Director of Financial Operations & Customer Experience

Birmingham, England, United Kingdom

12/11/2024

Role Introduction

OneAdvanced is seeking an exceptional Financial Operations Director to lead a critical function that drives the company’s order-to-cash process, improving both internal operations and the overall customer experience. This high-visibility leadership role demands a highly skilled individual with deep financial expertise, strategic insight, and an innate ability to execute at a senior level.

As a Financial Operations Director, you will be the cornerstone of our transactional processes, overseeing the team’s efforts across billing, renewals, credit management, collections, cash allocation and accounts payable. The ideal candidate will have the strategic foresight to transform our financial operations, reduce our DSO (Days Sales Outstanding), and drive process improvements at every stage of the customer lifecycle, from order to cash.

Your role will centre on building stronger cross-functional relationships, working directly with customers to identify pain points and proactively drive solutions that enhance the customer journey. You’ll be empowered by our CFO, who values precision, communication, and diligent execution to relay key operational insights to investors. This position also involves significant leadership responsibility, managing a team of 70+ people in both the UK and offshore locations (with local management directing offshore teams).

What You Will Do

• Customer-Centric Focus: Lead the strategic design of the order-to-cash journey, ensuring seamless processes that enhance customer satisfaction while preventing issues before they arise. Focus on improving the overall customer experience through proactive problem resolution.
• Process Ownership: Oversee the execution of billing, query resolution, debt collection, renewals, cash allocation and cash flow management processes, ensuring these are run efficiently and accurately.
• Team Leadership: Drive a culture of continuous improvement within the financial operations team. Engage and motivate a diverse team, ensuring alignment with business goals. Champion the development of managers and promote career growth within the team.
• Transformational Leadership: Work alongside the CFO to design and implement operational changes that align with the OneAdvanced strategic vision. This includes a focus on process improvement, system integration (Salesforce CPQ), and automation, and potential M&A integration across financial operations.
• Cross-Functional Influence: Collaborate with senior leaders across sales, finance, and commercial teams to ensure smooth handoffs between departments, especially focusing on accurate customer data that feeds into billing and cash collection.
• Continuous Improvement: Drive initiatives to streamline the order-to-cash and procure-to-pay processes, reducing inefficiencies, improving data accuracy, and enhancing cash flow forecasting and reporting.
  

What You Will Have

Requirements:

• Finance Expertise: Strong background in finance, with experience in SaaS or technology-driven companies, particularly with complex contracts and billing processes.
• Leadership & People Management: Proven track record in leading diverse, multi-location teams, including direct oversight of UK-based teams and indirect management of offshore teams through local management. Experience leading teams through transformation and process improvement.
• Systems & Process Knowledge: Advanced proficiency in billing operations, credit management, and cash flow management, with deep experience using Salesforce CPQ and related financial systems. Experience with process automation and data accuracy is a must.
• Customer-Focused Approach: Ability to understand and improve the customer experience, ensuring that both external clients and internal stakeholders benefit from streamlined financial operations.
• Decisive and Action-Oriented: Strong, hands-on leader with a keen ability to resolve problems quickly and effectively, driving change while maintaining high standards and meeting critical deadlines.
• Communication Skills: A clear, articulate communicator with the ability to influence senior leadership, investors, and clients, presenting complex financial information in an accessible manner.
• Resilient & Driven: A robust and resilient leader who thrives in a fast-paced, dynamic environment and is capable of driving results across various teams and stakeholders.
  

What We Do For You

Wellbeing focused – Our people are our greatest assets, and ensuring everyone feels their best self to come to work is integral

• Annual Leave – 25 days of annual leave, plus public holidays and the ability to buy additional days
• Employee Assistance Programme – Free advice, support, and confidential counselling available 24/7 through Care First
• Endometriosis Friendly Employer - We are proud to confirm our commitment to developing an environment and culture that allows those with endometriosis to thrive in the workplace
  
  
  

Personal Growth - Regardless of where you are at in your career, we’re committed to enabling your growth personally and professionally

• Development Programmes – From Future Managers to Leadership Training, our development programmes help you get where you need to go
• Performance Bonus – Our Group-wide bonus scheme enables you to reap the rewards of your success
  
  
  

Financial wellbeing - We understand as well as your mental wellbeing, your financial wellbeing is really important

• Pension Scheme – Our plan with Scottish Widows offers 5% matched contribution by the company
• Income protection insurance – Providing you with support and assistance when you need it most
• Discounted Parking - We have partnered with QPark to provide an exclusive discounted rate for OneAdvanced employee's when purchasing a digital season tickets
  
  
  

Recognition – Highlighting and rewarding the great work our people do

• Performance & Talent – Our own technology platform that allows you to get real-time feedback, conversations and goals to help you become your best self
  
  
  

Making a Difference – we provide opportunities to help our people make a difference to the causes they care about

• MatchIt! – Fundraise for a cause close to your heart and Advanced will match part of the funding
• Volunteering Time – Our volunteering leave scheme allows you to use your time to help those who need it
• Pennies from Heaven – donate the pennies from your pay check to help make a difference without lifting a finger
  
  
  

Who We Are

OneAdvanced is one UK's largest providers of business software and services serving 20,000+ global customers with an annual turnover of £330M+. We manage 1.5 million 111 calls per month, support over 2 million Further Education learners across the UK, handle over 10 million wills, and so much more. Our mission is to power the world of work and, as you can see, our software underpins some of the UK's most critical sectors.

We invest in our brilliant people. They are at the heart of our success as we strive to be a diverse, inclusive and engaging place to work that not only powers the world of work, but empowers the growth, ambitions and talent of our people.

To learn more about working at OneAdvanced please click here