Head of Commercial Finanace - Game Innovation

Join our journey to create a new experience for the National Lottery and help us to power change for the greater good.

ABOUT US: We are the new operators of the UK's National Lottery license from February 2024. Join us as over the next year we embark on a large-scale transformation journey to build a bigger, better, and safer National Lottery that delivers more money to Good Causes. As one of the UK's largest brands, you will have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to work with one of the UK's biggest media budgets. Once-in-a-lifetime opportunities exist for people from within and outside the betting and gaming industry to join us in giving the National Lottery a fresh start. Allwyn is part of the Allwyn Entertainment Group - a multi-national lottery operator with a market-leading presence in Austria, the Czech Republic, Greece, Cyprus, and Italy.

ROLE PURPOSE: The Head of Commercial Finance - Game Innovation will business partner the Product Director working on Game innovation. This role will work with the Product, Insight & Commercial Finance teams, leading the analytics to support the game proposition and ensure a robust business case to support any changes.

FINANCE TEAM DESCRIPTION: The Finance department ensures the business is financially sound, has robust accounting and reporting processes, and delivers financial targets including returns to Good Causes, profit, and cash flow. Key responsibilities of the broader Finance Function are:

• Management accounts, including budgeting and forecasting
• Supporting commercial decisions including new game innovation, marketing, and capital investment cases
• Statutory accounts
• KPI reporting and analysis
• Licence and Trust reporting and compliance
• Tax and VAT reporting, compliance, and advice
• Management of the cash position and relationship with our banking provider
• Delivering value and ROI

TEAM DESCRIPTION: The Commercial Finance department supports the business to achieve its goals and objectives with commercially sound, data-led decision making. Responsibilities include:

• Budgeting and forecasting of Sales, Net Margin, and Marketing costs
• Decision support, particularly through the development of financial business cases to support our commercial proposals and capital expenditure
• Decision support on Game innovation and development
• Financial modelling of Game simulation and performance
• Broader analytics including econometrics
• Monitoring performance against the milestones and KPIs set out in the Annual Business Plan with both the Executive team and the Board
• Weekly trading performance and analysis of games and channels
• Day-to-day cost control / Management accounts reporting

ROLE RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Finance accountability for Game Innovation across the Portfolio.
• Business Partner Product Director, working closely with them and their Head of Product leads for each area.
• Support Modelling of the Game Proposition to translate Consumer Research into a proposition, ensuring this is financially robust, using Monte Carlo simulations.
• Lead Financial Business case for a full P&L ensuring any changes are supported with robust analytics and rationale.
• Work with 3rd Party Volatility analytics provider to ensure Game meets financial benchmarks for Volatility.
• Dotted line leadership for 2 Commercial Finance colleagues, one leading game simulation analytics and one leading Business Case Proposition.

SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE:

• Qualified accountant with several years of post-qualified experience.
• Strong commercial awareness and ability to apply this to decision making and recommendations.
• Strong analytical skills, ability to direct the team on use of large volumes of data.
• Working knowledge of different statistical techniques is helpful.
• Excellent organisation and project management skills.
• Ability to lead and drive projects and interact with multiple stakeholders (internal and external).
• Solutions focused and ability to 'create the new' as the business evolves.
• Excellent presentation skills at Executive management level.
• Strong leader as well as a team player with a focus on collaboration and delivery.
• Advanced Excel Modelling and PowerPoint skills.
• Comfortable managing upwards as well as downwards.
• Ability to negotiate and influence Senior Stakeholders.
• Excellent problem-solving skills.
• Displays excellent attention to detail.
• Excellent understanding of the Gambling industry and the challenges and opportunities that exist is a plus.

OUR GOAL IS TO CREATE ONE OF THE UK'S MOST INCLUSIVE ORGANISATIONS - WHERE PEOPLE CAN BRING THE BEST OF THEMSELVES, TO DO THEIR BEST WORK, EVERY DAY, FOR THE BENEFIT OF GOOD CAUSES. Allwyn is an Equal Opportunity Employer which prides itself in being diverse and inclusive. We do not tolerate discrimination, harassment, or victimisation in the workplace. All employment decisions at Allwyn are based on the business needs, the job requirements, and the individual qualifications. Allwyn encourages applications from individuals regardless of age, disability (visible or hidden), sex, gender reassignment, sexual orientation, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, and marriage and civil partnerships.