Assignments

This established, high-end fashion retailer requires a forward thinking highly commercial Chief Financial Officer with an evidenced track record, to join an established team focused on growing the business not only in terms of sales and profits, but talent, products, revenue, channels, and competitive strengths.

The ideal CFO candidate will constructively challenge the CEO and management team and be capable of contributing to the growth and strategic development of the business in areas outside of the remit of the finance function.

• Lead the Finance and IT function so as to ensure proper and proactive management of the group’s finances and systems;
• Support the Chief Executive with the development and execution of the four-year strategic plan;
• Proactively drive business performance whilst ensuring accurate forecasting means controlled growth is achieved, with no surprises;
• Deliver effective multi-currency cash management, including execution of an international trade and treasury strategy;
• Lead global ERP system replacement through CIO; resulting in new, scalable ERP system (Microsoft Dynamics AX) in order to deliver a solid foundation for future growth.
• Oversee seasonal stock sales and margin plans in order to ensure appropriate stock levels are balanced with impacts on cash;
• Evaluate investment proposals and ensure robust approval and review procedures are adopted in respect of all capital investments;
• Manage the preparation and review of statutory accounts including oversight of consolidation of Group accounts upwards ensuring compliance with relevant tax/accounting standards across four legal entities and three territories;
• Manage corporate cash flow across five key currencies to meet working capital requirements. Ensure adequate financial resources to fund the Group’s investment proposals and ensure appropriate hedging is in place to minimise fx risk;
• Oversee management of IT infrastructure including networks, desktop equipment and support, connectivity, security, phone systems, email, and disaster recovery;

• Degree educated from a top/recognised institution with a professional accountancy qualification (ACA or similar) and a proven track record in previous CFO/FD roles;
• Gravitas, credibility, independence, strength of character and be highly commercial. Comfortable representing the business to customers as a non-salesman advocate and influencer as well as challenging the business itself on commercial matters such as pricing and margin;
• Strategic ability with strong execution skills and the ability to see broad issues affecting the future of the company, and recommend programmed actions accordingly;
• Experience of treasury and foreign exchange risk management;
• Experience of IT and systems and the ability to scope and manage an IT implementation project.