Associate Director, Financial Partnering, Planning & Analysis

Disclosure & Barring Service

Hybrid

Expires: Expiring in less than 4 weeks

Flexible

£74,061 - £79,037 per year

Job summary

About the Department:

DBS was established under the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 on 1 December 2012, working from two sites, which are Liverpool and Darlington. We operate on behalf of government delivering Disclosure functions in England, Wales, Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man, and Barring functions for England, Wales, and Northern Ireland. We function within a framework of legal and regulatory requirements and that includes work with a range of external organisations including other government departments, regulators, and trade bodies.

We provide a service that enables organisations in the public, private and voluntary sectors to make better informed, safer recruitment and other decisions. We do this by providing information to enable them to determine whether individuals are unsuitable or unable to undertake certain work, particularly with occupations involving regular contact with vulnerable groups, including children.

Our Strategy:

Our current Strategy sets out our purpose, vision, and the impacts we want to achieve. Our strategy was co-created with our staff and has been supported by insight from our various partners, and throughout, you will find our ambitions to be achieved. Everything that we do within DBS, from developing our strategic intent, to the day-to-day operational delivery of our services, is underpinned by constant considerations of safeguarding, quality, sustainability, value for money, and diversity and inclusion. Our strategic objectives aim to enhance our effectiveness, influence, and customer satisfaction while fostering a supportive environment for everyone.

Equality, Diversion, and Inclusion at DBS

DBS is committed to fostering an environment that values individual differences and ensures fair treatment to unlock the full potential of staff and better support customers. Equality, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) are core to driving organisational success and we have developed specific equality objectives for DBS.

Every decision and activity will be considered through an EDI lens, aiming to build an inclusive culture, improve policies and practices, gain external assurances, and become a leading voice of good practice in EDI.

Read More:

For further information, please see below for a collection of DBS strategies and business plans:

DBS strategies - GOV.UK

DBS business plans - GOV.UK

Job description

The post of Associate Director, Financial Partnering, Planning and Analysis is primarily responsible for leading the FPP&A team, encompassing finance business partnering, management accounting, financial planning and strategy, efficiency, and financial transformation. As a key member of the Finance leadership team, you will work collaboratively with colleagues to ensure customer/stakeholder needs are met, along with public accountability expectations, legislation and professional standards.

As the DBS is a member of the Home Oﬃce family, you will work closely with other members of the Home Office Finance community. Building relationships with people in Home Oﬃce will be key to ensuring DBS and Home Oﬃce expectations, systems and processes are aligned.

You will play a key role in the implementation and embedding of the revised Finance structure, designed to enable the continued development of the function to become a true partner to the organisation, influencing and supporting strategic decision making, with the capacity and capability to support the delivery of their strategy.

Corporate Duties:

FPP&A

Lead and integrate FPP&A and Management Accounting functions, establishing a single, robust framework for budgeting, forecasting and in-year performance management, ensuring senior leaders have a clear view of financial position, risks and opportunities.
Provide authoritative financial insight and challenge at senior levels, owning the quality of management information and analysis, and ensuring it drives strategic decision-making, prioritisation and effective use of public resources.
Drive strategic business partnering and financial performance, leading engagement with Directors and budget holders to strengthen financial control, improve forecasting accuracy, and align resource allocation to organisational priorities and outcomes
Responsible for reporting the financial position to provide insight and analysis of the key issues and risks and opportunities to senior management, providing the full picture.
Lead the development of the DBS Financial Strategy, including a mid-term financial plan which supports the organisation overarching strategy and captures impacts and benefits of investment proposals.
Review fee levels, ensuring the development and adoption of an appropriate product costing methodology, and lead the process to propose and secure approval for changes as required (based on projections of demand and costs), including working with Home Office and HM Treasury to secure the legislative changes.
Develop the FPP&A function to support and challenge budget holders and managers to ensure they effectively use resources to meet demand, performance targets and business plan priorities.
Build capability in financial modelling, to enable the team to support the commercial team in building, analysing and validating commercial financial models.
Provide commercial financial advice to support DBS and its Commercial function in managing commercial relationships and maximising value for money.
Ensure credible budgets and forecasts are developed that withstand scrutiny by Executive Team, the Board and its committees, Directorate Management teams, and other governance forums as appropriate.

Continuous Improvement / Efficiency / Transformation

Co-lead the development and delivery of a Finance Transformation roadmap that positions Finance as a strategic business partner, driving value creation across the organisation.
Champion continuous improvement by identifying and implementing process efficiencies, new technologies and digital solutions that simplify operations, enhance self-service capabilities and improve customer outcomes.
Work collaboratively across functions to optimise end-to-end business processes, support transformation initiatives and build robust business cases for change, ensuring benefits are realised and measured.
Foster a culture of efficiency and operational excellence through effective performance measurement, strong financial controls and the ongoing monitoring of organisational and financial performance.

Other Responsibilities

Lead, manage and develop the FPP&A teams, providing direction and influence that ensures the teams have the required capacity, capability, resilience, processes and systems to deliver their objectives.
Interacting with senior leadership team members and senior members of staff from across the organisation, as well as partners such as the Home Office.
Undertake corporate duties including deputising for the Executive Director for Finance and Commercial and/or representing the function, including at Executive Team, its committees, and in meetings with external stakeholders.
Provide expert financial advice at a strategic level, including on complex financial matters
Providing robust financial advice, support and analysis to support strategic decision-making. Influencing the development of strategies and adding value by ensuring that financial advice is integrated into their decision making.
Constructively challenging the use of resources in meeting demand, performance measures and business plan priorities. Proactively supporting budget managers and holders to find solutions, ensuring maximum benefit is achieved and the right balance between economy, efficiency and effectiveness.
Providing financial advice and modelling to support the annual pay review process.

Person specification

The successful applicant will need to be able to demonstrate the below ability and experience:

Essential Criteria:

Ability

Strategic thinking, planning and analysis skills, with the ability to develop creative solutions to support the management of change and mitigate associated risks.
Excellent relationship management, influencing, facilitation and presentation skills.
An expert people manager with the ability to build, lead, coach and retain a cohesive and high performing team.
Presence and credibility to work with the Executive Team and senior colleagues across the organisation.
Highly organised and able to plan and manage a broad portfolio of activities.
Resilience in challenging circumstances: ability to work under pressure, remaining calm but decisive.
Highly effective communicator in person, in writing and in electronic media.

Experience

Strong stakeholder management.
Ability to resolve problems and present appropriate business solutions and recommendations.
Leading and developing a finance team with broad responsibilities in a changing environment of comparable scale or complexity.
Expert finance business partnering skills.
Financial planning and modelling skills, with experience developing/analysing commercial models and providing commercial finance advice.
Development and maintenance of financial strategy and a mid-term financial plan.
Developing financial frameworks and procedures.
Proven relevant experience of working within a change/transformation role

Professional Qualification/Membership

A fully qualified member of a CCAB accounting body or CIMA

Desirable Criteria:

Experience of operating in a regulatory agency or non-departmental public body (NDPB)

Further Information:

To view the DBS Recruitment and On-boarding Privacy Notice, please click the link below:

DBS Recruitment and On-boarding Privacy Notice - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

This privacy notice covers personal data collected during the recruitment, security clearance and on-boarding process.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £74,061, Disclosure & Barring Service contributes £21,455 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).

The DBS offers a number of excellent benefits for its employees. These can include:

Generous annual leave entitlement
Excellent maternity, paternity and adoption schemes (after a qualifying period)
Commitment to the health and wellbeing of our employees
Employee Assistance Programme
Flexible working opportunities
Eyecare voucher scheme
Occupational Health Service including referrals for counselling and physiotherapy
24/7 Counselling and Wellbeing Service
A Civil Service Pension with an employer contribution of 28.97%

The DBS vision and purpose is to make people safer by being a visible, trusted and influential organisation, providing an outstanding quality of service to all our customers and partners, where our people understand the important safeguarding contributions they make and feel proud to work here. To do this, the DBS is committed to being an employer that is able to attract, develop, retain and engage diverse talent that is representative of the communities we serve, and to be an organisation providing outstanding service to all our existing and new customers, who are diverse and have a range of different needs. We want all our staff to be able to bring their ‘whole self’ to work.

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

To apply please submit your CV via our recruitment partners site at:

Associate Director, Financial Partnering, Planning & Analysis - JN-092026-7114840 , Page Executive

Recruitment Timeline

The following timetable outlines indicative dates.

Please note, these dates may be subject to change without prior notice:

Closing date: 08/11/2026 at 23:59

The initial candidate sift is due to take place week commencing 09/11/2026

First interviews will take place on the 18th and 20th of November

Second interviews will take place on the 23rd November

Interviews will be held virtually via MS Teams

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

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a basic (or equivalent) 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.

Diversity and Inclusion

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see theCivil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window).

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Contact point for applicants

Salary range

£74,061 - £79,037 per year