Business Intelligence Manager

Job Description

Requirements

• Core Competencies:
• Business Acumen & Strategic Thinking (paramount): Deep commercial intuition connecting analytical insights to P&L drivers, customer behavior, and competitive positioning
• Analytical & Technical Capabilities: Advanced proficiency in SQL, Python/R, Excel financial modeling, and visualization tools (Tableau/Power BI)
• Communication & Influence: Exceptional ability to distill complex analyses into clear, actionable recommendations for C-suite executives
• Ability to anticipate business needs and proactively deliver insights before being asked
• Commercial acumen that connects analytical findings to P&L impact and value creation
• Courage to bring uncomfortable truths to leadership when data reveals strategic vulnerabilities
• Success in translating complex market dynamics into executable strategic recommendations
• Track record of driving strategic initiatives that delivered measurable business results
• Strategic mindset that sees patterns others miss and connects seemingly unrelated dots
• Proactive approach—bringing solutions, not just problems
• Experience building forecasting models, scenario planning frameworks, and business cases
• Competitive intelligence expertise with understanding of market dynamics
• Customer insight development skills that inform commercial strategy
• Ability to design executive dashboards and establish leading indicators
• Cross-functional influence and strategic partnership skills
• Who You Are:
• You're the person who sees patterns others miss and connects dots that seem unrelated
• You don't just crunch numbers—you understand what drives business performance and can articulate the "so what" behind every analysis
• You've earned credibility with senior leaders by consistently bringing forward-looking actionable insights that protected the business from threats or unlocked new opportunities
• You're equally comfortable debating market strategy as you are building financial models
• You're proactive, not reactive—you bring solutions, not just problems

Responsibilities

• Strategic Intelligence & Proactive Solution Development:
• Serving as the strategic early-warning system for Kenya Operations, proactively identifying emerging threats and opportunities before they impact the business
• Developing unsolicited strategic recommendations based on patterns you observe in performance data, market dynamics, or competitive moves
• Anticipating leadership's strategic questions and arriving at meetings with analysis and recommendations already prepared
• Building advanced forecasting models that identify inflection points, risks, and opportunities requiring strategic response
• Designing sophisticated scenario planning frameworks that pressure-test strategies against multiple future states (regulatory changes, competitive disruption, macroeconomic shifts)
• Challenging strategic assumptions with rigorous analysis—being the voice that asks "what if we're wrong about this?" and provides data to validate or redirect strategy
• Transforming complex, multi-dimensional datasets into compelling strategic narratives that drive executive decision-making
• Conducting deep-dive root cause analyses when performance deviates from expectations, arriving with not just diagnosis but recommended solutions
• Building business cases for strategic initiatives, quantifying expected ROI and implementation requirements
• Market & Competitive Intelligence: Winning the Strategic Game:
• Maintaining comprehensive competitive intelligence that goes beyond feature comparison to understand competitors' strategic intent, vulnerabilities, and likely next moves
• Proactively developing competitive response strategies before competitors' actions impact our market position
• Building war-gaming scenarios that simulate competitive dynamics and test the robustness of our strategies
• Identifying strategic whitespace—underserved segments, unmet needs, or market inefficiencies that represent growth opportunities
• Monitoring the broader fintech and financial services ecosystem for emerging business models or technologies that could disrupt our approach
• Translating regulatory developments into strategic implications—not just compliance requirements, but competitive advantages or strategic risks
• Developing point-of-view perspectives on "what's next" for Kenya's fintech market and positioning M-KOPA to lead rather than follow
• Building relationships with industry experts, regulatory bodies, and market intelligence sources to maintain information advantage
• Creating competitor scorecards that track not just what competitors are doing but how effectively they're executing
• Customer Intelligence & Commercial Strategy:
• Developing deep customer insight that goes beyond demographics to understand motivations, decision-making processes, and unmet needs
• Proactively identifying customer segments with attractive unit economics or strategic value that we're underserving
• Supporting pricing strategy with commercial insights
• Translating customer insights into product and marketing strategies that drive acquisition, engagement, and retention
• Identifying early signals of customer behavior shifts that could impact portfolio quality, retention, or lifetime value
• Building financial models linking customer acquisition strategies to long-term unit economics and shareholder value
• Challenging product and commercial teams with customer data when strategies seem misaligned with market realities
• Developing customer segmentation frameworks that inform differentiated go-to-market strategies
• Performance Management & Strategic Diagnostics:
• Designing executive dashboards that don't just report what happened but highlight why it matters and what action is required
• Establishing leading indicators that provide early warning of performance issues before they become crises
• Conducting proactive variance analyses when performance trends deviate from expectations, arriving with hypotheses and recommended interventions
• Building self-service analytics that empower managers to answer their own questions while maintaining strategic oversight
• Creating KPI frameworks that align operational activities with strategic objectives and drive accountability
• Strategic Partnership & Cross-Functional Enablement:
• Serving as thought partner to department heads, bringing external perspective and analytical rigor to their strategic challenges
• Facilitating strategic planning sessions where you don't just participate but shape the agenda and drive outcomes
• Proactively identifying cross-functional issues or opportunities that no single department owns but require coordinated response
• Building analytical capability across teams, raising the bar for data-informed decision-making organization-wide
• Challenging strategies that lack analytical foundation while offering to develop the analysis needed to validate or improve them
• Serving as strategic translator between technical teams and commercial teams, ensuring both perspectives inform strategy
• Education & Experience:
• Bachelor's degree in Business, Economics, Finance, Engineering, or related quantitative field
• 6-8 years combining strategic analysis, business intelligence, and hands-on business management with demonstrated ownership of strategic initiatives end-to-end
• Proven track record of proactively identifying business opportunities or risks that resulted in strategic action and measurable impact
• Experience in high-growth fintech, financial services, telecoms, or technology sectors balancing rapid execution with analytical rigor
• Background in East African markets with understanding of Kenya's commercial, regulatory, and competitive dynamics preferred