Head of FP&A and Strategic Finance - PE backed Portco - Boston

Our client is a Private Equity backed middle market services company based in Boston.

The company is hiring a Head of FP&A and Strategic Finance to support the continued growth and geographic expansion. Reporting directly to the CFO and working closely with the Private Equity sponsor, this hire will be responsible for all financial business planning, forecasting, budget reporting, financial modeling and decision support. This is a highly visible and cross functional position with direct access to the ownership group and board of directors. The company is ideally targeting a candidate with a background in investment banking and/or private equity, who also has experience in and understands the rigor of building/scaling/managing an FP&A function in a fast paced, high growth corporate environment.

The Role

Company is seeking a Head of Financial, Planning and Analysis (FP&A) and Strategic Finance reporting to the Chief Financial Officer. The Head of FP&A and Strategic Finance provides financial leadership and insightful business analysis. The candidate must:

• Have strong, broad, progressive functional capabilities in strategic planning, accounting, consumer insights and financial planning, forecasting and analysis.
• Possesses a deep understanding of profitability drivers necessary to achieve financial objectives and be able to translate complex issues into simple-to-understand concepts.
• Use outstanding inter-personal skills to influence through relationship building, business insights and critical thinking
• Be a strong leader with experience developing and leveraging talent.
• Demonstrate a strong work ethic, high sense of urgency, ability to roll-up their sleeves and the passionate desire to drive results.

Key Objectives

• Partner with the CFO to evaluate and design the optimal operating model to support and scale profitable growth of the business. Identify, track and report the critical drivers and KPIs of the business.
• Contribute to development of the strategic plan; creates P&L architecture to achieve financial objectives while funding key investments to drive future growth. Drives translation of strategic plan into financial budgeting and forecasting processes
• Deliver timely and accurate financial analysis to support structured decisions. Create libraries and embed automation to speed future analysis work. Define standards for assumptions and methods for common analysis.
• Connect long-term strategy to current and anticipated operational activities, financial performance, and capital structure. Enhance the planning process through tighter integration of long-range planning, rolling forecasts and the annual budget. Support decision making processes through effective scenario, “what-if”, and sensitivity analysis.
• Improve on or establish frameworks for evaluating then incorporating financial forecasts of acquisition targets and newly acquired businesses.
• Remain aware of changing trends in the business and proactively provides insights and solutions to business issues maximizing short and long-term strategic / financial objectives.
• Lead the monthly close providing key insights and financial reporting to company.
• Improve financial / business acumen of company. Has a desire to help others develop into business leaders.
• Participate in or leads strategic/ tactical business projects (beyond finance)that provide broad-based value.
• Capital control – Works with project owners to develop business cases as well as the annual budget and quarterly forecast.
• Build and maintain the tools and processes to provide performance measurement and reporting to the management team
• Hire, coaches, and develops high-performing teams. Ensures alignment and a strong working relationship with the operations team. Maintains a culture that emphasizes responsiveness, accountability, and transparency.
• Is confident, transparent, nimble, and succinct. Provides accurate and timely reporting and analytics to key stakeholders. Ensures there is integrity in projections and that they are grounded in reasonable, logical assumptions. Demonstrates excellent oral and written communication skills both internally and externally.

Candidate Profile& Preferred Experience

• A bachelor's degree in finance, accounting, or related fields. A master's degree, especially an MBA, is a plus.
• Proven leader with 5 – 10 years of experience of financial planning and analysis within a complex, multi-location, dynamic organization
• Working understand of generally accepted accounting principles
• A record of serving as a business partner in helping to influence key business decisions and track performance against key objectives.
• Experience working in a fast-growth company, particularly one executing an acquisition focused strategy. Experience developing a performance management environment where KPIs/dashboards are developed and leveraged to help track and drive results.
• Demonstrated knowledge of advanced analytical, data science and financial analysis techniques and methods