Director of Finance

Job responsibilities

As a Senior Leader and a member of NHSBSA Leadership Team, reporting into the Chief Financial Officer youll define and drive a compelling vision, aligning diverse teams and stakeholders to deliver organisational impact. This role will help shape the NHSBSA strategic position within the broader healthcare system, leveraging influence to advance priorities, anticipating trends and evolving challenges, ensuring resilience, agility and long term sustainability. Job summary: 1. This role will provide strategic, technical and professional expertise to deliver a complex finance agenda, maximising the use of resources within your remit, setting and achieving key performance indicators and break-even budgets, and maximising outcomes through productive sustainable delivery. You are responsible for corporate financial strategies and corresponding policies and procedures that drive value and efficiency through use of NHSBSAs supply chain and estate. This includes being key areas of NHSBSA that will define delivery of our Environmental and Social Impact Goals.

2. As a member of the NHSBSA Finance Commercial and Estates Senior Management Team you will strive to maintain world class levels of staff engagement across the Directorate. Leading a large, diverse workforce, you will lead, inspire and develop colleagues across a range of disciplines in continuous improvement utilising user centric design methodologies, in addition to building and maintaining effective trusted relationships with external clients and key stakeholders.

3. As NHSBSAs Director responsible for its finance and counter fraud professions you will develop and maintain strategies and plans to drive professional excellence including compliance with government professional standards. In this role you will maintain effective relationships and influencing skills and will be responsible for leading and operationally managing the development, implementation, and improvement of your business area, including overall responsibility for service delivery, and relationship management of external partners specifically around complex and challenging contractual performance but also in working within the NHSBSA Partnership Key Principles relating to business, culture, and values.

Strategic Leadership Shared accountability for supporting the overall organisation to achieve its vision and contribute to the development of the organisations strategic and annual business plans, leading and driving operational performance improvement across NHSBSA Services to deliver high-quality, cost-effective services. Providing strategic leadership to a department of finance professionals who provide financial services needed to enable the delivery of the NHSBSA strategy and business plan through development and implementation of a Financial Strategy and associated plans, whilst supporting the Executive Director/Chief Financial Officer in the development of vision and strategic direction.

Financial Leadership

This role will ensure strategic alignment of service delivery, workforce planning and operational excellent and ensure a culture of financial discipline, value for money and optimising resourcing is embedded. Youll champion efficiency, continuous improvement and customer centric innovation to enhance service impact and oversee governance, risk, and compliance with a strategic and ethical lens, balancing ambition with responsibility.

Strategic Financial Leadership Support the Chief Financial Officer in delivering an integrated financial strategy for all NHSBSA operations, including administration of the NHS Pension Scheme, services Directed by the Department of Health and Social Care and other commissioned services.

Provide leadership across the finance portfolio to ensure joined-up planning, effective business support and alignment with the organisations strategic objectives. Ensure NHSBSAs financial control environment is robust, transparent and compliant with Managing Public Money, DHSC requirements including NHSBSA Delegations and applicable government finance professional standards, and internal governance frameworks. Represent finance in organisation-wide planning and service transformation discussions, offering strategic insight and challenge.Financial Management and Control Oversee delivery of finance operations for both NHSBSA core business and the NHS Pension Scheme, including payroll, payables and receivables, pensions finance, financial systems, treasury and accounting services. Ensure timely and accurate production of all statutory and non-statutory financial returns, including the NHS Pension Scheme accounts, in compliance with relevant accounting and audit standards. Work with the CFO to support engagement with the National Audit Office (NAO), the Audit and Risk Committee, and the Department of Health and Social Care. Promote best practice financial controls and assurance mechanisms across all teams.Financial Strategy, Business Planning and Performance Lead development and coordination of financial planning across all areas of NHSBSA, including Spending Reviews, multi-year planning and forecasting including for the administration of the NHS Pension Scheme. Ensure that NHSBSAs finance business partnering model supports effective decision-making, budget accountability, and delivery of business priorities across the organisation. Oversee investment appraisals and ensure robust financial analysis and alignment with organisational and system-level value priorities.

Financial Transformation and Value Lead the financial transformation portfolio, ensuring alignment with corporate strategy and delivery of long-term financial sustainability for both NHSBSA and the NHS Pension Scheme. Ensure development and implementation of costing, benchmarking and service value metrics, with processes embedded across core services and pension administration. Drive innovation in financial service delivery, leveraging data, digital tools and best practice to improve efficiency and transparency.Tackling Fraud and Loss in the Health System Provide senior oversight for the finance functions role in fraud detection, prevention and reporting, including NHS Pension Scheme-related risks. Provide senior leadership support to the Counter Fraud and Loss Prevention team to ensure strong financial controls are in place to mitigate fraud and loss. Promote fraud awareness and accountability across all finance teams, embedding this within financial operations, planning and reporting. Ensure alignment with the Cabinet Office Public Sector Fraud Authority, DHSC Anti Fraud Unit and NHS Counter Fraud Authority standards and expectations.Leadership and People Development Provide inspirational leadership to the Heads of Financial Strategy, Financial Operations, and Financial Transformation, with responsibility for all finance teams supporting NHSBSA services and the administration of the NHS Pension Scheme.

Decision-Making & Continuous Improvement

Budgetary responsibility for a large directorate and keeping the Chief Financial Officer informed of any financial issues arising. Overall responsibility for the effective management and monitoring of budgets. This will include prioritisation of resources and ensuring all benefits are captured and delivered. Allocating funds for high-priority, high-impact activity by seeking out the most cost-effective way to deliver services, ensuring corrective action is taken where necessary including working closely with other stakeholders.

Make sure that all legal responsibilities related to services are followed through proper governance. Ensure your team is well-trained and ready to handle these responsibilities as needed.

Implement a culture of service excellence within the directorate, working to set, and embed the standards and behaviours needed to bring about lasting improvements in service delivery that deliver client and user satisfaction.

Transformation, Innovation & Stakeholder Influence

Build and maintain appropriate professional relationships with key contacts within client and customer organisations; proactively communicating regularly with them to keep them engaged in operational and service delivery performance outcomes, managing the resolution of any issues or performance challenges that arise and managing their expectations regarding service delivery and the lead times to implement change, navigating a complex and changing strategic environment, political sensitivities or competing priorities.

Leadership level responsibilities and accountabilities:

Providing advice and preparing strategic reports and briefings for NHSBSA Directors and Leadership Team, DHSC, Arms Length Bodies to DHSC, Cabinet Office, HM Treasury and other key stakeholders, as required and analyse, interpret, and produce more in-depth reports on performance.

Drawing from experience, expertise and networks across industries, to ensure that the organisation benefits from relevant innovations, and remains future proof, and aligned to moving technology and best practice, and keep this at the forefront of all strategic plans.

Please see attached job description for full responsibilities.

Experience

Desirable

• NHS or arm's-length body experience
• Oversight of public sector pension scheme or regulatory reporting responsibilities
• Policy development and implementation
• Previous experience working at director level in a relevant role

Qualifications

Essential

• Degree or equivalent
• Full CCAB (or equivalent) professional accountancy qualification

Desirable

• MBA or postgraduate qualification in finance, leadership or public administration

Personal Qualities, Knowledge and Skill

Essential

• Highly developed financial leadership skills, able to manage cross-functional teams and large-scale financial operations.
• Deep understanding of public sector finance, audit and governance requirements.
• Strong knowledge of financial frameworks relevant to public sector pension schemes and complex business service operations.
• Champions the strategic importance of people, talent management, development and wellbeing through setting and maintaining direction, clear requirements and performance standards, building a culture of diversity and inclusion and continuous learning and improvement

Desirable

• Understanding of NHS Pension Scheme governance, funding and reporting structures.
• Familiarity with shared service operations in a public sector context.
• Political awareness and awareness of broader aspects which may impact on the area of expertise.
• Coaching and mentoring at leadership level

Experience

Essential

• Extensive senior finance leadership experience in a complex public sector or comparable organisation.
• Extensive experience of leading multi-disciplinary finance teams, including support to pension or specialist financial services.
• Extensive experience of delivery of statutory and management accounts at scale, including audit and governance engagement.
• Experience of change leadership and transformation across finance or corporate services.
• Significant experience in managing a highly complex budget.
• Extensive post qualification experence

Personal qualities, knowledge & skills

Essential

• Strategic thinking and problem-solving abilities to manage risk, deliver value, and support business planning.
• Uses enterprise-wide thinking to break down silos, fostering collaboration and accountability at all levels.
• An engaging leader who sees the big picture and inspires through providing meaningful direction empowering their team to delivery focus on customer experience and service outcomes
• Excellent communication and engagement skills, ability to articulate complex situations clearly in order to influence and inform decisions.