Finance Team Leader

Job summary

The Business Support team provide a support service to the district’s operations. As a key member of the team, you will play an essential role in leading the day-to-day finance function on behalf of the Finance and Business Manager and in supporting the achievement of our strategic business objectives. You will be responsible for ensuring financial transactions are processed by the team, efficiently, accurately and within agreed timelines, achieving full compliance with established policies, procedures and service level agreements. You will liaise effectively with internal and external stakeholders, collating and dissemination information as required. You will work alongside the Office Manager, the Finance and Business Support Manager, the Business Support team and other colleagues as needed.

Job description

Key Responsibilities & Accountabilities

Management Duties
• Lead the business support and finance function to achieve the monthly, quarterly and year end timetables
• Undertaking regular 1-2-1’s with each staff member, setting and reviewing objectives based on district strategy, and ensuring timely dissemination of communications
• Identifying training gaps and ensuring the ongoing development of all team members
• Appropriate delegation of tasks amongst the team members and ensure the team prioritise workload
• Ensure cross functional training to remove silo working practices delivering flexibility and district cover
• Engaging in training and CPD to effect compliance with policy updates and accounting standards
• Ensure Health and Safety compliance within the team, including attendance at mandatory training.
• Encouraging process improvement opportunities, collaborative and team working to streamline tasks, boost team efficiency and promote best practice.
• Maintaining a positive outlook and promoting wellbeing within the team
• Deputising for the Finance and Business Support Manager and the Office Manager

Finance Duties
• Ensure transactions are processed in accordance with Forestry England financial procedures and policies, to include: the delegation of authority and accurate coding and VAT treatment
• Oversee the district cash account reconciliations
• Ongoing development and adherence to district month end timetable to ensure accurate capture of accruals, provisions, capitalisation and income drawdowns
• Assist in the preparation of the district’s annual business plan
• Assist in the preparation of the monthly business management report and revised forecasts.
• Assist in the preparation of finance workbooks (2 per annum) for submission to the national office.
• Assist in budget monitoring; tracking financial performance, analysing income and expenditure and investigating variances against budget/forecast
• Liaising with district colleagues, customers, suppliers, and national office colleagues, ensuring a high level of customer service at all times
• Acting as the finance liaison for district audit and other national team requests
• Provide other financial support for the wider team, as and when required

Other Duties
• Occasional travel to other sites, potentially with overnight stays to attend meetings/training.
• Perform other reasonable duties as required.
• Support for communication outputs as and when required.

Person specification

Skills, Knowledge & Experience

Essential Professional and Technical experience

• Leadership - team working and customer centric approach
• Over 2 years of Accounting and Finance experience
• Effective decision making - ability to prioritise and adhere to monthly finance timetables
• Communication – ability to provide clarity and enthusiasm
• Aptitude for IT including excel, and finance systems
• Changing and improving – a willingness to develop self and others, with a drive for continuous improvement

Desirable Professional and Technical experience
• Prior experience in a team leadership role.

Qualifications
Essential

• A GCSE in Maths and English or functional skills equivalent
• Obtained or working towards a Professional Accounting qualification such as ACCA/CIMA/AAT or qualified by experience

Desirable

• Degree in Accounting, Business or other relevant professional qualification.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £33,854, Forestry Commission contributes £9,807 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).

• Learning and development tailored to your role
• An environment with flexible working options
• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity
• A Civil Service pension with an employer contribution of 28.97%

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

How to apply…

You will be asked to write a 200 word statement on your relevant experience and career history, along with a personal statement of no more than 500 words. You will be assessed on both during sifting. More details about how to apply are listed on the application form.

You will be assessed on experience and strength based questions during your interview.

The Behaviours being assessed at interview are –

• Managing a quality service
• Developing self & others
• Delivering at pace

“If candidates pass the interview but are not the leading candidate they can be placed on a reserve list. We may offer candidates on the reserve list for this role the opportunity to be considered for other roles at the same or lower pay bands.”

Successful candidates will undergo a criminal record check and the government baseline personnel security standard check.

If you require any reasonable adjustments, please email [email removed].

If you're planning to use AI to support your application, please ensure you've read our guidelines here first.

Read more about our application process and working with us