Financial Performance Lead

Salary: Grade A - £50,466 (National Framework) or £55,484 (London Framework – if you are London office based or homebased and live within the boundary of the M25) – There is also an additional homeworking allowance of £514 per annum for those working from home
Contracted hours: Full time 37 hours per week
Contract type: 18 Month Fixed Term or Secondment Opportunity 
Closing date: 28 November 2022 at 11.59pm.

This role is NOT open to applications from those who will require sponsorship under the points based system. Should you apply for this role and be found to require sponsorship, your application will be rejected and any provisional offer of employment withdrawn.

Are you committed to helping us regulate health and social care within England?

When thinking about what drives you every day in your job, what keeps you motivated and passionate about your work what comes to mind? For 3000+ people at the CQC we end each day knowing that we have made a difference to the lives of those most in need in our communities. We make sure health and social care services provide people with safe, effective, compassionate, high-quality care and encourage care services to improve. We are looking for people who are caring, demonstrate integrity and work well as part of a team to join with us and share in this sense of achievement. If you would like to help us make a positive impact to health and social care within England, then read on.

Why this could be a great role for you…
This is an exciting role within the Finance team to lead on all aspects of financial performance for CQC, to empower stakeholders to make the right decision, in an environment which endorses and promotes continuous improvement.

What we can offer you...
Your health and wellbeing are important to us and are supported through generous annual leave (starting at 27 days and rising with service to 32.5days, plus 8 Bank Holidays), a cycle to work scheme, discounted gym vouchers and access to a free employee assistance service 24 hours a day. We also understand the importance of financial health and offer membership of the NHS pension scheme, contributing about 14% of basic salary. You will also be able to access discounts to supermarkets, high street stores, electronics, fleet cars, plus we also have an internal reward scheme which could see you earn yourself a voucher or two! All of our Homeworkers are also kitted out with everything they need to comfortably work from home.

We want to support you to succeed and be your very best, with opportunities for training and development along with the support of experienced managers and mentors. 

We want to make working for CQC a great experience for everyone, and to role model a diverse and representative culture. To support an inclusive environment where colleagues feel empowered to bring their whole self to work, we support a variety of staff networks, including the Race Equality Network, LGBT+ Equality Network, Carers Equality Network, Disability Equality Network and Gender Equality network.

What you will bring…
Reporting directly to the Head of Finance, this role is responsible for driving improvements in the financial performance of CQC and performance improvement within Finance, implementing efficient processes across Finance. This includes embedding and ensuring CQC maximises the effectiveness of systems and service provision, which are aligned to and deliver the Finance strategy. The role will lead on ensuring user needs are realised, and metrics are reported within the function and across the organisation to provide excellent financial insight and assurance to the business, enabling effective decision making aligned to CQC’s purpose. The Lead will work with others to help remove obstacles raised by the Finance team and the wider business and hold the team to account for their performance.

Accountabilities:
Supports the Head of Finance in providing a robust, effective and high-performing finance service as part of the Finance Senior Leadership Team.

Accountable for the provision of an effective reporting service to the function and the business, on finance performance and insight that facilitates business decision-making and corrective action as required.

Accountable for ensuring high quality, timely and accurate data, analysis and insight requirements are met including projections, market trends, working collaboratively with other areas of the directorate and business

Responsible for CQC maximising the capabilities and outputs of its finance systems and that dependencies and interfaces between systems and processes are managed effectively.

Responsible for developing CQCs accounting systems and shared service provision to enable the day to day activities of the financial function to support the overall finance strategy.

Develop and deliver systems for monitoring Finance performance

Responsible for ensuring appropriate controls and procedures are in place.

Leads on the management of the shared business services contract for finance.

Work with stakeholders to understand requirements and manage and provide data to support efficient operational and contractual planning and monitoring.

Communicate effectively with all stakeholders.

Manage and track all issues, risks and quality specifications. Escalate in a timely manner to the appropriate party when unable to resolve.

Oversee best approach to all training, learning and development requirements across finance teams.

Maintains financial records effectively and ensures that security is assured at all times.

Contribute to strong leadership in support of professional excellence and CQC core values.

Undertake any other duties commensurate with your role and responsibilities.

Demonstrate application of CQC Values and Behaviours in all interactions, raising awareness and improving practice in respect of Equality and Diversity and promotion of Human Rights within the workplace.

Essential Skills and Experience:
Educated to degree-level or equivalent qualification.

Qualified Accountant with experience of team management and leadership within a Finance environment.

Very high degree of autonomy, self-starter and highly motivated individual able to work to a high standard alone and in a team.

Able to think and act strategically to develop practical, innovative and creative solutions to the management of complex strategic issues – able to synthesise key points, costs, benefits, risks and issues.

A first-class communicator with excellent analytical skills and project management and delivery skills.

Strong experience and expert knowledge of different financial systems, with the ability to ensure operations are fit for purpose.

Excellent IT skills, expert knowledge of MS Excel and accountancy packages, able to pick up new systems quickly.

Experience of designing and creating financial reporting information in a way that provides insight and enables business decisions to be made.

Substantial knowledge and experience of working with, managing and performance management of shared service providers.

Able to actively promote and protect equality, diversity and human rights through the duties of the role.

Leads by example and possesses the highest degree of integrity.

Visible, open, transparent and accountable.

Ability to create a sense of community amongst the members of the team.

For an informal discussion or further information on the role, please contact Gemma Skipsey, Head of Finance at Gemma.Skipsey@cqc.org.uk 

We are committed to being open and transparent around our processes and we endeavour to offer every candidate the opportunity to perform at their best throughout the recruitment process. We seek to support candidates to identify potential challenges and work with them to identify and facilitate reasonable adjustments as appropriate. Should you require assistance and/or would like to request a reasonable adjustment at any stage of the recruitment process, please contact a member of the team via email: recruitment@cqc.org.uk 

Note for external candidates: 
CQC are currently working through an organisational transformation programme which includes the creation of a new target operating model. This role is offered as a fixed term contract as part of the transition process to that new model. For further information on this please visit https://www.cqc.org.uk/about-us/jobs/information-applicants

CQC is committed to promoting a fair and inclusive workplace where all our people can flourish and reach their full potential. We know diverse teams allow for a more creative and productive environment and therefore encourage applications from everyone regardless of: age, gender/sex, gender identity or expression, religion or belief, disability, ethnicity or sexual orientation.

For this role, we are particularly encouraging people from Black and Minority Ethnic communities and people with a disability to apply, who are currently under-represented at this level in the organisation.

Our Values
Excellence – Meeting our challenge to be a high-performing organisation
Caring – Treating everyone with dignity and respect
Integrity – Demonstrating our passion for ‘doing the right thing’
Teamwork – Enabling us to be the best we can