Job Introduction

Role Overview

As a Senior Finance Manager, you'll play a significant leadership role within the Finance Team, overseeing specific business areas and guiding a team of Finance Managers and Finance Analysts to deliver a consistently excellent finance service across the business.

You'll be a trusted partner to senior leadership stakeholders, shaping financial plans, driving commercial insight and ensuring robust governance across your remit. You'll lead and develop your team with a forward thinking approach, contribute actively to Finance Team culture and work closely with your Head of Finance on team strategy and people development.

Key Responsibilities

• Act as a senior finance partner to leadership stakeholders — offering proactive challenge, commercial guidance and decision making support across a broad set of financial and non-financial KPIs.
• Provide financial leadership on major business cases and investments, bringing analysis from multiple areas into a cohesive and strategic point of view.
• Oversee the delivery of monthly management accounts across your team's remit, ensuring outputs are accurate, insightful and on time.
• Understand and review all balance sheets within your area, taking accountability for accuracy and leading improvements to support efficiency, control and audit readiness.
• Lead and coordinate budgeting, forecasting and long range planning, providing strategic direction to your team and managing risks and opportunities to deliver the overall budget in line with top-down expectations.
• Identify opportunities to improve processes, data quality and reporting, empowering your team to deliver improvements and considering the commercial impact.
• Lead and develop a team, ensuring clear succession plans are in place and creating opportunities for growth across the team.
• Support the Head of Finance in shaping and delivering the Finance Team people plan and ways of working.
• Represent Finance credibly and confidently at senior forums and cross functional meetings.
• Deputise for the Head of Finance when required.

Behaviours

• Relationship Building — works collaboratively with business partners at all levels; broadens relationships to include leadership from other functions; builds connections with Executive stakeholders and uses a holistic view of business processes to bring functions together.
• Challenge & Influence — ensures stakeholders understand the likely full-year outturn for financial and non-financial KPIs; uses insight to influence or define business decisions; brings together multiple stakeholders to deliver outcomes.
• Communication — coordinates within the business area using insight and experience to enhance plans; takes accountability for the financial delivery of the business area alongside stakeholders; presents clearly and confidently to senior audiences.
• Responsiveness & Proactivity — builds increasing trust through real commitment to delivering appropriate solutions; uses relationships to manage expectations and navigate difficult circumstances; proactively identifies and discusses issues and opportunities.
• Balance Sheet Accuracy — understands and reviews all balance sheets in their area; identifies opportunities for improvement and efficiency; challenges ways of working and tests the suitability of reconciliation processes for audit purposes.
• Understanding the P&L — understands and articulates to stakeholders the current position and expected outturn of the business area; proactively identifies risks and opportunities and engages stakeholders to manage them.
• Financial Modelling & Presentation — consolidates analysis from multiple areas into a cohesive point of view, incorporating non-financial factors and a strategic lens; creates concise presentations that clearly articulate the what, why and how; coaches and guides the team on modelling approach and output quality.
• Planning — plans resource and workload across the team to deliver the full-year framework; proactively drives medium and longer-term deliverables; ensures alignment across the wider Finance Team and manages interdependencies.
• Process & Controls — identifies control risks and defines mitigating actions; works proactively with business stakeholders to implement improvements; leads audit responses and identifies end-to-end process opportunities to improve control and reduce risk.
• Succession Planning & Development — supports and coaches the team to improve; develops a forward-thinking approach within the team; ensures a clear succession plan is in place matching talent internally and externally.
• Values & Culture — role models leadership behaviours, champions wellbeing and contributes to a culture where everyone is comfortable standing out from the crowd and bringing their authentic self.
• AI & Technology — champions the use of AI and emerging technologies across the team; leads by example in exploring new tools, drives their adoption where they add genuine value, and creates space for the team to experiment and innovate.

Skills & Experience

• Fully qualified accountant — CIMA, ACCA, ACA or international equivalent.
• Significant post-qualification experience, with a track record of operating in senior finance roles.
• Proven experience managing and developing a team of finance professionals.
• Strong business partnering experience at a senior level, ideally in a complex or fast-moving organisation.
• Experience driving process improvement and embedding best practice within a finance team.
• Excellent financial modelling, planning and analytical skills — including the ability to bring analysis from multiple areas into a cohesive story.
• Experience with financial systems and using AI technologies

Selfridges