Head of Finance

Lead the finance team through a period of real growth and change. Executive role in a well-established, family-owned business.

The opportunity:

Our client, a long-established Melbourne-based industrial manufacturer, is in the process of consolidating and growing their business from a position of strength. To support this, they now seek a Head of Finance; a hands-on senior leadership role created to strengthen reporting and controls across an enlarged balance sheet, and help capture the margin upside their recent growth initiatives have created.

The company:

Multi-generational and family-owned, our client is a well-regarded Victorian manufacturing business with a long track record of steady growth. From its base in Melbourne’s south-east, the company manufactures and supplies a range of engineered products used in infrastructure and the built environment, sold to engineers, specifiers and contractors across the State. The business is backed by a strong balance sheet and a long-term ownership horizon. While proudly family-owned, it is professionally run. Led by an experienced Managing Director, it has deliberately invested in governance maturity as it has grown, and its recent acquisition signals a business with the confidence and capital to keep growing. It is a company that combines the pace and pragmatism of private ownership with the discipline of much larger organisations.

The role:

Reporting to the Managing Director and as a member of the Executive Leadership Team, the Head of Finance will lead an eight-member finance and administration function. Key accountabilities include:

• Leading the financial integration of all finance related systems and processes;
• In conjunction with the Managing Director, oversee monthly management reporting and analysis, and preparation of Board reporting;
• Budgeting, forecasting and banking covenant compliance;
• Margin analysis, product costing within a manufacturing environment and pricing support;
• Foreign exchange and input-cost management, including forward cover within Board-approved policy;
• Working capital and cash management;
• Internal controls, compliance and financial risk;
• Developing the finance team’s capability, systems and processes to match the enlarged business.

The candidate:

Qualifications and experience:

• Degree qualified in accounting, finance or commerce, with CA/CPA or equivalent qualification highly regarded;
• Experience as a Head of Finance, Financial Controller or senior Finance Manager, ideally in an industrial manufacturing environment;
• Experience with the financial integration highly regarded;
• Background in manufacturing, industrial products or the construction materials sector preferred;
• Exposure to Executive Leadership Teams, with experience preparing Board reporting;
• Experience managing input-cost and foreign exchange exposures, including hedging or forward purchasing;
• Strong command of management and statutory reporting, controls and compliance.

The person:

• High-level financial expertise, high emotional intelligence, with a proven track record of developing teams;
• Energised rather than daunted by change, with an appetite to do things differently;
• Confident with senior stakeholders, yet hands-on enough to stay close to small finance team;
• Commercially sharp, with the ability to turn financial insight into business decisions;
• Well organised and highly articulate communicator, who can relate at all levels of the organisation.