Head of Financial Performance – Guildford

Contract Type: Contract - Fixed term: 6 months (FTC). Hours: Full time – 37.5 hours per week. Salary: £81,774 – £93,879. Partner Organisation: Royal Surrey County Hospital.

Job Overview: Head of Financial Performance to join the Finance Team at Royal Surrey NHS Foundation Trust. The role will drive two key workstreams: the delivery of the Cost Improvement Programme (CIP) and strategic initiatives across the Group including its trading subsidiary Healthcare Partners Limited. The position is hybrid: work across RSFT and Group sites, with some work from home.

Main duties of the job: The Head of Financial Performance will support the Trust to deliver sustainable financial improvement with a focus on the development, monitoring and delivery of the CIP and the financial governance of the Trust’s trading subsidiary, HPL. The post holder will work closely with senior finance, operational and corporate colleagues across the Trust, its subsidiary, and the Trust Group to ensure robust financial performance, effective decision making and compliance with NHS financial frameworks. The role requires a highly skilled finance professional capable of analysing complex financial information, influencing senior stakeholders, and driving improvements in financial processes, reporting and governance. Although the postholder will not have direct line management responsibility, they will provide leadership and expert advice to colleagues across finance, operations and the subsidiary to ensure delivery of key financial objectives. The postholder will act as a senior representative of the Finance Directorate, providing authoritative advice on financial performance, accounting treatment, business cases, investment decisions, and financial implications of strategic initiatives.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities:

• CIP leadership – Lead the financial oversight, modelling and monitoring of delivery of the Trust’s Cost Improvement Plan, ensuring schemes are robust, deliverable and aligned to operational and strategic priorities.
• Scheme delivery – Using a "PMO" style approach support delivery of the CIP Programme.
• Accounting model review – Lead a comprehensive review of the accounting treatment, processes and financial controls of the Trust’s trading subsidiary.
• Group model alignment – Ensure accounting policies and processes are aligned across the parent Trust and partner Trust within the group model.
• Policy review – Review policy and procedure at HPL, recommend and implement policy changes as required, and create and implement where gaps are identified.
• Technical accounting – Provide expert advice on complex accounting matters including service concessions, right of use assets, consolidation, intercompany transactions and VAT implications.
• Subsidiary oversight – Support the subsidiary Board and management team to strengthen financial governance, reporting and compliance with NHS and statutory requirements.
• Operational Finance – Expert knowledge in the operational working of a Finance Team to understand and advise on the target operating model, including recommendations across a Group and multi-site model.
• Strategic Financial Leadership – Influence senior operational and clinical leaders to support financially sustainable decision making; provide expert financial appraisal of business cases, investments and service developments; lead benchmarking and productivity analysis to identify opportunities for improvement; promote strong financial governance, value for money and effective use of public funds.

Person specification:

Qualifications – Essential criteria: Professional qualification in accountancy (ACA, CIMA, ACCA, CIPFA). Evidence of having kept technically up to date since qualification (CPD).

Knowledge and Experience – Essential criteria: Experience in a Senior Financial role within a large organisation. Significant experience in financial modelling and data handling. Experience of presenting complex information to non-finance managers including clinicians. Expert understanding of the NHS financial regime.

Desirable criteria: Experience of interpreting all relevant financial legislation, making recommendations and implementing changes across a large complex financial organisation.