Cedar is working exclusively with a leading international services group based in Surrey. The business is undergoing a large-scale global upgrade of its finance systems into a new standardized global platform, a significant and highly visible development.
This Finance Business Partner will be a key part of the team in creating new governance processes and in ongoing operations of the technology hub moving forward. Financial leadership will be critical in managing the global technology hub including budgeting/forecasting, preparing business cases, prioritizing the most impactful investments, and monitoring performance against both cost and benefits commitments.
This role will be responsible for establishing these financial governance mechanisms and supporting the technology leadership teams with sound financial guidance. This role will report to the Vice President of Finance
Key Responsibilities
- Work closely with the functional leaders of the global technology hub, supporting the teams in actively managing their costs and tracking towards the associated financial commitments
- Assisting in the preparation of long-term strategic plans
- Collectively establishing annual budgets and operating targets
- Preparing periodic re-forecasts during the course of each fiscal year
- Providing monthly reporting to measure progress and identify risks/opportunities
- Proactively providing financial guidance and recommendations
- Operate as a key leader in the Strategic Programme Management office to establish new processes to effectively govern global technology investments moving forward
- Prioritization and balancing of the ongoing investment portfolio
- Project execution and financial control
- Benefits realization and reporting
- Collaborate with key stakeholders to collectively ensure that global technology investments are effectively balanced to focus resources on the most critical priorities and ensure the highest value profit-generating opportunities are exploited
- Calculation of recharges based on periodic budgets and re-forecasts
Key Skills
- Must have leadership and management experience with the ability to positively influence and gain alignment with senior stakeholders across the organization
- Understanding of enterprise-level technologies used by global organizations of international scale and complexity, with the requisite subject matter expertise needed to be impactful as a technology finance partner
- Advanced financial and data analysis skills to translate the complex dynamics of the technology landscape into summarized and transparent recommendations and reporting
- Advanced MS Excel skills to build financial models and automate reporting mechanisms
- Sound written and verbal communication skills to work effectively across the organization, including with senior stakeholders at all levels
Critical Success Factors
- Clear written and verbal communication will be needed to effectively work with stakeholders across different levels of the organization
- Must have the ability to develop trusting relationships with senior stakeholders, supporting them in the fulfilment of their roles while also maintaining independence and objectivity
- The ability to prioritize and balance multiple tasks and deliverables will be critical given the fast-paced and evolving nature of the technology function .
- Understanding of fundamental accounting and financial reporting principles will be necessary to ensure compliance and work through issues or key decisions as they arise
Requirements and Experience
- An undergraduate degree in finance or accounting
- At least 10 years of professional financial experience within a large global corporate environment, ideally with experience supporting the technology function
