Lead Finance Business Partner

Babcock International; Devon and Torbay; Hybrid; GBP 57,000 - 72,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Holiday allowance

Pension with life assurance

Digital GP & health check

Employee share scheme

Shopping portal

Professional Fees

Reservists paid leave

Holiday Trading

Be Kind Day

Wellbeing programme

Job summary

Babcock is recruiting a Lead Finance Business Partner to join our Transformation team at Plymouth, Devonport Royal Dockyard or Bristol with hybrid working. You will influence decision-making, develop robust business cases and provide financial leadership across major programmes in a defence engineering environment.

You will partner with senior leaders to drive value through investment appraisal, budgeting, forecasting and cost control, while identifying risks and implementing mitigations.

Qualifications

• Experience working in a senior finance leadership or business partnering role.
• Experience maximising financial performance and supporting business growth.
• Strong investment appraisal and business case development experience.
• Demonstrable experience supporting or leading business transformation, finance transformation or large-scale change programmes.
• Experience developing transformation business cases

Responsibilities

• Driving transformation and business improvement initiatives across the organisation.
• Developing business cases, financial appraisals and investment evaluations to support strategic decision-making.
• Partnering with finance and operational teams to deliver accurate budgeting, forecasting, reporting and cost control.
• Identifying financial risks and implementing effective mitigation strategies.
• Supporting the delivery of finance transformation plans and ensuring benefits are realised.

Skills

Senior finance leadership

Investment appraisal

Business partnering

Business transformation

Transformation business cases

Education

CIMA or ACCA

Job description

Job Title: Lead Finance Business Partner

Location: Plymouth, Devon or Stoke Gifford, Bristol + Hybrid Working Arrangements

Compensation: £57,300 - £71,600 + Benefits

Role Type: Full time / Permanent

Role ID: SF75283

At Babcock we're working to create a safe and secure world, together, and if you join us, you can play your part as a Lead Finance Business Partner at our Babcock Technology Centre or Devonport Royal Dockyard site.

The role

As a Lead Finance Business Partner within our Transformation team, you'll play a pivotal role in evaluating investments, building robust business cases and ensuring major programmes deliver sustainable value. Working closely with senior leaders and stakeholders, you'll influence decision-making, support business improvement initiatives and help drive operational excellence across a complex engineering and defence environment.

Day-to-day, you'll provide financial leadership and strategic insight to support business transformation and performance improvement. You'll help shape investment decisions, evaluate financial opportunities and risks, and ensure financial plans align with business objectives. This is an exciting opportunity to develop your leadership profile while contributing to projects and programmes that support national security and critical infrastructure.

• Driving transformation and business improvement initiatives across the organisation.
• Developing business cases, financial appraisals and investment evaluations to support strategic decision-making.
• Partnering with finance and operational teams to deliver accurate budgeting, forecasting, reporting and cost control.
• Identifying financial risks and implementing effective mitigation strategies.
• Supporting the delivery of finance transformation plans and ensuring benefits are realised.

This role is full time, 35 hours per week and provides hybrid working arrangements.

Essential experience of the Lead Finance Business Partner

• Experience working in a senior finance leadership or business partnering role.
• Experience maximising financial performance and supporting business growth.
• Strong investment appraisal and business case development experience.
• Demonstrable experience supporting or leading business transformation, finance transformation or large-scale change programmes.
• Experience developing transformation business cases

Qualifications for the Lead Finance Business Partner

Essential:

• Relevant professional accounting qualification such as CIMA or ACCA.

Desirable:

• Additional finance, commercial or business transformation qualifications.
• Professional memberships relevant to finance leadership and business partnering.

Security Clearance

The successful candidate must be a sole UK National who is able to achieve and maintain Security Check (SC)) security clearance for this role.

Many of the positions within our company are subject to national security clearance and Trade Control restrictions. This means that your eligibility for certain roles may be affected by your place of birth, nationality, current or former citizenship, and any residency you hold or have held. Further details are available at United Kingdom Security Vetting: clearance levels - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).

What we offer

• Generous holiday allowance
• Matched contribution pension scheme, with life assurance
• Access to a Digital GP, annual health check, and nutritional consultations through Aviva DigiCare+
• Employee share scheme
• Employee shopping savings portal
• Payment of Professional Fees
• Reservists in the armed forces receive 10-days special paid leave
• Holiday Trading is a benefit that allows UK Babcock employees to buy additional leave or to sell up to one working week of annual leave from their annual entitlement. There is an annual Window to request this benefit. 'Be Kind Day' enables employees to take one working day's paid leave a year (or equivalent hours) to undertake volunteering work with their chosen organisation or registered charity
• Excellent development opportunities and benefits package including an employee assistance programme supporting physical, mental and financial wellbeing.

Babcock

We're Babcock - a global FTSE 100 organisation with over 29,000 people working together to make a difference.

Here, you'll be part of something bigger. From initial design to final decommissioning, your work will contribute to products and services that are essential to national security and public infrastructure. Together, we're building a future that lasts - not just through the impact we make, but through meaningful careers that respect your work-life balance.

We call that lifetime engineering.

Join us and see how far we can go, together.

We are a disability confident, committed employer. If you have a disability or need any reasonable adjustments during the application and selection stages, please email [e-mail] with the subject header 'Reasonable adjustments requirement'. We're committed to building an inclusive culture where everyone's free to thrive. We are happy to talk about flexible working - please ask about alternative patterns of work at interview.

Closing date: 07/10/2026