Senior Finance Business Partner

We are a leading global market and social research company, enabling organisations to make smarter, bolder, and faster decisions. Are you a commercially minded finance professional ready to act as a trusted adviser to senior service-line leaders? Do you love turning P&L insight into clear recommendations, streamlining processes and coaching a small finance team to deliver impact across 18 UK service lines? If so, read on.

About the role: This is a senior, business-facing Commercial Finance Business Partner role within Ipsos's UK Commercial Finance team of 30+ colleagues, providing finance support to 18 service lines. You'll own monthly P&L's, produce KPI dashboards for service-line leaders and the UK Management Team, explain variance drivers and recommend corrective actions that improve profitability and efficiency. You will lead budgeting and rolling forecasting cycles, model scenarios with commercial and operations partners, and support pricing, costing and bid modelling for new and repeat projects. A key part of the role is to drive efficiency by streamlining reporting, embedding automation via use of Power Query/Power Automate where appropriate, using BI and data tools to uplift MI. You'll manage and coach a small team of two, partner across research, operations and client teams, and ensure compliance with relevant accounting and industry standards. This role offers the chance to influence strategy, sharpen commercial decision-making and contribute to a people-first, values-led culture in a global research business.

About you: Commercially focused and able to translate financial analysis into clear, actionable recommendations for non-finance stakeholders. Proven experience owning P&L, month-end close and management reporting. Skilled in budgeting, rolling forecasting and scenario modelling to support resource and pricing decisions. Strong stakeholder management and coaching experience, able to lead and develop a small finance team. Analytically curious, resilient, and able to work collaboratively across functions and geographies. Communicate confidently to senior stakeholders and produce clear, executive-ready packs.

Essential skills:

• Qualified accountant (CIMA or ACCA).
• Strong P&L ownership, month-end close and production of management information.
• Proven budgeting, forecasting and scenario modelling skills.
• Advanced Excel skills (formulas, pivot tables, structured modelling).
• Confident presentation skills and ability to produce clear PowerPoint/management packs.
• Experience managing and developing a small finance team.
• Strong stakeholder management and the ability to influence non-finance colleagues.
• Attention to detail and the ability to manage competing priorities and deadlines in a challenging environment.
• Commercial pricing and costing experience for bids and contracts.
• Experience in market research, professional services or agency environments.

Desirable skills:

• Exposure to AI and adoption to enhance day-to-day tasks, reporting and analysis workflows.
• Familiarity with Power Query / Power Automate and an interest in automating reporting and repetitive tasks.
• Experience with ERP / financial systems in a multi-entity environment.
• Prior exposure to central finance processes and multi-market reporting.

Benefits: We offer a comprehensive benefits package designed to support you as an individual. Our standard benefits include 25 days annual leave, pension contribution, income protection and life assurance. In addition, there are a range of health & wellbeing, financial benefits and professional development opportunities. We have a hybrid approach to work and ask people to be in the office or with clients for 3 days per week. We appreciate you may have commitments outside of work and will consider flexible working applications – please highlight what you are looking for when you make your application. We are committed to equality, treating people fairly, promoting a positive and inclusive working environment and ensuring we have diversity of people and views. We recognise that this is important for our business success – a more diverse workforce will enable us to better reflect and understand the world we research and ultimately deliver better research and insight to our clients. We are proud to be a member of the Disability Confident scheme, certified as a Level 2 Disability Confident Employer. We provide an inclusive and accessible recruitment process.