Financial Controller | Fast Growth Global Consumer Brand in London

The Client

Harmonic are delighted to be partnering with a well established global consumer brand with a strong international following and a reputation built on the quality and longevity of its product. The business is privately owned, highly profitable, and several years into a sustained period of strong growth. There are several hundred people worldwide, the majority of them in the UK, and European expansion is now underway, with regional finance teams being built and managed from the London head office.

The Role

A newly created Financial Controller position, reporting to the Finance Director for UK and Europe and sitting at the top of a finance team of 12+ colleagues. You own the financial control across a multi entity, multi currency operation: month end and year end close, balance sheet integrity, statutory reporting and audit, the AP and AR functions, inventory, and the internal controls framework the next phase of international growth will run on. You are also central to embedding a newly implemented ERP, leading the ongoing refinement of processes and controls that sit around it.

That is the technical half of the job. The other half, and the real reason this role exists, is the team: this is a position for someone who actively enjoys people management. You will be building rather than inheriting, recruiting as European expansion adds entities and volume, lifting the technical standard, and handing individuals genuine ownership of processes that currently escalate upwards. Success in year one looks like a finance team that has held steady through the changes that growth has brought around, and a function which is stronger in terms of automation, systems and ready for future international growth.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead a finance team of 12+ across financial control, accounts payable, accounts receivable and management accounting, with four to six direct reports.
• Recruit, onboard and develop new team members as the function scales to support global / European expansion.
• Coach and train the team technically, building clear ownership and accountability at every level and reducing the function's dependency on senior leadership.
• Act as the primary escalation point for operational finance issues, resolving blockers at pace.
• Own end to end financial control across the group: month end and year end close, balance sheet integrity, statutory reporting and external audit.
• Take full ownership of the accounts payable and accounts receivable functions, including payment runs, invoice processing, banking controls and supplier and customer master data.
• Oversee inventory accounting across the group, including valuation, movement tracking and reconciliation.
• Design, maintain and strengthen the internal controls framework in line with audit requirements and best practice.
• Partner with IT, BI, FP&A and the wider finance team to embed and optimise processes within the ERP and surrounding platforms.
• Drive consistency and standardisation of finance processes across all business channels.
• Proactively identify and manage risk across finance operations.

Essential Experience

• Proven experience leading an in house finance team of 10 or more, across multiple layers of seniority.
• A genuine appetite for the people side of the job: recruiting, onboarding, teaching, training and developing accountants at every level.
• Qualified accountant (ACA, ACCA, CIMA or equivalent) with at least three years in a comparable Financial Controller role.
• Background in a product business: retail, consumer goods, FMCG or a comparable branded product environment, with inventory exposure.
• Strong technical accounting knowledge (IFRS) and a track record of designing and improving internal controls at scale.
• International exposure across multi currency, multi entity environments.
• Comfortable stepping into a fast paced, high growth environment and providing immediate stability.

Desirable Experience

• Systems implementation experience, ideally Dynamics 365, NetSuite or a comparable ERP.
• Experience building or managing finance teams across multiple European entities and tax jurisdictions.
• Previous experience at Financial Controller, Head of Financial Control, Senior Finance Manager or Group Finance Manager level.

Package

• Salary: £90,000 to £120,000
• Bonus: 20% (half company performance, half personal KPIs)
• Location: London
• Hybrid: 3 days in the office, 2 days at home
• Hours: 37.5 per week
• Start Date: Flexible, with September or October preferred to allow a proper onboarding runway.

At Harmonic, we are dedicated to fostering an inclusive and equitable workplace. We actively welcome applications from individuals of all backgrounds and assure you that every candidate will be thoughtfully considered for the roles we represent.