Finance Strategy Manager

Location:

London

Department:

Finance

Salary Details:

Not Specified

Advertising End Date:

04 Aug 2024

Job Description

Overview

Finance: The Finance department has a large part to play in the success of our business. We are based across a few locations, but operate as one team, and work together to create a positive, productive and highly efficient finance department within News UK.

The Team: The Finance Strategy Manager position sits within the focused, high-calibre Finance Strategy team, reporting to the Strategy Head of Finance and working closely with the Group Finance Director and the wider Group Finance team, including the Technology Head of Finance. The role is to provide robust strategic insight, manage the strategic planning process for both opex and capex Technology spends, modelling for the long-range plan, as well as providing comprehensive competitor, industry and economic analysis, strategic analysis, and ad hoc cross-business project work. Deliverables from this team form a key part of commercial and strategic decision-making at the Executive level. The role is high profile and at the forefront of the overall business strategy.

Role Objectives

As a Finance Strategy Manager, you will be responsible for:

Strategic Business Planning:

Responsibility for the consolidated planning process, including establishing the process within the annual finance calendar and ensuring the models are fit for purpose and outputs are accurate

Leading the preparation of the financials for the long-range business plan and engaging with counterparts across the business and finance to challenge assumptions and ensure these are appropriate, accurate and complete

Clear articulation of assumptions and interdependencies, as well as drivers of changes between different versions of the business plan

Scenario analysis, including risks and opportunities

Support on KPI development aligned with corporate strategy

Producing presentation material to support the planning outputs including budget presentations and associated narratives

Market Competitor Analysis:

Manage competitor analysis and tracking market developments to apply learnings/insight to News UK then and provide recommendations for improvement

Understand drivers of competitor profitability, KPIs, risks and opportunities and modelling their performance

Challenge our understanding of our business based on the external analysis of competitors and the market

Strategy and Ad Hoc Projects:

Responsible for financial analysis and business case development to support new corporate strategies, initiatives and opportunities on an ongoing basis

Providing strategic analysis to determine the effectiveness of the corporate strategy and analysis to support changes

Supporting the Head of Finance to produce ad hoc presentation material for our Board of Executives

Ad hoc Investor Relations and CFO requests

Technology planning:

Collaborate with Technology Directors and relevant finance teams to build investment cases for capex programmes, aligning these initiatives to corporate strategy

Manage capex approvals process and cash forecasting of spend

Provide strategic suggestions for reporting improvements and efficiencies

Departmental Responsibilities:

Take a role in enhancing internal communications and coordination of cross-departmental initiatives

Liaise and coordinate with other Finance Managers to ensure a streamlining of processes and systems

Keep relevant Heads of Finance informed of business decisions that will impact their areas

Key Skills

Knowledge:

Professional Accounting Qualification essential

Analysis/ Financial Modelling/ Excel – Expert

Presentation of key outputs/ PowerPoint/ Google slides – Expert

Exposure to understanding Company Strategy

Transaction/ MA/ Due Diligence experience preferred

Behavioural Competencies:

Communicating Influencing – Intermediate

Relationship Management – Intermediate

Leadership – Intermediate

Problem Solving:

Setting Direction Decision Making – Intermediate

Analysis of large volumes of data from across all News UK businesses, with the ability to consolidate, identify and concisely present key issues to senior leaders - Intermediate

Accountability:

Self-starter/Self-motivated

Deliver ad hoc projects and analysis for CFO

Key Behaviours

Passionate about the work you do, embracing every opportunity to do your best work

Principled in the way you go about your role and the decisions you make

Purposeful with a strong desire to achieve and deliver work to a high standard

We are News UK: One of the leading media businesses in the UK and Ireland. Our newsbrands include The Times, The Sunday Times, The Sun, The Sun on Sunday and The TLS. Our national broadcast brands include talkSPORT, Times Radio, TalkTV and Virgin Radio UK, and we have market-leading local radio stations across Ireland. Our world-famous brands provide news, analysis, opinion and entertainment to almost 40 million people each month. Spanning print and pixel, audio and video, events and experiences, our multiplatform brands are home to a plurality of opinion, representing the diverse communities we serve. News UK is wholly owned by News Corp.

Life at News

Driven by passion, guided by principles and acting with purpose. We represent, reflect and reach the nation, telling the stories that matter. We inform our audiences so that they can make decisions based on trusted information.

To do this, we believe our employees must represent different backgrounds, perspectives and experiences. We strive to maximise and encourage every individual’s potential and ensure everyone feels valued. We support this through ourDiversity, Equity and Inclusion Strategy , which focuses on three main priorities - attracting talent from a wider, more representative pool, developing equity programmes to drive better representation in our leadership, and ensuring diversity and inclusivity in our workforce as well as the journalism and content we produce. We also currently have12 employee led networks and groups (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMCi-KiMlL4t=2s) that support our strategy and connect like minded employees socially.

Benefits

Some of our benefits include:

Maternity leave up to 18 weeks full basic salary paternity leave up to 2 weeks

Wide range of training available, plus full LinkedIn Learning access

Private medical insurance including coverage for pre-existing conditions

Discounted gym memberships , free ClassPass at Home, weekly virtual yoga classes

‘Bikes for Work’ and ‘Electric Car’ scheme

Up to 60% discount on Harper Collins books

Access to exclusive events and competitions with exciting brands such as talkSPORT, Virgin Radio UK The Times. Weekly virtual panel chats with top journalists and celebrities

Access to wellbeing benefits such as EAP, physio/massage and counselling

A generous pension scheme with employer contributions of up to 5%

25 days holiday , plus bank holidays and up to 4 volunteering days per year

We want to ensure that everyone we meet has the opportunity to perform to their best when applying for a role. Please let us know, at any stage, whether you require any reasonable adjustments during the recruitment process, and we will do our best to accommodate.