capability design, and data implementation across Disney Entertainment and enterprise Finance teams.

• Communicate clearly with executive, business, functional, and technical audiences, translating complex data and technology concepts into practical decisions, risks, tradeoffs, and next steps.

Required Qualifications & Skills

• 5+ years of progressive experience in enterprise data strategy, data platform implementation, data product delivery, Finance Transformation, or related technology transformation roles.

• Experience leading complex, cross-functional data implementation initiatives from strategy and requirements through delivery, validation, adoption, and operational support.

• Strong understanding of enterprise data platforms, modern data stack concepts, cloud data architecture, data lakehouse patterns, and scalable data pipeline delivery.

• Working knowledge of Finance processes, including planning, forecasting, reporting, performance management, financial data definitions, and the role of data in enabling modern Finance capabilities.

• Experience translating business needs into functional requirements, technical requirements, data models, source-to-target mappings, implementation plans, and user acceptance criteria.

• Experience partnering with engineers and architects on data ingestion, ETL/ELT pipelines, dimensional modeling, medallion architecture, data quality, access controls, and production-ready datasets.

• Strong project and delivery leadership skills, including roadmap development, prioritization, dependency management, risk management, stakeholder alignment, and delivery governance.

• Excellent communication skills with the ability to engage both business and technical audiences, including senior leaders, Finance stakeholders, architects, engineers, analysts, and external partners.

• Highly collaborative, detail-oriented, deliverable-focused, and able to navigate ambiguity, resolve complex issues, and manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with enterprise data domains; Finance data experience strongly preferred.

• Experience with Snowflake, Databricks, SAP systems such as S/4, BW, HANA, or BDC, and EPM platforms such as Oracle EPM.

• Experience with BI and visualization tools such as Tableau and Power BI.

• Experience with data governance, master data management, metadata management, data quality frameworks, and role-based access controls.

• Familiarity with dbt, Python, Airflow, SQL, Java, CI/CD practices for data, and performance optimization for cloud data platforms.

• Experience in entertainment, streaming, media, or similarly complex global business environments.

• Formal project management, Agile, Six Sigma, consulting, PMP, MBA, CPA, or related transformation credentials are a plus.

Education

• Bachelor's degree in any of the following areas: Finance, Accounting, Computer Science, Information Systems, Engineering, Data Analytics, or a comparable field of study, and/or equivalent work experience.

The hiring range for this position in Burbank, California is $139,200.00-$170,000.00 per year. The base pay actually offered will take into account internal equity and also may vary depending on the candidate's geographic region, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience among other factors. A bonus and/or long-term incentive units may be provided as part of the compensation package, in addition to the full range of medical, financial, and/or other benefits, dependent on the level and position offered.