Our Finance Department

Our Finance Department

The Finance department provides a high-quality shared service across the National Church Institutions. We offer a comprehensive, cost-effective finance service to each organisation, meeting their varied needs across the full range of finance disciplines – operational, statutory and compliance, and financial reporting, planning and insight. The team is also supporting our NCI clients with major change and transformation projects. In addition to our work with the NCIs, we also provide support to, and promote best practice across the wider Church in relation to financial matters, including monitoring the financial health of Dioceses, Cathedrals and Theological Education Institutions etc.

Within the Finance department, we are currently undertaking a Finance Transformation Programme which will see us develop our service even further as we replace our finance system and adopt process improvements and changes to ways of working. We are also supporting the Church of England Governance Programme which is proposing a new governance structure for the Church of England and is likely to reduce the number of NCIs from seven to four trustee bodies. Whilst not yet finalised, this will be a significant organisational change programme over the coming months and years.

 

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We are a large team of around 50 people, working across the full range of areas shown above.  We are expanding our capacity over the next few months as we undertake a period of significant change, both in terms of transforming our own finance service but also supporting the NCIs with other change initiatives.

As a result we have opportunities available in:

• Senior Finance: our senior leaders within Finance, co-lead the team, and provide strategic finance support to the Chief Executives, Senior teams and Boards of each of our NCI clients, ensuring they are receiving a high quality service across all the finance disciplines

• Financial Accounting & Control: this team has responsibility for statutory reporting (year end accounts and audit) across the full breadth of entities which include large charities, investment funds, listed companies, trading companies, pension schemes and more! They also undertake the day to day management of the balance sheet and financial control environment, as well as operating our treasury and payments function

• Financial Planning & Analysis: this team undertakes financial reporting, planning and analysis for each of the NCIs including annual budgeting, quarterly forecasting, longer term financial planning and variance analysis. We operate a finance business partnering model to provide decision-support to budget holders, and ensure strategic plans are underpinned by financial analysis and insight. This team also undertakes a range of grant accounting and reporting across our major grant programmes, and works with wider Church stakeholders to provide support and financial monitoring.

• Finance Systems: this team supports our existing Finance system (SAP) and a range of other products including banking systems, virtual and physical credit cards etc., providing first line support, training and maintenance, and working with our support partners. The Finance Transformation Programme will incorporate the replacement of our legacy systems but it is really important that our systems are reliable and our users are well supported in the meantime.

We are a hybrid working team, spending at least two days per week in the office – Tuesdays is our main ‘Finance team’ day, plus one other day which is determined by the sub-team you’re working in or the nature of your role. Sub-teams meet together on a regular basis, either in person or online, and we have one in-person full department meeting each quarter, which usually includes a mixture of formal and informal updates, opportunities for learning and reflection, and team building.

If you’re a qualified accountant, we will meet your professional subscription costs, and provide occasional support for training and development activities to enable you to meet your CPD requirements. If you’re interested in undertaking a professional qualification then we will provide financial and other types of support to help you do that, as appropriate to the role. We also look for other ways to learn and develop together, through more informal skill sharing sessions, and opportunities to get involved in projects, and one-off pieces of work.