Commercial Finance Manager

Booker; Little Irchester; On-site; GBP 50,000 - 70,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading UK wholesaler is seeking a Commercial Finance Manager responsible for financial reporting and analysis to support decision-making. The role involves leading a team of analysts and collaborating closely with senior management. Ideal candidates will have strong commercial acumen and experience in budgeting and forecasting, along with excellent communication skills.

Qualifications

• Proven track record of building positive cross-functional relationships.
• Strong experience in providing outstanding insight and analysis.
• Ability to engage and influence senior partners effectively.

Responsibilities

• Ensure business understands and delivers against expectations.
• Identify and highlight risks, mitigate potential issues.
• Build financial models to understand P&L impacts.

Skills

Commercial awareness

Communication skills

Cross-functional collaboration

Financial analysis

Microsoft Office proficiency

Education

Qualified accountant (CIMA) or equivalent experience

Job description

As a Commercial Finance Manager within the Product division at Booker, you will play a critical role in shaping the financial direction of our growing wholesale business. You will be responsible for delivering accurate financial reporting and providing insightful analysis to support strategic, data-driven decision-making.

This is a high-impact, business-partnering role that offers the opportunity to work closely with senior business leaders and cross-functional teams. Acting as a trusted advisor, you will use your strong commercial acumen to provide expert financial guidance, challenge assumptions, and influence key strategic decisions that drive business performance and growth.

You will also lead and develop a team of three analysts, ensuring they deliver high-quality insights and value to key stakeholders across the organisation. Collaboration will be central to your success, as you build strong relationships across Product, Commercial, and Operations teams to deliver results and create meaningful business impact.

Key Responsibilities:

• Ensuring the business understands and delivers against expectations by collaborating effectively with the business leadership team.
• Supporting a Pro area within the Product function understanding year-on-year movements alongside budgeting and forecasting responsibilities.
• End to end management of Supplier Terms Agreements within your key pro area.
• Identifying and proactively highlighting risks, working diligently to mitigate potential issues.
• Providing decision support to close performance gaps by crafting informed choices.
• Applying competence to analyse data and support decision-making within FP&A teams.
• Reviewing and critiquing key business plans to ensure financial rigor in investment decisions.
• Leading business plan reviews for your Pro area, ensuring plans reflect current business realities and appraise performance accurately.
• Building financial models and arguments to help the business understand P&L impacts of promotions and investment decisions.
• Ensuring full governance is in place around the period close process to provide transparency and understanding around accruals and provisions.
• Adhering to all Booker policies, following our Business Code of Conduct, always acting with integrity and due diligence.

Requirements:

• Proven track record of building positive cross-functional relationships.
• Strong experience in providing outstanding insight and analysis, along with a robust background in business planning and forecasting processes.
• Ability to engage, influence, and work with senior partners effectively.
• Excellent communication skills and commercial awareness.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office suite, including Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint.
• Collaborate with all teams to deliver growth initiatives across the group.
• Partner with the Director of Trade, holding them accountable for their financial performance and working alongside the Pro plans to deliver results.
• Take ownership of the budget and forecast for savings/growth initiatives.
• Enhance existing processes across workstreams to increase clarity and drive significant improvements in business performance.
• Work closely with the FP&A team to build a clear and consistent view of current performance, outlook, and risks & opportunities.
• Qualified accountant (CIMA) a preference but not essential. Qualified by experience is also considered, candidates would need to demonstrate a strong commercial acumen within a finance environment.

Booker is the UK's leading food & drink wholesaler. We are privileged to serve independent retailers, caterers and small businesses, from locations across the country.

We are committed to diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) and welcome conversations about flexible working.

We are a Disability Confident Committed employer and we’re committed to providing a fully inclusive and accessible recruitment process.