Finance Director - Advertising and AI

The Microsoft AI (MAI) business is a rapidly growing space, encompassing a diverse portfolio of businesses spanning advertising, subscription, and consumption. The MAI Owned & Operated (O&O) Finance team plays a critical role in overseeing Browser, Search, and News, as well as AI Ads Monetization & Data Acquisition. This team is responsible for Financial Planning and Analysis (FP&A), long-range planning, growth frameworks, transformational projects, competitive analytics, and external partnerships—all essential to driving business growth and strategic investment decisions. 

As Finance Director -Advertising and AI, you will lead this highly visible function, partnering closely with Consumer business executives to shape financial strategy, optimize investments, and influence key decision-making. This impactful role requires management capabilities, cross-functional collaboration, thought leadership, and the ability to distill complex concepts into actionable frameworks. 

Responsibilities

• Strategic Financial Leadership: Partner with engineering and business leaders to drive financial objectives, optimize investments, and identify efficiency opportunities across Browser, Search, and News products. 

• Investment Optimization: Lead financial planning and analysis for AI-driven workloads, including search quality enhancements and platform transformation. 

• Profitability & Cost Management: Develop and execute strategies to improve gross margin, vertical Profit and Loss (P&Ls), and cost-to-serve metrics, ensuring sustainable financial growth. 

• Data-Driven Decision Making: Utilize advanced financial modeling, external benchmarks, and unit economic frameworks to define north-star unit costs and maximize return on invested capital. 

• Executive Communication: Craft compelling narratives using storytelling techniques to communicate complex financial insights in a clear and impactful manner to leadership. 

• Team Leadership & Development: Lead a team of highly capable individuals with exceptional, inclusive people management capabilities. Foster a culture of “Model, Coach, and Care.” Recruit, develop, and retain a high-performing team. 

• Portfolio Investment Strategy: Own the development and execution of frameworks to guide growth and investment across Microsoft’s consumer portfolio of businesses, driving alignment of direction with executives, including Senior Leader Team (SLT) members. 

• Strategic Investment & Return on Investment (ROI) Assessment: Partner to develop investment strategies and ROI assessments of program dollars, making tradeoffs across the O&O portfolio of products to optimize investments. 

• Competitive Analytics & Insights: Build compete analytics and insights across Advertising & AI businesses, leveraging insights to shape planning discussions and influence roadmap decisions. 

• Financial Rhythms & Accuracy: Lead core financial rhythms for the O&O businesses (Budget, Forecast, Long Range Planning (LRP), Close, etc.), driving insights through analytics and maintaining high forecast accuracy. 

Qualifications

Required/minimum qualifications:

• Master's Degree in Business Administration, Accounting, Finance, Economics, Data Science or related field AND 8+ years experience in financial analysis, accounting, controllership or finance, or related field
  • OR Bachelor's Degree in Business Administration, Accounting, Finance, Economics, Data Science or related field AND 10+ years experience in financial analysis, accounting, controllership or finance, or related field
  • OR equivalent experience.
• 1+ year(s) experience managing direct reports.

Financial Analysis M6 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $130,900 - $277,200 per year. There is a different range applicable to specific work locations, within the San Francisco Bay area and New York City metropolitan area, and the base pay range for this role in those locations is USD $165,600 - $303,600 per year.

Certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation. Find additional benefits and pay information here:

https://careers.microsoft.com/us/en/us-corporate-pay

Microsoft will accept applications for the role until June 18, 2025.

Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable laws, regulations and ordinances.  We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements. If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application or the recruiting process, please send a request via the Accommodation request form.

Benefits/perks listed below may vary depending on the nature of your employment with Microsoft and the country where you work.