Senior Finance Officer - College of Medicine and Health - 107619 - Grade 6 in Birmingham

Location: University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham UK

Full time starting salary is normally in the range £33,002 to £35,608 with potential progression once in post to £39,906

Grade: 6

Full Time, Fixed Term contract up to September 2028

Closing date: 23rd July 2026

Our offer to you:

• People are at the heart of what we are and do.
• The University of Birmingham is proud to have been a part of the City of Birmingham and the wider region for over 100 years, and we are equally proud to be recognised as a leading global university.
• We want to attract talented people from across the city and beyond, support them to succeed, and celebrate their success.
• We are committed to helping the people who work here to develop through our sector-leading Birmingham Professional programme which provides all professional services staff with development opportunities and the encouragement to reach their full potential.
• Supporting our people to achieve a healthy work/life balance is important both to our employees and to the success of the University and, depending on the role, we offer a variety of flexible working arrangements.
• You will receive a generous package of benefits including 40 days paid holiday a year, one paid day a year for volunteering, occupational sick pay, and a pension scheme.

Background:

This is an exciting opportunity to work with one of the largest clinical trials units in the country. The Cancer Research UK Clinical Trials Unit (CRCTU) is a Department within the School of Medical Sciences at the University of Birmingham. The CRCTU employs a multidisciplinary team of around 200 staff including statisticians, trial management staff, research nurses, monitors, programmers, administrators and IT staff. It specialises in running research studies testing new treatments for diseases (mainly cancer or rare disease) in both adults and children.

Role Summary:

The Senior Finance Officer will support the CRCTU and will be jointly managed by the CRCTU Business Support Manager and the Research Project Finance Manager in the College Research Project Finance Team. The post holder is responsible for maintaining effective oversight of CRCTU’s portfolio of research project funding, undertaking financial monitoring, preparing financial summaries and communication of financial information to Team Leaders and the senior leadership team within the CRCTU.

Main Duties:

• Responsibility for monitoring research funding across the CRCTU, to include regular reviews of income and expenditure, identification of any potential issues and proactive engagement with Team Leaders.
• Responsibility for the preparation of financial summary documents at a research project, team portfolio and unit level, with associated explanatory detail to enable effective decision making.
• Ensuring spending is in line with budget or plans and advising on implications.
• Liaising with relevant contacts to resolve day to day queries or issues identified through financial monitoring.
• Provide challenge when required regarding budgets/spend and change requests.
• Investigate, manage, assess, and process complex information from a variety of documentation to resolve queries and provide information and guidance to Team leaders and external funding bodies.
• To assist CRCTU Business Manager and Research Project Finance Manager with the management of tasks e.g. financial trackers, closure preparations, resolving issues and ad hoc one-off tasks.
• Continually looking to improve and develop systems and procedures to enhance service and outputs.
• Calculation and reporting of budget to date information considering agreed principles and assumptions.
• Ensuring that the financial information provided is relevant and understood.
• Producing ad-hoc financial data as deemed necessary.
• Reviewing the financial position, interpreting and analysing information and communicating these in a clear way to the CRCTU Leadership Team.
• Identifying critical areas of financial performance and focusing time on those areas where improvements can be made.
• To establish and maintain effective purchasing processes across the unit and provide dedicated support for complex purchases.

Required Knowledge, Skills, Qualifications, Experience:

• Educated to Degree level (or equivalent qualifications).
• Significant practical experience in a similar role, experience of using project management tools.
• Evidence of literacy and numeracy, with the ability to write clearly, and to analyse information and data.
• Highly proficient IT skills, including the wider MS Office suite of programmes including excel and PowerPoint.
• Excellent analytical skills used to produce reports, identify issues and resolve them decisively.
• Excellent interpersonal skills.
• A high degree of professionalism, tact, and diplomacy, and the ability to exercise discretion regarding the handling and management of sensitive information/issues.
• Ability to work effectively in a large, complex organisation.