Senior Business Partner - Operations Finance
Saffron Walden, GB, CB10 1XL Portishead, GB, BS20 7AW High Peak, GB, SK23 6FJ Harlow, GB, CM19 5TR
For 75 years, Charles River employees have worked together to assist in the discovery, development and safe manufacture of new drug therapies. When you join our family, you will have a significant impact on the health and well-being of people across the globe. Whether your background is in life sciences, finance, IT, sales or another area, your skills will play an important role in the work we perform. In return, we’ll help you build a career that you can feel passionate about.
Job Summary
Have you got proven business partnering experience in operations finance?
Charles River is recruiting a new team member for their UK Discovery finance group.
Are you our next Senior Business Partner?
The Senior Business partner has responsibility for leading and managing the financial planning, analysis, and control activities for assigned site(s). You will partner closely with Operations leadership to provide financial insight, challenge, and decision support focused on headcount, KPIs, cost efficiency, and workforce planning. Responsibilities include driving accurate and timely reporting, forecasting, and budgeting, while ensuring alignment with the company’s broader business and financial strategies. Acting as a trusted advisor, the role interprets performance, influences key operational decisions, and delivers actionable insights to improve business outcomes.
Charles River offers you personal and professional progression across a global finance network, do you have what it takes?
What You'll Be Doing
- Partner with Operations leadership to provide financial insight on headcount, KPIs, and cost performance.
- Lead monthly and quarterly forecasts and the annual budgeting process, ensuring robust reporting and variance analysis.
- Deliver timely financial reports and performance dashboards to Operations and Finance leadership.
- Develop and monitor performance indicators to drive accountability and improve operational efficiency.
- Provide headcount and workforce planning analysis, including productivity, utilisation, and efficiency metrics.
- Support internal and external audits, ensuring compliance with local requirements, corporate policies, and SOX controls.
- Partner with Shared Services and Corporate Finance to uphold internal controls and accounting standards.
- Provide financial guidance on procurement and capital expenditure planning, tracking, and approvals.
- Coach cost center managers to strengthen financial acumen and budget ownership.
- Drive continuous improvement in reporting processes to enhance quality, timeliness, and insight.
- Collaborate cross-functionally and represent Finance in business initiatives and projects.
Profile and Requirements
- Accounting qualification e.g. CIMA, ACCA, ACA.
- Highly motivated.
- Extensive post qualification experience.
- Proven business partnering experience.
- Experience in the collation/interpretation of financial and other information.
- Experience in the preparation of financial reports and information.
- Working with multiple entities and foreign currencies.
- Strong Excel and PowerPoint skills.
- Ability to operate an ERP system to extract relevant information.
- Attention to detail to ensure that information provided is accurate and complete.
- Time management and planning to ensure deadlines are met.
- Curiosity to understand new things and always wanting to learn more.
- Communication - Selects the most appropriate medium with which to communicate. Communication is clear, timely, unambiguous and to the point. Has the versatility to adapt communication style to suit audience.
- Networking & relationship building - Able to establish and maintain working relationships at all levels. Builds networks both internal and external in order to benefit the business.
- Financial Analysis – Able to perform logical analysis of financial and other information from multiple sources to prepare reports of past/current performance and forecasts of future performance.
- Problem solving - Able to identify and analyse problems effectively to draw logical and accurate conclusions.
- Experience in a Contract Research Organisation.
- Experience with SOX controls.
- Preparation of financial analysis to support investment business cases.
- Knowledge of SAP, SAC and BPC.
- Navigating Change - Ability to work on a changing environment and constantly adapt to new organisations.
What We Offer You
- A very comprehensive benefits package from day one, including a vrey generous pension contribution, private medical, great BONUS and more!
- Global opportunities and strong career progression.
- Personal development and skills enrichment, as one of our key focuses.
- To be able make a difference to health and well being of people.
- Flexible working opportunities.
About Discovery
Discovery from Charles River is industry-proven in the successful development of novel therapies, with over 350 patents and 80 preclinical drug candidates delivered to our sponsors in the past 17 years. Backed by more than 650 scientists, our comprehensive, integrated portfolio employs the latest technology and platforms to provide chemistry, biology, and pharmacology services that support clients from the earliest stages of hit identification all the way through to IND. Our client-focused, collaborative approach creates true partnerships that anticipate challenges, overcome obstacles, and move us forward together on the journey of getting new drugs to market.
About Charles River
Charles River is an early-stage contract research organization (CRO). We have built upon our foundation of laboratory animal medicine and science to develop a diverse portfolio of discovery and safety assessment services, both Good Laboratory Practice (GLP) and non-GLP, to support clients from target identification through preclinical development. Charles River also provides a suite of products and services to support our clients’ clinical laboratory testing needs and manufacturing activities. Utilizing this broad portfolio of products and services enables our clients to create a more flexible drug development model, which reduces their costs, enhances their productivity and effectiveness to increase speed to market.
With over 20,000 employees within 110 facilities in over 20 countries around the globe, we are strategically positioned to coordinate worldwide resources and apply multidisciplinary perspectives in resolving our client’s unique challenges. Our client base includes global pharmaceutical companies, biotechnology companies, government agencies and hospitals and academic institutions around the world.
At Charles River, we are passionate about our role in improving the quality of people’s lives. Our mission, our excellent science and our strong sense of purpose guide us in all that we do, and we approach each day with the knowledge that our work helps to improve the health and well-being of many across the globe. We have proudly worked on 80% of the drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the past five years.
At Charles River Laboratories, we recognize and recruit all talent. We are a company committed to fostering a sense of belonging and work daily in this direction.