About the job

Job summary

This position is based nationally

Job description

We encourage applications from people from all backgrounds and aim to have a workforce that represents the wider society that we serve. We pride ourselves on being an employer of choice. We champion diversity, inclusion and wellbeing and aim to create a workplace where everyone feels valued and a sense of belonging. To find out more about how we do this visit: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ministry-of-justice/about/equality-and-diversity.

Job Title/ Position:  Commercial Finance and Income Partner        
Band/Grade:  Grade 7
Number of Vacancies: 2
Business Group: COO Group
Directorate: Financial Strategy and Partnerships (FSP) Group.
Location: National – All locations. Travel to London is not anticipated unless there is a business requirement.
Hours: 37 
Working Pattern: Permanent 
Role Type/ Team: Commercial Finance & Income

Ministry of Justice an Inclusive Employer

We recognise the challenges that people with (multiple) protected characteristics may experience on the job market and in their career progression. We are fully committed to being an inclusive employer of choice and ensuring equity of opportunity for all. We welcome the unique contribution diverse applicants bring in terms of their culture, ethnicity, race, nationality or national origin, age, sex, gender identity or expression, religion or belief, disability status, sexual orientation, educational or social background or any other factor. To find out more about how we champion diversity and inclusion in the workplace please visit https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ministry-of-justice/about/equality-and-diversity

Overview

• The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) sits at the heart of public service delivery and the government’s wider social reform agenda, working to protect and advance the principles of justice. The department has been at the forefront of the Government’s wider efficiency agenda making a finance roles an exciting and challenging opportunity.
• C40% of the department’s budget is spent on external 3rd party suppliers that provides critical services to the department. Additionally, the department continues to embark on major multi-billion pounds change projects from building more prison places to restructuring, the complex commercial arrangements coming to an end, etc.
• MoJ earns almost a fifth (c. £2bn) of its gross annual budget through fees, fines and commercial income, with a significant focus on improving debt management as well as charges. In the current financial climate managing and protecting this income is vitally important. A new, extended offer from the Income sub-team is currently in development.
• This role in the Commercial Finance & Income team (CFI), within Financial Strategy and Partnership Group, plays a crucial role to lead on key areas of work that supports the department’s agenda. objectives. The role provides finance expertise within the commercial and income space.

Role Purpose

The main purpose of the role is to provide strategic leadership, support and challenge to business areas across the department, and to ensure that decisions are made with reference to financial information and consequences, putting finance at the heart of decision making.

The lead will spend a significant proportion of their time within the business, interacting regularly to build and sustain trust, ensuring they keep strategic oversight of all agendas.

This role will also require that you partner with the Commercial & Contract teams, wider Finance, Business and Functional areas and external stakeholders. The role holder will also own and drive forward the department's commercial finance policies and initiatives, sharing best practice and collaborating with colleagues from Other Government Departments

Entry Routes

Suitable for staff with the required skills and / or experience from within or outside Finance

Progression Routes

Within Finance:

This role may be suitable for FBP SEOs and other Finance individuals at SEO, Financial Operations SEOs for example, and G7 with the required influencing, stakeholder management, interpersonal skills, and technical financial understanding.

From Outside Finance:

This role is not suitable for non-finance professionals or individuals without significant finance experience.

Responsibilities

This role in the Commercial Finance & Income team plays a crucial role to lead and support delivery of the department’s objectives. These include but not limited to, monitoring supplier financial resilience, providing technical, commercial and corporate finance expertise, identifying, managing and remediating commercial and corporate finance risks, providing expert financial advice to support major commercial and change programme decisions and supporting the Department to protect and maximise its income. The Income team is currently developing an extended service offer, planning to move beyond the current focus on Income.

The job holder will be required to undertake the following duties and responsibilities which may vary in accordance to business needs.

Risk Mitigation & Management

• Provide expert corporate and commercial advice and insight on the financial implications of commercial contracts and major programme decisions.
• Lead/support complex reviews of existing contracts to ensure MoJ is gaining the maximum economic value and applying the financial elements of the contract fully.
• Lead/support on investigations and complex financial analysis.
• Lead/support on major contract issues with suppliers and support tender process on financial matters for major programmes.
• Provide specialist finance input into dispute and claims issues, including engagement with 3rd party suppliers.

Commercial and Income Strategy & Policy:

• Provide expert corporate and commercial finance advice on the financial implications of commercial strategies and decisions for major change programmes and existing commercial arrangements.
• Develop expertise in the end-to-end commercial cycle on commercial arrangement types, supplier legal structures, payment mechanism (including payment by results), financial contract clauses, financial rights and obligations, market players, macro-economic impacts (e.g. inflation and foreign exchange), financial protections and guarantee models and overarching bid/cost model requirements.
• Develop commercial finance policies/guidance and support their introduction and implementation in the relevant business areas. These will include learnings from key cross-government guidance documents.

Supplier Financial and Market Monitoring:

• Provide expert analysis of financial statements on the relative strength and ongoing financial viability of suppliers.
• Have an expert understanding of, and provide professional insight and advice in response to, market dynamics within key and applicable sectors.
• Lead/support on process improvement on supplier financial health monitoring, including developing the service offer across other government Departments. This includes working with other functional areas and Commercial in developing tools that allow easy analysis of outputs.

Investment /Business Case Reviews:

• Lead financial assurance reviews of business cases over £10m, providing advice to the approval bodies on the financial aspects, in order to influence major programmes on commercial and finance decisions.
• Work collaboratively with other functional experts in forming your overarching assessment.
• Upskill MoJ Finance colleagues to help ensure that they are able to deliver good quality financial analysis within business cases and carry out 1st line assurance responsibilities on business cases.
• Lead on process improvement around governance of investment assurance, specifically around finance requirements, with the intention to work with Other Government Departments to leverage best practice and share ours.
• Develop to become the MoJ’s central expert in relation to Finance Case preparation and application of the HM Treasury Green Book (Investment appraisal and evaluation).

Income & Debt (and extended offer):

• Identify opportunities to improve existing processes for assessing cost-recovery and fee-setting to reduce the risk of over-recovery and minimize the impact of any necessary fee-reductions.
• Support on assessments of commercial income opportunities, including engaging with HMT, where appropriate.
• Help support the creation of opportunities for sharing relevant best practice and knowledge across MoJ and cross-government.
• Support the Department’s Subject Matter Expert on setting fees and charges, with respect to Managing Public Money and within the appropriate legal framework.
• Contributing to and reviewing submissions for senior officials
• Play a major role in offering an extended service to the business once the offer has been developed. This will likely involve working with stakeholders on short term engagements to develop new policies or services, where the relevant Finance Business Partner does not have the specialist knowledge required to support the work effectively themselves.

Other duties

The post holder will be required undertake wider leadership work to support the department and to work in a flexible way and undertake any other duties reasonably requested by line management which are commensurate with the grade and level of responsibility of this post. This may also include working closely with other MoJ Finance staff and functions to develop solutions/problem-solve, engaging in project work to drive finance improvements.

Key skills and knowledge

The post holder will have:

• The ability to lead and influence others, using verbal and written communication to articulate their thoughts, ideas, and rationale in order to gain agreement;
• The ability to work across multiple areas, bringing together expertise from a range of teams to drive valued outcomes;
• The ability to research a new policy/service and build a working knowledge quickly, in order to influence business decisions;
• Experience of building productive and long-lasting relationships with others and establishing mutual respect;
• Experience of providing professional finance and corporate services to senior stakeholders and influencing business decisions;
• Experience of continual re-prioritisation, in order to meet business need;
• Experience in leading a team and driving forward wider corporate objectives;
• Experience of communicating financial information to a non-financial audience; and
• Established deployment of technical corporate and commercial finance expertise.

Success Profiles  

Success Profiles will enable a fairer and more inclusive method of recruitment by enabling us to assess the range of experiences, abilities, strengths, behaviours, and technical/professional skills required for different roles. This flexible approach to recruitment focuses more on finding the right candidate for the specific role. To find out more about Success Profiles to support your application please click here for further guidance.

Civil Service Behaviours

The following G7 Civil Service Behaviours are essential to this post and will be assessed upon application:

• Communicating and Influencing
• Managing a Quality Service
• Working Together
• Seeing the Big Picture

Please refer to the Civil Service Behaviours Framework, which can be found here, to complete this application: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/717275/CS_Behaviours_2018.pdf

If we receive a large volume of applications, we reserve the right to conduct the sift based on one lead behaviour. The chosen lead behaviour for this campaign is Communicating and Influencing.

A Statement of Suitability is required consisting of a maximum of 500 words, as well as a CV.

Interpersonal Skills

• Highlight’s areas of potential conflict between stakeholders and manages them accordingly.
• A confident communicator, comfortable with challenging senior business leaders.
• Ability to influence at all levels of the business hierarchy, using logical persuasion and consensus building within groups.
• Able to remain focused on the overall business strategic vision during negotiation, knowing when to compromise and when to challenge for the benefit of the business.
• Highly visible across their area as the primary point of contact for financial advice - the 'face' of Government Finance.
• Understands the vision for the business and confidently leads others to realise the vision.
• Leadership, and the ability to motivate and develop a diverse finance team and promote excellence.
• Highly proficient in using and interpreting data and analytics to support analysis and decision making, identifying gaps in data and reporting, and working with Financial Systems colleagues to develop additional reporting as required.

Professional Skills The core skills following are mandatory, but you may add to them.

Key for Levels of Professional Skills

• A = Awareness
• W = Working
• P = Practitioner
• E = Expert

Core                                                   Level
Budgeting, forecasting, and costing        P
The Budgeting Framework                     P
Commercial acumen                             P
Investment appraisal and evaluation        P
Strategic analysis and insight                W
Oral and written presentation skills         W
Performance and risks                          W
Understanding the role of the NAO         W
Data and analytics interpretation            E

Useful                                                 Level
Taxation                                               A
Government financial reporting                A
Supporting the PAC agenda                   A
Risk management and fraud                  A
Interpretation of Accounts                     A

Specific Experience, Skills Required

• Part or Fully Qualified with CCAB, CIMAor equivalent. If part qualified, you must be working towards completing the qualification
• Financial experience over an extended period
• CV

Professional Competencies / Requirements

MoJ candidates who are on a specialist grade will be able to retain this on a lateral transfer.

To apply please complete the online application form. Applications will be sifted by a panel who will look at the Civil Service Behaviour framework and what is evidenced in your application. Should many applications be received, an initial sift may be conducted using the lead behaviour, Communicating and Influencing.

Candidates who pass the initial sift may be progressed to a full sift or progressed straight to interview. Applicants will be expected to demonstrate the essential role requirements within the application behaviour responses. 

Candidates who are successful following the sift process will be invited to interview, where the behavioural elements and strengths will be tested further alongside other elements of the post. Further details will be provided to shortlisted candidates in advance of the interviews.

Travel

The MoJ offers Hybrid Working arrangements where business need allows. This is an informal, non-contractual form of flexible working that blends working from your base location, different MoJ sites and / or from home (please be aware that this role can only be worked in the UK and not overseas). Some roles will not be suitable for Hybrid Working.  Similarly, Hybrid Working will not suit everyone’s circumstances. Arrangements will be discussed and agreed with the successful candidate(s) and subject to regular review.

You are advised to access the JCC/JSO office map, which is updated whenever a new JCC/JSO site opens,  to determine potential travelling times and distances to MoJ locations before applying for a job.

Training

The Ministry of Justice is committed to staff development and offers an extensive range of training and development opportunities.

Networks

The opportunity to join employee run networks that have been established to provide advice and support and to enable the views of employees from minority groups to be expressed direct to senior management. There are currently networks for employees of minority ethnic origin, employees with disabilities, employees with caring responsibilities, women employees, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender employees.

For further information please feel free to contact Fred Morton at fred.morton@justice.gov.uk

Person specification

Please refer to Job Description

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £54,358, Ministry of Justice contributes £15,165 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

Things you need to know

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours, Strengths, Experience and Technical skills.https://justicejobs.tal.net/vx/candidate/cms/About%20the%20MOJ

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check. People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window). The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.