European Financial Controller

This is a rare & exciting opportunity for an experienced Commercial Financial Controller to join a highly successful, rapidly expanding £7Bn t/o global blue-chip as Commercial FC for its UK & European Operations. Reporting directly to the VP for Europe, this is a broad & autonomous role with full P&L responsibility across the Groups UK & European regions comprising 10 countries and a combined t/o of approx £400m. Working alongside an ACA Technical FC for Europe (Who covers all financial and statutory aspects) this is very much a Commercial role not just focussing on Commercial Reporting of each countries performance but working with local Operations and finance teams to ensure operational efficiency and to drive sales, margin and customer performance. Working in a hands on role where you will work to get a thorough understanding of the business and its key drivers your remit will include:

• Working with regional team to maximize the value extracted from contracts, including identifying and rectifying unprofitable contracts and maximizing variation management opportunities.
• Developing & implementing financial strategies & plans to support global & regional business strategy & objectives.
• Developing & deploying financial frameworks & modern and sophisticated measures for tracking business performance.
• Ensuring that financial bid models accurately reflect business inputs for new business or changes to existing business which the Account Management team are submitting proposals for.
• Providing on time, accurate business information & analysis.
• Completing regular commercial reviews to understand cost and value concepts on customer or manufacturing sites and then taking actions that will improve overall returns to the business.
• Ensuring SAP functionality is optimised, & extensively applied and leveraged across the business.
• Establishing & maintaining a modern & effective control framework.
• Driving a high level of accuracy in budgeting and forecasting input for the Business.
• Ensuring optimum profitability & cash flow.
• Cost Control.
• Providing input to the implementation of value-adding strategies.
• Ensuring site compliance with group policies.
• Pro-actively contributing to the improvement of profitability & cash flow.
• Championing actions to address performance variations.
• Production of regional management reporting requirements.
• Providing finance business partnering support to the UK and European Board and Senior Management across commercial, manufacturing, supply and business functions.
• Investment and contract approval evaluations for the region.
• Capex Management.
• Management of the finance team based across Europe (Up to 8 direct reports)

Applicants will be fully qualified CIMA, ACCA or ACA Financial Controllers and must have previous experience in a similar profile role with full European P&L responsibility. Working closely with sub-region & functional management teams, you will Business Partner with Senior Management teams across Europe, providing financial advice & support to maximise shareholder value, providing insight into underlying performance and driving accountability for results across the management team. Commercially astute with strong business analysis & presentation skills you will have a proven track record of optimising company performance through forging strong business partner relationships and will be familiar with working as part of a diverse, multicultural, internationally based senior management team/ You will be passionate about making a real difference and adding real business value and will have the credibility & adaptability to enthuse and inspire a broad and diverse audience. SAP experience is essential (Ideally SAP HANA) and Hyperion knowledge would be advantageous. A competitive salary (£75-90k basic) is complemented with impressive benefits including Bonus (10-15%), Company Car/Allowance, Healthcare, 25 days holiday, Pension, 0900-1700, parking. Due to the nature of this role there will be an average of 1 week per month travelling to the operations across Europe. This is an excellent opportunity to join a hugely successful and highly regarded business and a friendly & supporting team. For the right person there is a real ooportunity to progress within the business over the next 3-5 years.

Howarth Morris are a leading North West based Finance & HR Recruitment Consultancy. Providing a complete temporary, contract and permanent recruitment solution we work with a broad range of businesses ranging from owner managed SMEs to FTSE 100 and Blue Chip Multinationals, supporting their recruitment needs throughout the UK. We are dedicated to the career management of Part Qualified and Qualified Finance & HR Professionals, across ACA, ACCA, CIMA, AAT, ICM, CIPP and CIPD and work to support our candidates with not just securing their next move but through their longer term career management. We are committed to providing businesses with finance and HR professionals who will exceed expectation, make a difference and add real business value. Visit our website for more information on our unique profile and market leading service and call or email today to hear more about this and other exciting local and UK wide opportunities.