Manufacturing Cost Accountant

accounting cost accountant Finance Full Time Monday
- Friday Westwood Cabinetry is a Kelowna-based Canadian manufacturer of high-quality cabinetry serving dealer and retail channels across Western Canada. We are seeking an experienced, hands-on Manufacturing Costing Accountant to lead our finance function, strengthen manufacturing cost controls, and turn financial and operating data into practical business insight. Reporting to the President, this role provides financial leadership across accounting, costing, inventory, budgeting, forecasting, cash flow, reporting, and business analysis. The Controller reports to this position and manages day-to-day accounting activities. The successful candidate will partner closely with production, procurement, engineering, sales, shipping, and senior leadership to improve margins, operating performance, data integrity, and decision-making. Provide oversight and direction to the Controller and finance team, establishing priorities, accountabilities, and effective financial controls. Oversee timely and accurate monthly, quarterly, and annual financial reporting in accordance with applicable accounting standards and company policies. Review operating results, balance sheet reconciliations, working capital, cash flow, and financial performance metrics; present findings and recommendations to the President and senior leadership. Ensure the integrity of the general ledger and the appropriate accounting treatment of inventory, cost of goods sold, accruals, and capital expenditures. Coordinate year-end financial statement preparation, external review or audit support, and related schedules and documentation. Manufacturing Costing & Margin Management Own and continuously improve the company's product, job, and standard costing methodologies for raw materials, direct labour, freight, and manufacturing overhead. Develop, maintain, and regularly update product cost sheets, labour and overhead rates, bills of material, routings, cost roll-ups, and item master costing data. investigate purchase price, usage, labour efficiency, overhead absorption, scrap, freight, and production variances. Validate cost of goods sold and provide gross margin analysis by product series, channel, dealer, customer, and order type. Support quoting, pricing reviews, new product development, custom projects, and re-pricing decisions with accurate cost models and profitability scenarios. Quantify the financial impact of supplier changes, material price movements, labour-rate adjustments, design changes, and process improvements. Inventory Accounting & Controls Oversee valuation and reconciliation of raw materials, work in progress, and finished goods, including reserves for slow-moving, obsolete, or excess inventory. Establish and monitor internal controls over inventory, purchasing, costing, and production data. Lead the annual operating and capital budget process, including materials, labour, overhead, departmental expenses, headcount, and cash requirements. Build rolling forecasts using sales, backlog, production pipeline, capacity, lead-time, and purchasing data. Prepare budget-to-actual reporting with clear explanations of variances, risks, opportunities, and recommended actions. Develop management dashboards and KPIs covering revenue, backlog, margins, productivity, labour efficiency, scrap, inventory, working capital, and operating performance. Provide scenario modelling and ad hoc financial analysis to support capacity planning, capital investments, pricing strategy, product rationalization, and other strategic initiatives. Cross-Functional Partnership & Continuous Improvement Serve as a finance business partner to production, procurement, engineering, sales, shipping, and logistics, translating financial information into practical operational actions. Identify margin leakage, bottlenecks, data-quality issues, and inefficient workflows; lead improvements to reporting, costing, controls, and decision support. Maintain costing integrity across Microsoft Dynamics NAV, the SQL-based proprietary production platform, and the 2020 design catalogue. Develop scalable tools, procedures, documentation, and training that improve financial literacy and accountability across the organization. Stay current with manufacturing finance, cost accounting, inventory management, and business intelligence best practices. Bachelor's degree in Accounting, Finance, Business Administration, or a related field. CPA designation is strongly preferred; candidates with substantial, directly relevant manufacturing cost-accounting and finance leadership experience will also be considered. Minimum five years of progressive experience in cost accounting, financial analysis, controllership, or finance leadership, including significant experience in a manufacturing environment. Demonstrated experience with product costing, job costing, standard costing, inventory va