Job Title                            Assistant Finance Manager 

Responsible to                 Head of Finance

Location                             Derby

Overall Purpose of the Role

Reporting to the Head of Finance, the Assistant Finance Manager will play a highly visible and influential role within the business, acting as a trusted finance partner to the Operations Director and senior operational leaders.

This is a true business partnering position - providing robust financial insight, commercial challenge and strategic support to drive operational performance, margin improvement and sustainable growth. The role will proactively translate financial data into meaningful intelligence, supporting decision-making across cost control, efficiency initiatives and revenue-enhancing activities.

In addition to operational partnering, the Assistant Finance Manager will contribute to the ongoing development of the Finance function - enhancing the quality and timeliness of management information, improving controls, standardizing processes and driving continuous improvement to ensure finance delivers maximum value to the wider business.

This is an opportunity for a commercially minded finance professional to step into a role with genuine influence, visibility and impact.

Key Accountabilities

PURPOSE: Commercial Support

•  Business Partner key stakeholders (financial and non-financial) ensuring strong commercial and operational decision making, managing financial risks and opportunities
•  Delivering proactive financial analysis with summarised findings to support business unit decision making
•  Understand and manage the financial risks and opportunities arising from volumetric and other contract mechanisms - and ongoing business performance
•  Understand, highlight and manage the financial risks and opportunities arising from balance sheet maintenance 

PEOPLE: Relationship Management

• Working effectively as part of a team
• Building relationships with key stakeholders

PERFORMANCE

•  Provide analysis of key operational and financial reports - including month-end performance, manufacturing KPIs, cost of goods, budgets, cash flow, and variance analysis - for review at monthly business meetings.
• Commercial analysis, including make-versus-buy modelling, cost-benefit evaluations, pricing scenarios, supplier benchmarking, margin analysis, and capital investment appraisals Responsible for month end processes
•  Support with flash and attend weekly call-over call as required
•  Assist in training of operational teams in the use of business reporting to understand and improve their financial performance
•  Monthly balance sheet review for area of responsibility, escalating key risks/ opportunities to senior Stakeholders
•  Support with the budgeting and forecasting process by consolidating the budget, understanding variances and preparing the budget presentation for senior stakeholders
•  Preparation of documentation for client tenders, negotiations 
• Respond to any ad hoc client requests and complete monthly royalty statements and yearly

Reconciliations

Candidate Requirements: Key Skills, Knowledge & Experience

Essential:

•  Qualified accountant - ACA/ACCA/CIMA
•  Industry experience gained within a manufacturing entity 
•  Experience of management accounting inclusive of accounting adjustments, producing

                reports/analysis to support commercial decision making

•  Analytical and with a high level of attention to detail
•  Communication and presentation - all stakeholders are kept up to date on relevant issues which are communicated clearly 
•  Excel Macros and VBA
•  Experience of accounting software as analysis and reporting tools

Desirable:

•  Experience of training and mentoring junior team members
•  Ability to adapt to a changing environment
•  Experience of business partnering non-finance professionals to support the delivery of sound financial information

Performance Standards

•  Excellent communication skills - ability to communicate oral and written information concisely and logically - to both finance and non-finance people
•  Pro-active and energetic approach
•  Ability to analyse and evaluate information concisely
•  Excellent interpersonal skills with proven ability to influence internal and external parties
•  Self-motivated with an ability to effectively plan and organise own work
•  Ability to take on a broad spectrum of work under pressure and to deliver in agreed timescales

Leadership behaviours:

• Communication - ability to work well with peers
• Can Do - Finds new / quicker ways of meeting goals, responds quickly under to achieve targets
• Share Success - Provides task related feedback to do the job effectively and provides excellent service. Delegates tasks to develop others
• Passion for Quality - Sets demanding performance expectations, sets priorities to maximise benefits, tracks the commercial implications of a situation in a step by step way
• Win through Teamwork - Pursues friendly relationships with colleagues and clients, makes contact with colleagues across the organisation and shares own knowledge and insight and displays a high level of energy and commitment to the role and organisation
• Embrace Diversity - Listens to others and values their contributions, receptive to new and builds on ideas and acts in ethical and socially responsible manner