Business Services & Outsourcing Director - Guildford

Ideas | People | Trust

We’re BDO. An accountancy and business advisory firm, providing the advice and solutions businesses need to navigate today’s changing world.

Our clients are Britain’s economic engine – ambitious, entrepreneurially-spirited and high‑growth businesses that fuel the economy - and the owners and management teams that lead them.

We’ll broaden your horizons

The Business Services and Outsourcing team are essential to meeting our clients' evolving requirements. As well as delivering long-term, sustainable value to businesses by providing a range of solutions such as accounting, payroll and compliance services, they also play a key role in tying together many of our services across BDO both domestically and internationally. By building deep and meaningful relationships with a range of clients from ambitious entrepreneurial SMEs to large multi-national groups, our BS&O team don’t just advise on their specific business challenges, they open doors for other teams to provide our firm’s wider service offering. To succeed in this agile environment, you’ll need to demonstrate excellent problem-solving skills and initiative. In return, you’ll have the opportunity for progression, and the chance to develop in one of the industry’s most exciting and varied roles.

We’ll help you succeed

Based in our Guildford office, you will be responsible for providing leadership to the team, developing and managing a portfolio of clients and supporting and working alongside the Partner to help develop the team. This includes planning, monitoring, reviewing work of junior members and taking responsibility for business development and marketing initiatives.

You will be someone who:

• Has developed a clear area of specialism in outsourcing services with understanding of the local market
• Use knowledge and understanding of the client, business drivers, and technology to help design custom or complex management reports and complex KPI dashboards
• Act as project director on larger clients, and overall responsibility for the job, with Partner retaining relationship responsibilities only
• Apply accounting standards to argue accounting treatment for complex or contentious areas, and know when to bring in experts
• Serve as a resource for the team, having developed an in-depth knowledge and understanding of finance accounting functions
• Maintains and shares sector knowledge with others to ensure the wider team are up to date with developments.
• Uses their broad financial, accounting, business and industry knowledge to educate clients on how their finance and accounting needs will evolve as their business grows; helps clients identify what is next and persuades the client to value those unperceived needs; identifies what needs are critical verse what are not and looks at the business of the client holistically.
• Ensure all work is following the correct technical approach
• Identify and resolve all compliance issues that may arise
• Can diagnose the relationships and political structures of their clients to appropriately navigate through these complexities; quickly and accurately able to assess people’s different perspectives.
• Reviews and approves compliance work prepared by the team and deals with any issues arising.
• Articulates issues and engages with clients to ensure all exposures and risks are managed and mitigated.

Commercial responsibilities:

• Develop, execute and manage the marketing and business development strategy for own and wider portfolios, working with the partner to realise these
• Develops plans and forecasts for the area of the practice they are responsible for; manages the full lifecycle of practice management from budgeting through to collections.
• Contribute to the economic management of the department in matters such as budgeting and monitoring and managing to key metrics
• Ensures that cloud accounting software and add-ons are being used to the maximum effect across their outsourcing portfolio.
• Open to new solutions and ideas to improve the profitability of engagement and actively seeks to implement these
• Educate clients with new ideas minimalising the perception of buyers risk, differentiating our services, demonstrating our experience, building trust and confidence
• Seek to be a step ahead of the client and anticipate their future needs in a way that will make a significant commercial difference
• Design integrated solutions for clients and targets that respond to the identified situation including services from outside BSO
• Effectively use questions to identify what clients objectives are, what financial information they value for management/decision making and why. Look for root causes and understand the complexity behind the data
• Regularly review project plans and work schedules to ensure they are meeting the requirements of clients or internal teams. Resolves workflow and capacity issues which are escalated to them.

When you join us, we’ll make your growth our priority. If you can demonstrate the following skills, we can help you go far. We’re looking for someone with:

Experience and professional qualifications:

• Qualified Accountant (ACA, ACCA or equivalent) or equivalent and extensive experience with compilation assignments ideally as signatory
• Excellent UK GAAP and or IFRS knowledge
• Relevant experience of managing a team is essential
• Proven experience in managing a wide portfolio of concurrent projects and project teams in a project management framework
• Full knowledge of compliance and take on procedures
• In depth knowledge of financial reporting and accounting functions
• Excellent understanding of ecosystem of cloud accounting software and ad-ons and can articulate the purpose and value of appropriate systems to clients
• Excellent understanding of the rules and regulations of doing business in the UK

Personal responsibilities:

• Influence through understanding others and meeting their needs
• Able to lead by example and provide a figurehead for the group
• Excellent communication skills with the ability to deal with a wide mix of people, both internally and externally
• Excellent presentation skills
• Excellent analytical, problem solving and research skills
• Sets realistic but stretching performance targets for self and others
• Knows own strengths and limitations
• Undertakes difficult conversations when necessary

We’re in it together

Mutual support and respect is one of BDO’s core values and we’re proud of our distinctive, people-centred culture. From informal success conversations to formal mentoring and coaching, we’ll support you at every stage in your career, whatever your personal and professional needs.

We can provide the best support for our clients and people when we’re working side by side. Our agile working framework helps us stay connected, bringing teams together where and when it counts so they can share ideas and help one another. At BDO, you’ll always have access to the people and resources you need to do your best work.

We know that collaboration is the key to creating value for our clients and satisfying experiences at work, so we’ve invested in state-of-the-art collaboration spaces in our offices. BDO’s people represent a wealth of knowledge and expertise, and we’ll encourage you to build your network, work alongside others, and share your skills and experiences. With a range of multidisciplinary events and dedicated resources, you’ll never stop learning at BDO.

We’re looking forward to the future

At BDO, we help entrepreneurial businesses to succeed, fuelling the UK economy. Our success is powered by our people, which is why we’re always finding new ways to invest in them. Across 17 UK locations, we are 6,500 unique minds coming together to help our clients reach their ambitions.

We’ve got a clear purpose, and we’re confident in our future, because we’re adapting and evolving to build on our strengths, ensuring we continue to find the right combination of global reach, integrity and expertise. We shape the future together with openness and clarity, because we believe in empowering people to think creatively about how we can do things better.

For further information, and to apply, please visit our website via the “Apply” button below.