Chief Financial Officer at CABI (Centre for Agriculture and Biosciences International)

CABI is seeking to appoint a Chief Financial Officer.

• The new CFO will work in partnership with the CEO, Members of the Executive Management Team and Board to identify and pursue major new opportunities and collaborations, contributing to expansion and enhancement of CABI’s offer to its stakeholders.
• They will provide financial leadership to the organisation and be a real catalyst to enabling more step-change actions like aquisitions, licencing/IP deals, and major new strategic initiatives.

Key accountabilities include:

• Partner with the CEO and other members of the Executive Management Team and Board in developing and shaping strategy, and work with the Executive Management Team to drive successful implementation.
• Partner with the entire organisation to provide strategic financial insight and support, providing robust business performance forecasts and analysis to inform strategic decision making.
• Partnering with the CEO to represent the strategy and organisation to a range of stakeholders including Member Countries, key donors and partners, delivering a well-defined message and compelling vision for CABI.
• Lead the effective delivery of all corporate finance activities, creating robust financial frameworks to deliver on all aspects of organisational strategy and ensuring a culture of accountability, financial rigour and transparency.
• Maintain high quality compliant and transparent financial control and reporting standards.
• Manage the relationship with the auditors, obtain necessary financial and legal advice to ensure all corporate legal, regulatory and compliance responsibilities are met, and oversee the risk management structure and process.
• Provide financial support to the Board, and Audit
• Committee, including overseeing preparation and quality control of Board reports.
• Develop efficient operational processes, systems and data to underpin the organisation’s finance activities and obligations delivered through agile technology and high-quality management information.
• Provide executive sponsorship and leadership to organisation wide initiatives to increase capacity, improve efficiency and effectiveness or to reduce cost.
• Establish clear succession and talent management strategies to ensure talent within the function have clear and rewarding career paths.
• Ensure statutory group accounts and reports are published to agreed timetables and in line with all applicable accounting standards.

The Person
Experience and Competencies:

• Qualified accountant with proven experience in senior financial leadership roles within complex, international operating environments.
• Ability to contribute to the development of an organisation’s growth strategy through effective development of business relationships.
• Strong multi-divisional operational experience, with the ability engage and manage across multiple locations, geographies and cultures.
• Demonstrated ability to develop successful relationships with external stakeholders and internal colleagues at all levels within an organisation.
• Able to ensure integrity of the financial and business information required by, and produced for, the organisation.
• Outstanding stakeholder management, leadership and communication skills, able to flex stakeholder style and build trust across Board, Executive
• Management Team, business and functional colleagues.
• Experience of leading organisations through technology change and transformation would be advantageous.

Personal Attributes:

• Passion for the mission and vision of the organisation, with intellectual curiosity and interest in the science, innovation and technology that underscores all of CABI’s work.
• Ability to act as an ambassador for CABI, representing the organisation effectively when engaging with Member Countries and donors.
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills, with the leadership skillset to build a strong and collaborative working environment across an internationally dispersed team.
• A way of working that is collaborative, pragmatic, transparent and open.
• A practical and ‘can do’ attitude to delivering organisational change and improvement.
• Able to approach an organisation from the top and the bottom – as on top of the detail as they are the strategic plan.
• The maturity to challenge ideas, balance opportunities and threats and be creative/ innovative when identifying solutions.
• High level of integrity and dependability.