Manager - Financial Planning & Analysis

We are recruiting a Senior Manager for our Finance department who will support the mission of our charity, through clear leadership and insightful financial analysis of a wide range of datasets, to both influence the strategic direction of the diocese and to embed best practice in day-to-day operations. You will lead a dedicated team, working closely with stakeholders across the diocese to deliver the mission as effectively and widely as possible, while ensuring that the diocese remains compliant with all statutory requirements, rules and regulations. You will be responsible for owning the end-to-end delivery of all budgeting and forecasting processes, including liaising regularly with budget holders, understanding key variances and their impact on strategic and operational delivery. You will also drive efficiencies across the organisation, for example, by automating or enhancing existing reports or processes, or creating new ones, to support informed decision making and ensure consistent, accurate analysis and data-sharing across the diocese. Furthermore, you will have responsibilities surrounding statutory compliance and leading the statutory audit process for the diocese, its subsidiaries, linked entities and affiliates, taking direct responsibility for managing the preparation of all audit working papers and the production of annual statutory accounts. This means there's lots to get involved in - and to be excited about.

You'll love working in an analytical role, with the ability to summarise, analyse and interpret numerical data to identify issues/trends and patterns. A strong knowledge of budgeting and forecasting, as well as MS Office Suite is imperative to succeed within this role. With 5+ years' experience working in a FP&A, financial controller or similar role, you will be confident in your team management experience, as well as being able to demonstrate an ability to work independently, with self-motivation and forward planning to meet deadlines in a rapidly changing environment. Additionally, you will have excellent interpersonal skills, and an innate ability to provide support and explain procedures and processes to staff at all levels throughout the diocese, as well as positively influencing stakeholders within the diocese. The successful candidate will play a pivotal role for the Finance team, with a certified accountancy qualification, as well as an understanding and sympathy for the social and moral teachings of the Roman Catholic Church.

We are the Roman Catholic Diocese of Westminster, a faith-based charity with offices close to Victoria Train and Underground Station and just a short walk from St James Park and Westminster Underground stations. We are home to the Archbishop of Westminster (Cardinal Vincent Nichols) & our beautiful Westminster Cathedral. We are one of the leading Catholic dioceses in the country, delivering our charitable mission through our network of 208 schools in which over 90,000 pupils attend daily, 212 parishes and several hundred social justice initiatives. We seek to positively impact the lives of all members of society., The Diocese of Westminster is an Equal Opportunities and accredited Living Wage employer. To be successful, we aspire to be person centered at all times and place human dignity at our centre. We aim at all times to recruit the person who is best suited to the job, and we welcome applications from all communities and underrepresented groups, regardless of race, sexual orientation, disability, faith, age and gender. We guarantee an interview to disabled candidates who meet the minimum criteria. We strive to take a holistic approach to the development of our people so that we may better serve and empower the mission of our Church as ministered by the parishes, deaneries, schools and communities that we support. Our ambition is to work together to promote a more inclusive environment, which attracts all candidates and signals our commitment to celebrating and promoting diversity. We want people from all walks of life to feel valued for their individuality, thrive in our organisation, share a sense of belonging and demonstrate our values. With this in mind, we positively celebrate Diversity & Inclusion at the Diocese of Westminster and place it at the heart of our aim which is to reflect and connect with the diverse communities that we serve. Actions we take to provide equality of opportunity for all candidates include:

• We anonymise application forms during our shortlisting process to ensure that candidates are assessed without any consideration of their name, gender or background.
• As part of this anonymisation, we don't take into consideration where candidates studied, or the method of that study e.g. full-time, part-time or distance learning.
• We apply a consistent approach to our question setting across our applications and interviews to ensure that everyone is assessed against the identified values, competencies and job requirements. Our values are important to us and as such we use a scoring framework that marks candidates based on values, behaviours and competencies.
• We provide guidance and brief all our interviewers throughout the selection processes in recruitment best-practice to mitigate against any potential for conscious or unconscious bias or discrimination. Whenever possible we will have multiple interviewers when assessing each candidate to ensure marking is accurate and fair.
• We ensure all our assessment venues are accessible. We offer alternative formats of our application forms to encourage applicants with disabilities or who require reasonable adjustments to perform at their best.
• We will work together with candidates with a disability or health condition to implement reasonable adjustments to enable them to feel comfortable and strive during the assessment process.
  
  In return for your hard work and commitment to us, you will receive a competitive reward package which will include, but is not limited to:
• Life Assurance
• Access to Healthcare Cash Plan
• Discounts scheme through Reward Gateway - shopping, restaurants, cinema tickets gift cards and much more
• Specsavers Eyecare Vouchers
• Season Ticket Loan
• Cycle to Work scheme
• Access to low cost loans with Churches Mutual
• Employee assistance programme- free, independent 24/7 help and advice for work-related issues as well as problems affecting home life