At a Glance
- Tasks: Lead finance operations, manage reporting, and build robust financial processes.
- Company: Join Pentatonic, a forward-thinking company ready for growth.
- Benefits: Competitive salary, career development, and a dynamic work environment.
- Other info: Opportunity to work closely with leadership and drive meaningful change.
- Why this job: Shape the future of finance in a growing company and make a real impact.
- Qualifications: Qualified accountant with experience in building finance functions.
The predicted salary is between 56700 - 69300 £ per year.
Pentatonic is looking for a Finance Controller to take ownership of a function that's ready for its next stage of growth. Our Fractional FD is completing this year's year-end accounts, and we're now looking for someone to build on that foundation — strengthening processes, controls and reporting as the business scales. You’ll manage one Finance Associate.
Key Responsibilities:
- Own month-end close, management accounts, and Board reporting from day one.
- Build and maintain the cash flow forecast; this business needs to know its runway at all times.
- Take full ownership of the audit and year-end process going forward, picking up from the fractional FD's handover.
- Design and implement controls where none currently exist, reconciliations, approval processes, version control on models.
- Manage payroll-adjacent finance touchpoints in coordination with HR (payroll itself sits with HR, but FC owns the numbers that feed it).
- Prepare investor reporting and support fundraising financial narratives.
- Challenge spend, hiring business cases, and investment decisions with data, not vibes.
- Modernise the finance stack where legacy tools are slowing things down.
- Manage and develop the Finance Associate.
What You’ll Need:
- Qualified accountant (ACA/ACCA/CIMA or equivalent).
- Proven experience in a scale‑up or SME environment where you’ve built a finance function from a messy starting point, not just maintained an existing one.
- Comfortable being the most senior finance person in the building day-to-day, with limited support.
- Strong systems background, able to assess and improve the finance stack, not just work within it.
- Confident presenting to Board and investors, and comfortable delivering uncomfortable truths early.
- A bias to action over process for its own sake.
What Success Looks Like in the First 6 Months:
- Clean handover from interim FC fully absorbed, no dropped threads on the year-end audit.
- Cash forecasting is reliable and trusted by leadership.
- Basic controls in place where there were previously none.
- Board packs are accurate, on time, and don't need translating by someone else.
Reporting Line:
Reports to CEO. Manages 1 Finance Associate.
Values in Action:
- Master the Fundamentals: Build finance foundations that are rock-solid—cash forecasting, controls, reporting—while treating every process as open to improvement.
- Obsess the Details: Deliver Board packs, forecasts and models that are accurate to the last cell—the details are where credibility is won or lost.
- You Are Where You Are: Show up to Leadership meetings, investor calls and team conversations with the same energy: curious, kind, and confident.
- Legacy Has Limits: Respect the past, but don't be ruled by it. Question inherited assumptions in budgets, forecasts and ways of working.
- Break Codes, Honourably: Deliver constructive challenge to the CEO, founders and Board on performance, spend and priorities—directly and without politics.
- Intuition is Feeling, Data is Fact: Ground every recommendation—runway, hiring, pricing, investment—in evidence, not gut feel.
- We Are Storytellers: Translate complex financials into clear narratives the founders, Board and team can act on—no jargon, no fog.
- Inspire Bravery with Bravery: Progress comes from courage—and a little chaos. Go first: surface uncomfortable truths about cash, performance or plans before they become crises.
Finance Controller employer: Pentatonic
Pentatonic is an exceptional employer located in North London, offering a dynamic work environment where innovation and growth are at the forefront. As a Finance Controller, you'll not only have the opportunity to shape the finance function but also benefit from a culture that values continuous improvement and employee development. With a focus on collaboration and transparency, Pentatonic empowers its team members to challenge the status quo and drive meaningful change, making it an ideal place for those seeking a rewarding career in finance.
