About The Job
Salary: £43,516 to £46,549 per annum
Working Pattern: Full-time (37 hours per week) Mon to Friday 9am- 5pm
Contract Length: Permanent
Base Location: Burnside Day Opportunity service, Burgess Hill. Hybrid working and county wide travel.
All West Sussex County Council (WSCC) employees have a WSCC location as their contractual work location, however we do operate a ‘Smarter working’ approach, this is something that you agree locally with your manager, for what works best for you, your role, and your team.
Effective business management develops and delivers support to Directly Provided Services as well as the Safeguarding and Access team. Your role will enable our services to operate effectively and efficiently.
We’re looking for a finance professional with experience to deliver a finance business partnering model, which includes a full range of high-quality financial management and accountancy service. You will be responsible for advising and influencing the service to make informed financial decisions, which will have a direct impact on service delivery.
Initially it will involve working with Adult Social Care budgets. The service is experiencing a period of unprecedented change, where people are living longer resulting in significant growth in demand for social care services. Since we want to make sure West Sussex is a great place to live, the County Council recognises this challenge and has an ambitious improvement programme. At the heart of this is an aim to promote independence by enabling people to stay healthier and live in their homes and communities for longer. Linking financial data with performance information, and with a naturally enquiring mind, you will play an essential role in supporting the service to build a sustainable model for delivering adult social care services.
The successful candidate will work alongside, our Assistant Director, 3 Heads of Services and 5 Area Service Managers. Within the Directly Provided Services we support 6 Residential Care homes, 7 Day Opportunity Services and Shared Lives, where self-employed shared lives, carers open up their own homes to provide support on a long- or short-term basis.
As a Business Finance Manager, you will:
1. Support the management of the Adult Services budget through the monitoring and recording of savings targets, efficiency initiatives and the service budget.
2. Provide a link between performance, finance, and operations on key business activities.
3. May be required to manage a small team, and to travel to various locations throughout the county.
4. Present data in a way which can be easily accessed and understood by the Senior Leadership team and other stakeholders who may not have a financial background.
5. Accountable for reviewing, long-term planning and recommending changes to and gaining approval for systems, processes, procedures, and practices, which may shape current and future service provision, priorities and resource requirements.
Who are we looking for?
As well as being a finance professional with experience of delivering a finance business partnering model, you will also need to be:
6. Strategic thinker – someone who can think independently and beyond the surface of a task/ issue to provide a strategic view and added value to the service that you support.
7. Relationship manager – someone with the ability to successfully manage key relationships with partners.
8. Critical friend – someone with the ability to challenge, persuade, negotiate and influence the service that you support.
In addition, you will be able to demonstrate the following skills and experience.
9. Ability to research, analyse and interpret information to make effective judgements to review the effectiveness of activities and service provision, plan long term and set timescales.
10. Ability to identify and analyse risks, and manipulate complex financial data relating to large budgets in the region of £30m.
11. Ability to anticipate problems, plan solutions and make sound pragmatic problem-solving decisions and recommendations, which will have a wider service impact, particularly in relation to providing a varied and complex service, resource issues and partnership building.
12. Excellent communication skills with the ability to influence the actions of others and communicate information which may be complex and contentious. Including the ability to negotiate solutions across wide areas of the business and successfully convince others of the need to take a specific course of action.
13. Ability to challenge existing practices and identify innovative solutions within the required framework.
14. Ability to articulate problems and lead staff to a position where they can find and implement solutions.
Qualifications and/experience
15. Post graduate diploma in management studies, or equivalent management qualification or management experience.
16. Experience of monitoring and setting budgets effectively to deliver a service within available resources.
17. Experience of contributing to the development of business strategies and translating strategies into operational policy and procedure and delivering outcomes.
18. Sound and accurate IT knowledge e.g. Microsoft Office, and expert at data handling.
Rewards and Benefits
As an employer we recognise that it is our employees that are central to everything we do. We aim to create a supportive and dynamic working environment where employees can achieve their full potential, achieve a healthy work-life balance, and are rewarded for the work they do.
In addition to working within a great team and a competitive salary you will have access to:
19. 29 days annual leave + bank holidays with the ability to buy additional leave annually
20. Access to a generous, defined benefit pension scheme
21. A range of flexible working options
22. Training and development opportunities, including coaching and mentoring
23. Health and wellbeing benefits including access to our Employee Assistance Programme, Mental Health First Aiders and Voluntary Health Cash Plans
24. Discounted membership at selected local sports and fitness centres
25. A range of discounts giving our staff access to hundreds of offers with the opportunity to save over £1,000 (Including: Argos, Samsung, ASOS, B&Q and many more)
26. Car benefit scheme and access to our Pool Cars.
27. A range of commuting and business travel discounts and initiatives
For a full list of the benefits offered to you as a West Sussex County Council employee you can find them on our Rewards and Benefits page.