Contract: 12 month initial contract (with the intention to become permanent as funding allows)

Hours: Full Time / Open to 4 days per week (0.8 FTE)

Location: London Hybrid / Remote. Office-based employees are expected to be in the office two days per week. Remote staff are required to travel to our London HQ at least once a month; if you are on a remote working contract, your travel to the London office for team days will be paid. This is a UK-based role; you must have the right to work in the UK to be considered.

Salary: £42,000 - £44,000 gross FTE per annum. Team members who come into the London office 2+ days per week are entitled to an additional office allowance of £2,000 FTE per annum.

Travel: There are no specific travel requirements for this role, though we do ask all team members, wherever possible, to be available to support two key youth events each year including overnight stays.

Benefits: 30 days annual leave, flexible working environment, enhanced sick pay, 5% employer / 3% employee pension contribution, bike to work scheme

Reporting to: Director of Finance and Operations

Please note: Owing to the nature of this role, any offer of employment with Bite Back will be subject to a satisfactory enhanced DBS check.

Do you want to work with a vibrant, dynamic and youth-driven organisation that is committed to creating healthy futures for British children by improving the food system?

Be part of the creative, agile and growing team behind Bite Back’s exceptional teenage activists. Join us as our Senior Finance Manager and contribute to our journey to help make the food system healthier and fairer.

At Bite Back we are committed to ensuring our staff is representative of the diverse world around us and therefore we encourage candidates with a range of lived and professional experiences to apply. We particularly welcome applications from people of colour, LGBTQ+ people and disabled people. We will use positive action under the Equality Act 2010 to appoint from these underrepresented groups if two candidates are equally qualified.

About Bite Back

We’re surrounded by junk food. From the moment we're born, every second of every day, children are being targeted. Giant companies manipulate them with colourful, cuddly, clever marketing, deceive them with packaging claims and pump products at them that are full of junk. It's become the cultural wallpaper. Now, it risks destroying the health of a generation.

Over a third of 10/11 year olds leave primary school with an increased risk of developing food-related conditions like type 2 diabetes and heart disease in their future.

The good news is, it's totally preventable. And we're biting back.

Bite Back is a youth activist movement challenging a food system that's been set up to fool us all.

We do this by:

1. Calling out the manipulation of the junk food giants.
2. Demanding higher standards from food marketing and from everyday food itself.
3. Mobilising and equipping young people in the fight for better food.

We do all this so we can bite back against a global epidemic of food-related ill health.

Role Description

The Senior Finance Manager is a new role at Bite Back and will lead our financial management, practices and policies. We are a relatively new non-profit, established in 2019, and have now grown to a staff team of nearly 30 people with a turnover of £2.3 million.

Bite Back was initially housed within the umbrella of our founder’s company, the Jamie Oliver Group, and in the past 18 months we have decoupled our finances and operations and become a fully independent non-profit. We have further work to do to strengthen our financial management as part of this independence and to support our growth. We are increasingly receiving restricted funds and contracts for service and expect this type of funding to grow this year.

It is an exciting time for a Senior Finance Manager to join the team and be involved in the strategic and operational development that we need to support Bite Back through its next phase of growth.

Responsibilities

The Senior Finance Manager is responsible for:

Statutory Reporting

• Work alongside the Finance and Administrative Executive to support the Director with financial reporting for the audit in line with SORP regulations.
• Coordinate with the Finance and Administrative Executive to prepare all schedules for the annual audit and support the relationship with the auditors. Coordinate all audit, accounting and taxation services.
• Carefully monitor VAT applicable earnings, and provide appropriate forecasts to ensure statutory VAT registration obligations are met.
• Completion and submission of Annual Returns for Charity Commission and Companies House.
• Lead with the pension providers to resolve issues, and ensure that all pension deductions are paid within the statutory period after deduction.
• Prepare and submit Gift Aid claims as required.

Financial Management

• Support the Director with the preparation of quarterly management accounts and associated narrative reports for the board of trustees, attending and minuting finance sub-committee meetings.
• Work closely with the Finance and Administrative Executive and the Director to ensure efficient financial management for Bite Back, making recommendations on systems, controls and processes to resolve challenges and ensure robust and accurate financial governance.
• Accountability for all month-end processes resulting in accurate monthly Management Accounts, restricted fund reports and updated cash flow. Support the extended leadership team to monitor budgets and financial performance. Investigate and explain variances of budgets to actuals.
• Work with the Director and the extended leadership team to forecast income and expenditure quarterly and annually.
• Ensure effective processes are in place for resource allocation, cost control and performance monitoring.
• Work with the Director to research, identify and implement tech-based solutions that strengthen controls and drive efficiencies across expenses management and invoicing approvals to deliver an improved financial service for our team and suppliers.
• Lead on the control of costs throughout the organisation and work closely with the Operations and Contracts Manager to ensure that all procurement offers best value.

Financial Policies and Controls

• Ensuring that there are financial policies and procedures in place that cover all areas of the team’s governance and compliance responsibilities.
• Manage the charity’s finances alongside the Finance and Administrative Executive and the Director to ensure good financial controls are in place and that sound and appropriate practices are maintained.
• Work closely with the People and HR Manager to support the relationship with the outsourced payroll provider, and ensure accurate and timely payment of staff. Complete monthly reconciliations and journals for payroll.
• Oversee the monthly credit card reconciliations for the team, following up with the Finance and Administrative Executive as needed for internal coding and sign-off as well as managing the credit card platform. Be the point of expertise on the credit card use policy, advising team members and monitoring compliance.

Revenue Generation and Monitoring

Work closely with the Grants and Fundraising Manager, Director and CEO to:

• Monitor all income and grant payments, keeping the relationship leads informed of any payment delays and liaise with them on queries.
• Provide close and compliant management of restricted revenue, ensuring appropriate cost allocations.
• Support the preparation of funding budgets and the production of financial grant reports, ensuring strategies are implemented that demonstrate value for money across Bite Back’s activities and services.
• Support relationships with funders and ensure grants are accounted for in terms with the grant agreement.
• Any other duties as reasonably required.

Skills / Experience

We recognise that the list below is broad and we realise that the “ideal candidate” doesn’t really exist. What we will be looking for as we evaluate applications is demonstrable experience in at least some of these, and evidence of capacity to build skills in other areas. Please don’t be put off applying for one of our jobs because you can’t demonstrate every skill. If you're passionate and excited about working for us, and possess the main skills and experience we are looking for, go ahead and apply. You could be just what we are looking for!

The ideal candidate would have the following experience and qualities:

• Relevant accounting qualification e.g. CIMA or equivalent with minimum 2/3 years post qualification experience.
• Strong understanding of accounting procedures legislation and an understanding of charity SORP.
• Comprehensive knowledge of Excel, Google sheets and familiarity with typical accounting packages such as Xero, Quickbooks or other similar.
• Demonstrated track record of financial management experiences including budgeting and financial reporting to a leadership team. Ability to analyse financial information and present this in a suitable format for the audience.
• Good understanding of the principles underpinning financial planning in non-profit environments and ways to demonstrate impact and value for money.
• Effective communication skills, including written, and the ability to convey complex financial information to a non-financial audience.
• A proven track record in charity management and a good understanding of the environment in which charities operate.
• Payroll, PAYE and pensions policies, processes and legislation.
• Good understanding of the principles underpinning financial planning and of demonstrating impact and value for money.

Approach to Work

You will be able to show the following qualities:

• Honesty and integrity.
• Ability to work under pressure and meet deadlines.
• Detail-oriented, good at problem-solving with the ability to robustly follow through on lines of enquiry.
• Self-motivated, solutions-focused and proactive.
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills as part of a highly nimble, collaborative team.
• Discretion and respect for confidentiality.
• A sense of humour — we believe work should be fun and that we all perform at our very best when we enjoy what we do.
• Creativity — you will come at issues from new and unusual angles and be prepared to work hard on finding fresh and surprising angles.
• A commitment to Bite Back’s values: Fresh, Resilient, Respectful, Energetic, Real.

How to Apply

Please apply with a CV and covering statement (maximum two sides of A4) explaining why you are a good candidate for this position.

The covering statement is your opportunity to tell us why you’re a good fit for this role. We know it’s a big job so we don’t expect you to have everything we are asking for on day one and we are committed to providing support and training. Do look at each point under Skills and Experience and Approach to Work to give clear, specific examples of how you meet them through your personal or professional experience (volunteering counts too!).

Don’t forget to tell us why you want the job!

If you have any questions about the role or the application process, do contact us at recruitment@biteback2030.com and we’ll be happy to help. We will only accept applications submitted via the CharityJob website. This is because CharityJob automatically anonymises all applications to reduce bias in the selection process.

Applications will be handled in line with our Recruitment Privacy Policy.

Timeline

• Applications close at 09:00 on Monday 24 February 2025.
• Initial interviews are expected to take place on Thursday 27 February 2025.
• Second interviews will happen at Fivefields, 8-10 Grosvenor Gardens, Victoria, London, SW1W 0DH on Wednesday 5th March 2025.

If you are in receipt of means-tested benefits and cost is a barrier to attending a London-based interview, please let us know and we can help with booking your travel.

We are testing an approach of sharing one interview question in advance as part of our commitment to being more inclusive. Please let us know if you require any additional support or reasonable adjustments for the application or interview. We really want our process to feel accessible.