We believe in the power and joy of learning

At Cengage, our employees have a direct impact in helping learners around the world discover the power and joy of learning. We are bonded by our shared purpose – driving innovation that helps millions of learners improve their lives and achieve their dreams through education.

Position Summary

The Financial Manager – Incentive Compensation is responsible for supporting the development, administration, analysis, and reporting of employee incentive and commission plans. This role works closely with Finance, Revenue Operations, Sales, HR, and business leadership to ensure compensation programs are accurate, scalable, financially aligned, and operationally effective. The analyst will evaluate plan performance, perform financial modeling, validate payouts, and provide insights that support strategic compensation decisions. The incumbent should have experience building collaborative business relationships across different teams within an organization. They must be able to analyze large volumes of data and use available resources to solve problems. Effective communication skills are required to interact with all levels of management and staff. This position reports to the Sr. Director, Revenue and Sales Commission.

Key Responsibilities

• Coordinate monthly, quarterly, and annual incentive compensation calculations and payout processes.
• Validate commission and bonus calculations for accuracy, completeness, and compliance with plan documents.
• Analyze compensation plan efficiency and recommend improvements based on business performance and market trends.
• Partner with RevOps, HR, Payroll, and Accounting to reconcile data and resolve compensation issues.
• Prepare recurring and ad hoc reporting for leadership on incentive attainment, payout trends, and cost analysis.
• Support annual compensation plan development, quota setting, and budgeting processes.
• Find opportunities to improve processes, controls, automation, and reporting efficiency.
• Assist with SOX compliance, audit requests, and documentation of compensation processes and controls.
• Maintain compensation data integrity across systems and reporting tools.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Finance, Accounting, Economics, Business, or related field.
• 5-7 years of experience in financial analysis, sales compensation, FP&A, or related analytical roles.
• Strong proficiency in Excel, including advanced formulas, pivot tables, and financial modeling (Excel/Sheets and SQL basics).
• Experience working with large datasets and compensation systems preferred.
• Familiarity with ERP, CRM, or incentive compensation platforms such as SAP, Oracle, Salesforce, SPIF, Xactly, Anaplan, or equivalent is a plus.
• Strong analytical, problem-solving, and organizational skills.
• Ability to communicate financial concepts clearly to both technical and non-technical collaborators.
• Careful attention to detail paired with the capacity to oversee multiple deadlines in a quick-paced workplace.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience supporting sales incentive or variable compensation programs.
• Knowledge of accounting principles related to accruals and compensation expense.
• Experience with BI tools such as Power BI or Tableau.
• SQL or data analytics experience preferred.

Skills You'll Use Every Day

• Analytical thinking
• Financial modeling
• Data integrity and controls
• Cross-functional collaboration
• Process improvement
• Communication and presentation skills
• Careful attention to detail

Cengage is committed to working with broad talent pools to attract and hire strong and most qualified individuals. Our job applicants are considered regardless of any classification protected by applicable federal, state, provincial or local laws.

Cengage is also committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities including during our job application process. If you are an applicant with a disability and require reasonable accommodation in our job application process, please contact us at accommodations.ta@cengage.com.

About Cengage

Cengage, a global education technology company serving millions of learners, provides affordable, quality digital products and services that equip students with the skills and competencies needed to be job ready. For more than 100 years, we have enabled the power and joy of learning with trusted, engaging content, and now, integrated digital platforms. We serve the higher education, workforce skills, secondary education, English language teaching and research markets worldwide. Through our scalable technology, including MindTap and Cengage Unlimited, we support all learners who seek to improve their lives and achieve their dreams through education.

Compensation

At Cengage Group, we take great pride in our commitment to providing a comprehensive and rewarding Total Rewards package designed to support and empower our employees. Click here to learn more about our Total Rewards Philosophy.

The full base pay range has been provided for this position. Individual base pay will vary based on work schedule, qualifications, experience, internal equity, and geographic location.  Sales roles often incorporate a significant incentive compensation program beyond this base pay range.

In this position,  you will be eligible to participate in the company’s discretionary incentive bonus program.  This position's bonus target amount, which is not guaranteed and is dependent on individual performance and overall company results among other factors, is provided below.