Strategic Finance Manager

Posted An Hour Ago
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Staines-upon-Thames, Middlesex, England, GBR
Hybrid
Senior level
Information Technology • Software
The Role
Partner with the CFO to diagnose high-impact finance problems, lead cross-functional initiatives from diagnosis to execution, build financial models and board/investor materials, and reinvent forecasting and decision processes using agentic AI and automated modelling. Own M&A, capital allocation, long-range planning, and performance improvement projects, driving measurable change and accountability across the business.
Summary Generated by Built In
Company Description

IFS is a billion-dollar revenue company with 7000+ employees on all continents. Our leading AI technology is the backbone of our award-winning enterprise software solutions, enabling our customers to be their best when it really matters–at the Moment of Service™. Our commitment to internal AI adoption has allowed us to stay at the forefront of technological advancements, ensuring our colleagues can unlock their creativity and productivity, and our solutions are always cutting-edge.

At IFS, we’re flexible, we’re innovative, and we’re focused not only on how we can engage with our customers but on how we can make a real change and have a worldwide impact. We help solve some of society’s greatest challenges, fostering a better future through our agility, collaboration, and trust.

We celebrate diversity and understand our responsibility to reflect the diverse world we work in. We are committed to promoting an inclusive workforce that fully represents the many different cultures, backgrounds, and viewpoints of our customers, our partners, and our communities. As a truly international company serving people from around the globe, we realise that our success is tantamount to the respect we have for those different points of view.

By joining our team, you will have the opportunity to be part of a global, diverse environment; you will be joining a winning team with a commitment to sustainability; and a company where we get things done so that you can make a positive impact on the world.

We’re looking for innovative and original thinkers to work in an environment where you can #MakeYourMoment so that we can help others make theirs. With the power of our AI-driven solutions, we empower our team to change the status quo and make a real difference.

If you want to change the status quo, we’ll help you make your moment. Join Team Purple. Join IFS.

Job Description

The mandate

Sit beside the CFO of a €15 billion company. Find the problems that matter. Build the case. Drive the change.

IFS is approaching €2 billion in revenue and growing more than 20% a year — because we bet earlier and harder on industrial AI than anyone in our category. EQT, Hg, TA Associates, ADIA, and CPP Investments didn't fund incremental software growth. They funded a thesis: the companies that build and run the physical world will run on agentic AI, and on IFS.

That thesis generates real decisions — on capital, on structure, on where the business is and isn't working — every quarter. This role exists to find the friction, frame the question, and drive the answer through to something that actually changes.

What you'll own

  • Answer the unowned questions. Build or buy? Enter this vertical — at what cost, for what return? Where is margin actually made and lost? How far can AI rewire our own cost base? You scope each from a blank page and return with a recommendation that holds up in the room.
  • Identify what's broken and drive it to fixed. You'll carry two or three major cross-functional initiatives at any time — not as a contributor, but as the owner. That means diagnosing the real problem, aligning the right people across the business, and holding accountability for the output. This isn't advisory work. The change happens, or it doesn't, and that's on you.
  • Build the case — and present it. Long-range plan, M&A and partnership analyses, capital allocation, board and investor materials. You'll own the model and the story it tells, and you'll be in the room as it's argued — exposure to the board, shareholders, and prospective investors that most people wait a decade for.
  • Reinvent how the work gets done. We run on bleeding-edge technology — agentic AI, automated modelling, real-time data — and we expect you to push it further. Find what's slow or wrong in how we forecast, report, and decide, and rebuild it. This team should be the proof of what an AI-native finance org looks like, and you should be the one inventing it.

Why it's rare

You'll work directly with the CFO of a €15B+ company at the moment it reshapes itself around industrial AI — in the room with the board and investors, close enough to move the decisions, early enough to build a foundation almost no one gets. Real questions, real stakes, answers that change what the company does. For the right person, this isn't a job — it's the experience that defines a career.

    Qualifications

    Who we're hiring

    We're hiring for one thing above all: the ability to take a question you've never seen, with messy data and real money riding on it, and make real progress in hours. You break problems down, find the load-bearing assumption, and pressure-test your own logic before anyone else can.

    You'll also bring:

    • Force of personality. You move people and things. You don't wait for permission to own a problem, and you don't let organisational drag become an excuse for inaction.
    • Crazy ambition. You're not here for a tidy career step. You want to build something that matters, at a scale most people never touch, and you're impatient to start.
    • A builder's instinct in an AI world. You don't just use the new tools, you invent with them. You see where agentic AI changes what's possible and you go make it real.
    • Quantitative intuition. Fluent in the numbers, and faster to sense when one is wrong. You reason from first principles, not from a model you don't understand.
    • Clarity under ambiguity. You hold open-ended problems without freezing and land the answer crisply, to people making nine-figure calls.
    • Judgment. Your analysis stays honest when the answer is inconvenient, and discreet when it's sensitive.
    • You do not need finance experience. No finance degree, no FP&A, no banking, no specific tool. We'll teach you the finance. We can't teach the thinking — so we don't try.

    This is the same problem set you solved at the partner's side on a BCG, McKinsey, or Bain case team — except you own the recommendation, you live with the outcome, and you're not handing the deck to someone else to execute. Consultants, bankers, investors, founders, engineers, and standout generalists have all thrived here. The common thread is horsepower, not pedigree.

    Levelling

    • Analyst (~0–4 yrs): own analyses and models end-to-end with senior guidance, and scale your scope fast.  
    • Manager (~4–8 yrs): own whole decision areas and cross-functional projects, set the approach, and partner directly with the CFO.

    Experience matters less than the thinking. Unsure which you are? Apply — we'll figure it out together

        Additional Information

        We embrace flexibility and hybrid work opportunities to support diverse needs and lifestyles, while also valuing inclusive workplace experiences. By fostering a sense of community, we drive innovation, strengthen connections, and nurture belonging. Our commitment ensures you can work in a way that suits you best, while also engaging with colleagues to share ideas and build meaningful relationships.

        Skills Required

        • Ability to decompose novel, ambiguous problems and make fast progress with messy data
        • Strong influencing skills and force of personality to move people and decisions
        • High ambition and desire to build at large scale
        • Builder's instinct with agentic AI and automation; ability to invent with new tools
        • Quantitative intuition and rigorous, first-principles reasoning
        • Clarity and decisiveness under ambiguity
        • Judgment, discretion, and ability to present to executives, board, and investors
        • Proven ability to own and deliver cross-functional initiatives end-to-end
        • Finance experience or formal finance credentials

        IFS Compensation & Benefits Highlights

        The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about IFS and has not been reviewed or approved by IFS.

        • Retirement Support Retirement support is presented as part of the package in North America through a 401(k) plan and references to pension/defined contribution arrangements in some contexts.
        • Healthcare Strength Healthcare coverage is described as available in some regions, including health, dental, life, and disability insurance offerings.
        • Strong & Reliable Incentives Variable pay elements such as monthly bonuses and profit sharing are described as meaningful in certain roles, with bonuses tied to performance outcomes like reduced downtime.

        IFS Insights

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        The Company
        HQ: Linköping
        6,788 Employees
        Year Founded: 1983

        What We Do

        IFS develops and delivers enterprise software for companies around the world who manufacture and distribute goods, build and maintain assets, and manage service-focused operations. Within our single platform, our industry specific products are innately connected to a single data model and use embedded digital innovation so that our customers can be their best when it really matters to their customers – at the Moment of Service. The industry expertise of our people and of our growing ecosystem, together with a commitment to deliver value at every single step, has made IFS a recognized leader and the most recommended supplier in our sector. Our team of 5,000 employees every day live our values of agility, trustworthiness and collaboration in how we support our 10,000+ customers. Learn more about how our enterprise software solutions can help your business today at ifs.com. Follow us on Twitter: @ifs Facebook: www.facebook.com/ifsdotcom Instagram: www.instagram.com/ifsdotcom Visit the IFS Blog on technology, innovation and creativity: https://blog.ifs.com/

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