Our client is an established, high-growth manufacturing business entering an exciting period of development and transformation. With a strong foundation and a clear vision for the future, the organisation is focused on strengthening its capabilities, improving operational performance and building on its existing success.
Continued investment in its facilities, people and processes reflects the business’s commitment to long-term growth and continuous improvement. As the organisation evolves, there is a real opportunity to contribute to its ongoing development, influence decision-making and help shape its future direction. With a focus on operational excellence, commercial performance and sustainable growth, this is an exciting time to join a business where individuals can make a tangible impact and play a meaningful role in its continued success.
About the Role
Sowena Group have been engaged exclusively to appoint a Finance Business Partner into a newly created role designed to strengthen financial insight, commercial decision-making and profitability across the business.
Reporting directly to the Finance Director, this is a high-impact position that goes beyond traditional financial reporting. The successful candidate will take ownership of the numbers, providing clear insight into P&L performance, margin and profitability, while working closely with the wider business to identify opportunities to improve performance.
The role will act as a key finance partner, helping the business understand the factors driving financial performance and translating financial information into meaningful commercial actions. This opportunity will suit someone who is forward-looking, commercially minded and comfortable challenging the business, with the ability to turn financial data into practical recommendations that maximise output, improve efficiency and drive profitability.
Key Responsibilities
Commercial Finance & Business Partnering
- Act as a trusted Finance Business Partner to the Commercial, Operations and Purchasing teams.
- Provide meaningful financial insight and analysis to support commercial and operational decision-making.
- Challenge performance, assumptions and costs, ensuring decisions are supported by robust financial analysis.
- Translate complex financial information into clear, actionable recommendations for finance and non-finance stakeholders.
- Support the business in understanding the financial implications of operational and commercial decisions.
Profitability & Margin
- Take ownership of understanding and explaining the underlying drivers of the P&L. Analyse revenue, gross margin, overheads and other key profitability measures.
- Identify trends, variances and opportunities to improve profitability and margins.
- Provide detailed analysis of product, project, customer and contract profitability where appropriate.
- Work with operational and commercial teams to identify and deliver margin improvement opportunities.
- Ensure financial performance is understood at an operational level and drive accountability for financial performance across the business.
Forecasting & Budgeting
- Lead and support the development of commercially focused budgets, forecasts and financial plans.
- Provide forward-looking analysis of expected revenues, costs, margins, cash and profitability.
- Develop meaningful forecasting models and KPIs that give the business greater visibility of future performance.
- Challenge forecast assumptions and ensure forecasts reflect realistic operational and commercial expectations.
- Support the Finance Director with scenario planning and financial modelling.
Performance Reporting & Insight
- Improve the quality of management information across the business.
- Develop and enhance KPIs and dashboards that provide clear visibility of operational and financial performance.
- Deliver forward-looking financial insight and recommendations to support better decision-making.
Manufacturing & Cost Management
- Analyse manufacturing costs, labour, materials, efficiency and production performance. Work closely with Operations to understand capacity, productivity, output and cost drivers.
- Identify opportunities to improve efficiency, reduce waste and maximise output.
- Support business cases and investment decisions with robust financial analysis.
- Provide insight into the financial impact of operational changes and improvement initiatives.
Stock & Working Capital
- Analyse stock levels, movements, ageing, provisions and working capital requirements.
- Work closely with Purchasing and Operations to improve inventory management and reduce excess or obsolete stock.
- Ensure the financial impact of inventory decisions is clearly understood.
About You
To be successful in this role, you will ideally have:
- ACA, ACCA or CIMA qualification, with approximately 5–6 years of post-qualified experience.
- Experience within a manufacturing or similar operational environment.
- Experience working closely with Commercial and Operations teams.
- The ability to challenge senior stakeholders constructively and influence business decisions.
- Strong analytical skills, excellent attention to detail and the ability to identify the story behind the numbers.
- Commercial awareness and a focus on delivering tangible improvements to business performance.
- A forward-looking, proactive approach and the confidence to work with incomplete information to develop an informed view.
- Strong communication and relationship-building skills, with the ability to work effectively across all levels of an organisation.
Why Join?
This is an excellent opportunity for a commercially focused finance professional to join an established and developing manufacturing business in a newly created role. You will play a significant part in strengthening profitability, improving margins, enhancing forecasting and driving overall financial performance.
The position offers the opportunity to work closely with manufacturing operations, influence key commercial decisions and make a tangible difference to business performance.
You won’t simply be reporting the numbers. You’ll be expected to understand them, challenge them and use them to help the business make better decisions.