Strategic Finance Analytics Lead

Cleo; Greater London; On-site; GBP 87,000 - 120,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Health insurance

Dental insurance

Vision insurance

Mental health support

One-month sabbatical after four years

Learning & development platform

Pension contributions

Location-specific leave

Job summary

Cleo is hiring a Data Science Manager, Strategic Finance Analytics to lead the Strategic Finance Analytics sub-team of five data scientists across FP&A, Core Finance, Capital Markets, and Operations. You'll be the senior analytical partner to Heads of department, guiding exec-level decisions, and shaping the analytics roadmap while staying hands-on on high-impact analyses.

This role emphasizes leadership, automation, and scalable modeling in a fintech environment.

Qualifications

• 7+ years in data analytics, data science, BI engineering, analytics engineering, or hybrid data/finance roles, including 2+ years line managing data scientists or analysts with experience handling performance management
• Track record partnering senior business stakeholders - ideally across Finance, Strategic Finance, Capital Markets, or Operations - and shaping decisions at exec level
• Familiarity with forecasting and predictive models, enough to interpret outputs, pressure-test assumptions, and direct ICs working in this space
• Strong commercial instincts: deep grasp of financial and operational metrics, quick to pick up the levers in a new domain
• Comfortable being the most senior voice in the room on data, and pushing back constructively when the analysis doesn't support the ask
• Expert SQL, hands-on with BI tools (e.g. Looker, Mode, Tableau) and dbt
• A builder's instinct - bias for automation, ownership, and shipping - plus the leadership instinct to scale that across a team through delegation, templates, and systems
• Comfortable using AI tools (Claude, Cursor) as leverage, with the judgement to know when to trust output and when to verify
• Interest in fintech and Cleo's mission to make money easier and more human
• Nice to have: exposure to capital markets, debt facility reporting, or lender-side analytics
• Nice to have: prior experience automating or supporting investor-facing reporting or board materials
• Nice to have: experience in environments blending consumer tech and financial services (e.g. AI, lending, credit, payments)
• Nice to have: extensive hands-on experience building and/or monitoring forecasting or predictive models in production
• Nice to have: Python (or similar) for scripting and automation
• Nice to have: workflow orchestration tooling (e.g. Airflow)

Responsibilities

• Lead the Strategic Finance Analytics team across FP&A, Core Finance, Capital Markets, and Operations.
• Set and prioritise the analytical roadmap across four domains, directing the team's time to the work that moves the business most
• Act as the senior analytical partner to Heads of department, shaping decisions at exec level
• Stay hands-on on high-stakes or sensitive analysis, or decisions that need to move fast
• Own the quality bar - metric definitions, documentation, peer review, and trust in the numbers across internal and external reporting
• Raise the craft of the team through feedback, pairing, and playbooks so output scales beyond what 5 people can deliver directly
• Partner with Analytics and Data Engineering on the data foundations the team relies on
• Run team rituals and represent the team in cross-functional forums

Skills

SQL

BI tools

dbt

Forecasting

Leadership

Python

Airflow

Stakeholder management

Fintech domain

Tools

Looker

Mode

Tableau

dbt

Python

Airflow

Job description

Cleo is hiring a Data Science Manager, Strategic Finance Analytics to lead the Strategic Finance Analytics sub-team of five data scientists across FP&A, Core Finance, Capital Markets, and Operations. You'll be the senior analytical partner to Heads of department, guiding exec-level decisions, and shaping the analytics roadmap while staying hands-on on high-impact analyses.

This role emphasizes leadership, automation, and scalable modeling in a fintech environment.