NHS Scotland
Senior Head of Finance (LW)
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We have an exciting opportunity for an experienced and highly motivated finance leader to join NHS Fife as Senior Head of Finance. This is a key senior role within the Finance Directorate, providing strategic leadership across financial planning, management accounting, corporate reporting, and the continuous improvement of financial management services.
NHS Fife is responsible for the health of a population of around 367,000 people across Fife, delivering services through the Health and Social Care Partnership and Acute Services. With a revenue budget of approximately £1.1 billion and a capital budget of approximately £30 million, this role offers the opportunity to make a significant contribution to financial sustainability, transformation, and the delivery of high-quality patient care.
The Role
As Senior Head of Finance, you will lead the management accounting service for NHS Fife, ensuring robust financial governance, effective stewardship of resources, and high-quality financial advice to support decision-making across the organisation.
You will work closely with senior leaders, clinical and non-clinical managers, finance colleagues, and external partners to support the achievement of NHS Fife’s financial targets and strategic objectives. You will also deputise for the Assistant Director of Finance as required and represent NHS Fife in relevant local, regional, and national forums.
Key Responsibilities
- Provide strategic leadership for NHS Fife’s management accounting and corporate reporting services.
- Lead the production of timely, accurate, and insightful monthly and year-end financial reports and returns.
- Support the development of financial planning, medium-term financial plans, annual budgets, and transformation plans.
- Provide expert financial advice, analysis, and challenge to senior leaders, budget holders, and key stakeholders.
- Lead and develop high-quality costing arrangements, including the NHS Cost Book and Patient Level Information and Costing Systems.
- Contribute to the financial oversight of the savings programme and support the delivery of year-on-year financial balance.
- Strengthen financial governance, ensuring compliance with statutory requirements, professional standards, Standing Financial Instructions, and relevant policies.
- Lead, manage, and develop the Management Accounting Team, supporting a culture of continuous improvement, collaboration, and professional development.
- Support preparedness for the implementation of the new financial ledger system.
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About You
We are looking for a qualified and credible senior finance professional with substantial experience in financial management within a large, complex organisation. You will bring strong technical expertise, excellent leadership skills, and the ability to influence, advise, and challenge constructively at senior levels.
You will be a qualified accountant with membership of a CCAB body or CIMA, or have demonstrable equivalent experience within a public sector organisation. You should also be educated to degree level, with evidence of continued professional development.
The successful candidate will have experience of budgeting, budgetary control, financial reporting, performance management, project management, implementation of new systems, and staff management. You will be confident in presenting complex financial information clearly to finance and non-finance audiences and skilled in building trusted relationships across organisational and professional boundaries.
Why Join NHS Fife?
This is an excellent opportunity to take on a senior leadership role at the heart of financial decision-making in NHS Fife. You will help shape financial strategy, support service transformation, and contribute directly to the effective use of resources for the benefit of patients, communities, and staff across Fife.
We are a forward-thinking NHS organisation and are keen to further strengthen our dynamic finance function, which is underpinned by strong management accounting resources coupled with finance business partnering principles. You will join a committed Finance Directorate that plays a critical role in supporting sustainable, high-quality health and care services. The role offers significant scope to influence, innovate, and lead improvements in financial management across a complex and evolving environment.
If you are an experienced finance leader with the skills, judgement, and ambition to help shape the future of financial management in NHS Fife, we would welcome your application.
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Please direct any informal queries to Rose Robertson, Assistant Director of Finance on rose.robertson1@nhs.scot
A requirement of this post is to become a member of the Protection of Vulnerable Groups (PVG) Scheme prior to appointment.
To work in the United Kingdom, there is a legal requirement for an individual to demonstrate that they have the relevant permission to work in the country. This permission is, without exception, granted by the UK Visa and Immigration Service.
As part of the pre-employment checks for a preferred candidate, NHS Scotland Boards will check your entitlement to work in the UK. It can be evidenced through a number of routes, including specific types of visa as well as EU settled and pre-settled status. To find out more about these routes of permission, please refer to the GOV.UK website.
It is ESSENTIAL that you have checked that you either already have an appropriate right to work in the UK or that the post would be eligible to be sponsored BEFORE submitting your application form.
We offer flexible working and family-friendly policies and fully support disabled candidates and candidates with long-term conditions or who are neurodivergent by making reasonable adjustments to our recruitment policy and practices.
Please note the salary is pro rata for part-time hours.
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NHS Scotland is committed to encouraging equality and diversity among our workforce and eliminating unlawful discrimination. The aim is for our workforce to be truly representative and for each employee to feel respected and able to give their best. To this end, NHS Scotland welcomes applications from all sections of society.
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