Robertson Bell is partnering with a leading charity to recruit a Finance Manager (Operations) on a 15-month fixed-term contract to cover maternity leave.

This is an excellent opportunity for a qualified accountant to take responsibility for financial controls and operational oversight within a large, complex organisation. With diverse income streams, the charity offers an interesting and varied financial environment where effective financial management plays an important role in supporting its wider mission.

The successful candidate will combine strong technical accounting expertise with experience of finance operations, overseeing a broad function spanning financial controls, reconciliations, banking, payments and income. This is an oversight and management position rather than a hands-on transactional role, with a particular focus on maintaining robust controls, resolving complex issues and ensuring the effective delivery of operational finance services.

The Finance Manager (Operations) will be responsible for:

• Oversee the monthly balance sheet review process, ensuring bank and control account reconciliations are completed accurately and on time, with complex or unusual balances investigated and resolved.

• Maintain and monitor the financial control framework, ensuring key controls are completed, appropriately evidenced and reported.

• Investigate accounting and control issues, assessing their potential implications for financial reporting, statutory accounts and external audit.

• Oversee operational finance service delivery across areas including accounts payable, accounts receivable, banking, expenses and cash flow, monitoring performance against agreed service levels.

• Ensure operational finance activities support an accurate and timely month-end close, addressing any issues that could affect reporting deadlines.

• Provide leadership and direction across the operational finance function, supporting effective team performance, accountability and consistently high service standards.

• Build strong relationships with stakeholders across Finance and the wider organisation to resolve operational issues and improve processes.

• Lead and support improvements to operational finance processes and policies, addressing recurring issues and strengthening the control environment.

• Contribute to a major finance systems programme alongside the delivery of day-to-day operational responsibilities.

The ideal candidate will demonstrate:

• A recognised professional accountancy qualification, with ACA particularly relevant; suitably experienced ACCA or CIMA-qualified accountants will also be considered.

• Strong experience in financial controls, balance sheet reconciliations and investigating complex accounting issues.

• Experience contributing to month-end and year-end processes, financial reporting or external audit.

• Experience in finance operations, ideally covering a broad range of transactional activities and operational controls.

• The ability to oversee processes, manage operational performance and resolve issues without being reliant on hands-on transactional processing.

• Strong leadership, communication and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to work effectively across a complex organisation.

Experience within the charity or wider not-for-profit sector would be advantageous.

Working arrangement: Remote-first, with monthly in-office attendance.

Start date: December 2026 preferred.

If you are a qualified accountant with strong financial controls experience and a background in finance operations, Robertson Bell would be keen to hear from you. Please submit your CV for consideration now, to avoid missing out on this fast moving opportunity.