Deputy Director of Finance

LEWISHAM AND GREENWICH NHS TRUST; London; On-site; GBP 85,000 - 110,000; Full time

Job summary

Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust is seeking an experienced interim Deputy Director of Finance to lead an award-winning finance team. The successful candidate will manage financial strategy, operational finance, and governance, ensuring the balance between financial efficiency and clinical excellence. You will influence decisions using data, and support the achievement of exceptional patient care.

Qualifications

• Substantial experience at a senior level in managing corporate services within Acute Healthcare.
• Experience of negotiating on behalf of a Trust.
• Solid experience of managing major organizational change.

Responsibilities

• Responsible for day to day running of Directorate across its responsibilities.
• Deputise for the Director of Finance in their absence.
• Ensure Trust's financial position is reported accurately internally and externally.

Skills

Leadership

Analytical skills

Communication

Education

MBA or masters level degree

CCAB/ CIMA Qualified

Job description

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Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust, (LGT), is a community-focused provider of local and acute care, delivering high-quality services to over one million people living across the London boroughs of Lewisham, Greenwich, and Bexley. We provide whole-life care and are here to support our communities to live healthier lives as well as taking care of them when they need us the most.

Employing almost 7,500 colleagues, affectionately known as Team LGT, we provide services at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich, University Hospital Lewisham, and at over a dozen community settings in Lewisham. We also provide some services at Queen Mary's Hospital in Sidcup.

We have recently launched our new vision and values to mark the LGT10 - the tenth anniversary of our Trust forming in 2013. Our trust vision is to be exceptional. In the quality of our patient care; our support for colleagues; and in the difference we make through our partnerships and in our communities.

To achieve this we value Respect, Compassion, and Inclusion; Being accountable over staying comfortable; Listening over always knowing best; and Succeeding together over achieving alone. You can read more about our visions and values here

Our hospitals and community sites provide a wide range of inpatient and outpatient services, as well as emergency and planned care. The Trust is rated as "good" or "outstanding" in over three-quarters of the services inspected by the Care Quality Commission.

Every year our work includes performing 10,000 procedures in our theatres; bringing seven and a half thousand new lives into the world; carrying out 570,000 visits to patients in their homes or communities and providing emergency care for more than 300,000 patients arriving in our busy Urgent and Emergency Departments.

LGT is a centre for the education and training of medical students enrolled with King's College London's GKT School of Medical Education. We are a training centre for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals. We are pioneering new roles that will support the changing needs of our patients and are one of the largest employers of physician associates in the country.

We are committed to working with our partners to deliver the best outcomes for our local communities. This means playing an active role in the South East London Integrated Care System (ICS), and in formal partnerships including the South East London Acute Provider Collaborative, provider partnerships with our local mental health trusts and borough-based boards of the ICS in Bexley, Greenwich and Lewisham.

Job overview

Lewisham and Greenwich NHST Trusts (LGT) vision is to be exceptional and we are seeking an outstanding interim Deputy Director of Finance (DDoF) to join our award winning Finance Team to help us realise this. Experienced in financial strategy, operational finance, governance and performance, you will play an essential role in the senior finance team at LGT in the coming months as we meet the financial and operational challenges and opportunities and also support Team LGT to deliver exceptional patient care. You will understand the delicate balance between financial efficiency and clinical excellence and know how to shape conversations that drive both. You will be influential and a great communicator and play a pivotal role over the coming months to ensure LGT is successful in delivering it's financial performance.

An experienced and confident leader, you will be motivated by using data as a basis for decision making, no matter how challenging, and have a passion for developing and leading a high performing and strategic team aligned with our vision and values.

Must be available to start July 2025

Interviews will be held on the 2nd July 2025

Main duties of the job

Be responsible for day to day running of competent and busy Directorate across the entirety of its responsibilities.

Deputise for the Director of Finance or Chief Financial Officer in their absence as necessary within the Trust, including Board and Committee level, within the area or nationally.

Recruit, manage and develop a team of staff who will provide a professional service to the Trust. This will involve managing professional and personal development needs.

Provision of 'expert' financial leadership, guidance quality assurance and project management in support of the Trust wide planning and strategy.

Ensure that appropriate financial advice and support is provided to budget holders across the Trust - encompassing the design and delivery of training, the production of guidance materials and the degree and level of support provided by finance staff.

Champion the delivery of Cost Improvement Programme savings across the Trust, including ensuring robust reporting processes and mechanisms are in place.

Represents the trust in sensitive and political situations, delivering difficult messages where required to high level audiences.

Ensuring that the Trust's financial position is reported accurately internally and externally.

Working for our organisation

Our people are our greatest asset. When we feel supported and happy at work, this positivity reaches those very people we are here for, the patients. Engaged employees perform at their best and our Equality, Diversity & Inclusion (EDI) initiatives contribute to cultivate a culture of engagement. We have four staff networks, a corporate EDI Team and a suite of programmes and events which aim to insert the 5 aspirations:

1. Improving representation at senior levels of staff with disabilities, from black, Asian, and ethnic minorities background, identify as LGBTQ+ and women, through improved recruitment and leadership development
2. Widening access (anchor institution) and employability
3. Improving the experience of staff with disability
4. Improving the EDI literacy and confidence of trust staff through training and development
5. Making equalities mainstream

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Key Working Relationships

• Executive Directors
• Non-Executive Directors
• Site Triumvirates
• Clinical & Divisional Directors
• Consultant Medical Staff
• Senior Finance Team
• ICB Leads
• General Managers
• Matrons
• Heads of Service
• Corporate leads
• Internal & External auditors
• Local NHS organisations
• NHSE

KEY RESULT AREAS

Strategic Responsibilities
• Assess and implement the impact on NHS policy changes on the delivery of the strategic financial and contracting plans.
• Develop financial plans from complex data that will not be complete and require interpretation and high level of analytical skills to translate into meaningful information.
• Oversee the development of business cases from conception to authorisation and implementation for strategic projects and new business opportunities which would be of clinical and/or financial benefit to the Trust, and provide expert knowledge, challenge and rigour where appropriate.
• Forge positive internal and external working relationships, in order to support effective management approaches to achieve trust objectives.
• Provide financial leadership to the implementation of major change and transformation programmes to achieve desired benefits. The strategic financial implications of service transfers or redesigns and to manage the process of any funding transfers. This will involve the development of complex financial models to facilitate the manipulation of timely financial information to assist in the planning of service developments.
• Lead negotiations with external bodies, both NHS and non NHS, the strategic financial implications of service transfers or redesigns and to manage the process of funding transfers.
• Lead specific long term plans and projects to improve the quality and efficiency of services in line with Commissioners' strategic intentions and Trust requirements.
• Ensure internal and external financial reporting is of a high standard with accurate and timely reporting of financial results.

Operational Responsibilities
• Jointly lead a team of approximately 80 wte. The DDoF will provide strong leadership and maintain high levels of motivation and engagement.
• Lead on the production of timely financial information that meets the needs of the Trust Management Executive, Finance and Investment Committee and Trust Board. Ensure that reporting is incisive and identifies drivers and trends, plus remedial actions to respond to adverse trends. The use of a variety of presentational methods is expected and reporting information processes and outputs will be expected to be continuously improved.
• Lead on the process of providing commentaries to financial plans and regular monitoring reports to Trust Management Executive, Finance and Performance Committee, Trust Board and Regulators.
• Ensure that appropriate financial advice and challenge is available to Divisional and Directorate leadership teams, and that high levels of internal customer satisfaction are maintained.
• Be a visible champion of cost improvement programmes throughout the organisation, helping and enabling Directorates to produce and deliver local savings whiles contributing to shape Trust wide savings initiatives.
• Work closely to support the PMO in producing clear and accurate reporting of budgeted, actual and forecast CIPs.
• Take overall responsibility for the Trust's Reference Cost submission. Investigate differences between the Trust's costs and those of peers and the national average. Provide accurate information to the Clinical Directorates where costs exceed or are inferior to income. To ensure year on year improvement in the accuracy of the Trust's costing information.
• Lead on the development and roll out of Service Line Management to enable improvements in financial management and service delivery. To develop the information systems with a view delivering patient level costing information to provide the detail underpinning service line reporting. Lead on the design of SLR information within the Trust and the analysis and presentation of the information and trends to the Trust Management Executive, Finance and Investment Committee and Trust Board.
• Ensure the Trust's approach to costing is in line with best practice.
• Lead the production of the Trust's financial performance reports including supporting the completion of all internal and external financial returns.
• Monitor and assist in the development of Trust Recovery Plans by assessing and validating the financial implications of any service redesign proposals.
• Key link between the income, contracting and costing functions and clinical directorates and ensure they are kept informed of commissioner requirements throughout the contract negotiations. Facilitate directorate involvement in the contracts process to ensure clinical ownership of contract standards and targets. Ensure in particular that they have a sound knowledge of the structure of PbR and the relevance to their business proposals.
• Ensure that contract values are recorded and invoiced monthly, and that performance adjustments are reported on a regular basis. Responsible for ensuring that Commissioners fund activity overperformance. Assess action required for late and non payment, and respond to Commissioners on these issues. Initiate action at an appropriate level.
• Manage the financial evaluation of tenders for contracted out services by undertaking comprehensive financial analysis of the contractual documentation and make appropriate recommendations.
• Responsible for the comprehensive briefing of the Director of Finance, other members of the Board, Senior Management and commissioning leads as necessary on the financial and contractual status of the Trust in relation to commissioning agreements.

Person specification

Qualifications

Essential criteria

• MBA or masters level degree or equivalent based on several years senior management experience in a healthcare commissioning environment
• CCAB/ CIMA Qualified
• Evidence of continued professional development with a particular emphasis on healthcare commissioning or performance management

Experience

Essential criteria

• Substantial experience at a senior level in managing a range of corporate services or disciplines within Acute Healthcare
• Significant staff and budgetary management
• Experience of representing and negotiating on behalf of a Trust
• Extensive experience of collecting complex data from a number of sources, forming opinions, identifying options, making recommendations and presenting to diverse audiences
• Solid experience of managing a programme of project work, including major organisational and/or service change

Knowledge

Essential criteria

• In depth knowledge of the NHS Commissioning regime, including PbR
• Knowledge of clinical data systems
• Sufficient knowledge of medical procedures as to be credible when dealing with clinicians
• Able to analyse highly complex issues involving material drawn from various sources, sometimes conflicting
• Outstanding communication skills - verbal, written and via the use of high level presentation tools
• Adept at handling politically sensitive situations
• Able to translate departmental objectives into coherent work plans and objectives for self and staff
• Ability and knowledge to specify, at a high level, process improvements for further development by others
• Ability to manage own workload and make informed decisions and judgements on the basis of experience and such facts as are available, working tight and often changing deadlines
• Time management skills

Personal Qualites

Essential criteria

• Open and participative leadership style
• Focused
• No problem with working under a lot of pressure
• Clear decision maker based on good consultation
• Highly organised
• Excellent planner
• Inspires staff though clarity of objectives, hard work and interest in their careers and personal development
• Relationship builder
• Able to manage conflict in an open manner
• Sociable and outgoing

We reserve the right to close the post before the stated closing date, please apply early. We do not contact applicants with the outcome of the shortlisting. If you have been shortlisted, you will receive an invite to an assessment day or interview.

As a local employer and anchor institution we work closely with our community to recruit locally and we welcome applications from the widest variety of people to ensure our workforce are reflective of the local communities which we serve. We encourage all suitable candidates to apply including if you are Black, Asian or other ethnic minorities, live with a disability (visible or not) or are LGBT+. We have a number of active staff networks including Disability, LGBT+, Multicultural Inclusion and Women's staff networks to bring staff together and celebrate diversity across our whole workforce.

Please note, not all roles will meet the criteria for a skilled worker visa.

Employer certification / accreditation badges

Applicant requirements

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

The postholder will have access to vulnerable people in the course of their normal duties and as such this post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Documents to download

• JD (PDF, 347.4KB)
• Working at LGT (PDF, 4.2MB)
• Visa and Certificate of Sponsorship Information for Applicants (PDF, 3.8MB)