Senior Finance Manager - Digital & Technology

Senior Finance Manager - Digital & Technology
Senior Finance Manager - Digital & Technology

The location of the role is Paddington, London (hybrid working).

The duration of the contract is 6 months.

The pay rate on offer is £600 - £750 per day.

The client is a multinational high-street retailer.

Summary

This role is the finance lead for Digital & Technology and Corporate led areas covering Data, Group Technology Services, Infosec, Finance and HR. The role is responsible for business partnering & providing insight to the Chief Technology Officer, Chief Information & Security Officer, Head of Enterprise Data and Head of Data Science & Heads of Product & Delivery.

This is a broad role with an exciting remit as we embark on an Evolution of our Digital & Technology function, including establishing D&T as a strategic partner to the business, agreeing our strategy aligned to the strategic pillars, setting out the right governance to underpin value assurance, defining our future simplified, secure & modernised technology landscape with the right structure, culture & partners in place to achieve our ambition.

This is a great opportunity for an ambitious individual to play a significant role in the Evolution programme led by the Chief Digital & Technology Officer (Executive Committee member).

Key accountabilities of the role

• Lead role in the Evolution programme for the Governance workstream co-designing the framework & underpinning information model to provide value, quality & risk assurance across Digital & Technology. Lead on development of a plan to deliver this, highlighting immediate priorities and mobilise a team to deliver on these. Develop insightful analysis to track progress against the plan.
• Work collaboratively with the Evolution programme workstreams to identify potential crossover & dependencies, developing a clear RACI to mitigate.
• Finance lead for Technology Landscape planning, supporting the development of a 3-5 year roadmap to modernise and simplify the estate driving structural cost out. Develop financial modelling to outline end to end costs and benefits, challenging underlying assumptions, add commercial insight & ensure key design principles are upheld.
• Develop insightful analysis to track progress against the Technology Landscape plan, working closely with the programme leads to provide transparency over risks & opportunities.
• Proactive business partner to Digital & Technology led areas & Corporate areas providing commercial insight & challenge to drive effective decision-making & support the shift to total cost of ownership driving accountability for investment and run costs in all decision making.
• Support and challenge on investment business cases, ensuring the financials are robust and benefits are achievable and tracked. Lead the post implementation review process to update D&T Business Board on how the business case is tracking against the targets.
• Provide insight and analysis on D&T & Corporate led areas engaging with the BU Finance teams and FDs, translating technical terminology into a clear story to drive understanding & enable choices.
• Business partner BEAM leadership to provide clarity & insight into progress against BU led data roadmaps. Building on the recent review outline the plan to deliver cost reductions and track progress against this. Identify further areas to reduce costs of this programme.
• Business Finance & HR areas to provide insightful analysis of progress highlighting risks and opportunities across key strategic programmes e.g. SAP Decoupling, SAP S4 and Payroll.
• Leading core planning processes (3 Year Plan and Budget), working cross-functionally with numerous business partners to generate challenging but achievable plans, based on clear assumptions, that are in line with the area's strategy. Drive stakeholder accountability for these plans.
• Responsible for accurate and timely cost reporting on a monthly basis, forecasting and planning across the Digital & Technology led areas
• Responsible for management of the Fixed Asset Register, ensuring all qualifying investments are capitalised in a timely manner and in line with the Business' accounting policy whilst upholding key financial controls.
• Development & coaching of a Finance Manager leading on Data & Data Science and Corporate areas.

Key skills and experience

• Qualified accountant with several years PQE in a commercial environment
• Strong commercial acumen to add challenge and insight to the business - Technology experience preferrable
• Excellent communication skills to enable business partnering of senior nonfinancial colleagues
• Confident communicator and inquisitive thinker, able to join the dots across multiple areas and be a 'critical friend' to business stakeholders
• Proactive self-starter with collaborative approach and a natural style that builds strong network with colleagues
• Willingness to challenge the status quo, and a drive for continuous improvement
• Ability to manage multiple competing priorities.
• Advanced excel capabilities and good PowerPoint skills
• A great team member, but also happy to work independently on own initiative