Freshfields

Assistant Management Accountant

Manchester 

Salary: Competitive 

THE ROLE

We are seeking an Assistant Management Accountant to join Freshfields at our new Global Centre (Europe) in Manchester. The overall remit of the management accounts department is to deliver accurate financial and supporting information on a global basis to the business.

The Assistant Management Accountant role operates on a six month rotation within the peer group; this gives a wide breadth of experience to equip our people with the skills needed to develop their careers. The areas of rotation are reporting, management accounting, systems and statistics.

ABOUT US

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer is a major international law firm, providing business law advice of the highest quality. We want to be the law firm that clients turn to for legal advice where it matters most, wherever in the world that may be. We deliver seamless service across borders, cultures and languages, and the launch of the Freshfields Global Centre (Europe) is central to this vision.

Our aspiration is to extend the Centre outside Europe, enabling us to give our lawyers the worldwide 24/7 support they need to deliver excellent client service.

You will be joining us in the early stages of this initiative, and helping to shape this new and exciting way of delivering our global services. Whatever your area of expertise, this is a place where you can be yourself and really flourish.

ABOUT MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTS

The group management accounts team works alongside the firm’s Chief Financial Officer, senior management partners and global support heads to provide the financial information required to run the business. In addition to the prompt provision of financial data and analytics, the team is expected to manage, develop and control the production of management data across the firm’s local finance functions, providing them with support and guidance through continual review and development.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES AND DELIVERABLES

Assistant Management Accountant - Management Accounting 

These roles focus on ongoing ledger accounting data and the development of quarterly forecasts and annual budgets on a worldwide basis. There is additional involvement in the UK ledgers; however the team primarily works with the Finance Support teams in other offices to achieve a consistent standard across all regions.

  • Assist with month-end close worldwide, posting journals to UK ledgers and helping to review and check non-UK office submissions;
  • Take a lead on inter-office transaction quality maintenance. Perform reconciliations and the feedback process, and raise recharges for global costs. Calculate exchange gains and losses on balances and book results;
  • Assist with quarterly forecasting and annual budget processes;
  • Assist with the preparation UK VAT returns and EC sales listings for submission to HMRC;
  • Oversee bad debts and disbursement provisions globally ensuring figures are accurate and representative.

Assistant Management Accountant - Systems

This role involves ongoing business as usual systems maintenance and helping to develop systems for the benefit of users and the wider business.

  • Provide front line support to all users of the global consolidation package and the UK ledgers system;
  • Load financial and statistical data into the firm’s consolidation package‎, ensuring checks are performed and high quality standards are maintained;
  • ‎Assist in maintaining the systems for monthly, quarterly (forecast) and annual (budget) routines, running processes, maintaining security of data and communicating with users;
  • Proactively identify practical improvements and help solve issues with the systems;
  • Work closely with other management accounts teams on system issues, current data and ongoing / future changes.

 

 

Assistant Management Accountant - Reporting

This role assists in delivering management accounts reporting to the business and is also involved in the design and construction of new reports.

  • Run routine reports, ensuring high quality output and distribute to global and UK stakeholders. This covers monthly costs, quarterly profit forecasts and annual budgets;
  • Help to maintain the existing suite of reports ensuring self-service users are supported and have easy access to the accurate figures;
  • Prepare figures for external demand such as National Statistics Office and Legal Press surveys;
  • Work closely with the systems team on structural issues impacting reporting and with the management accounts and statistics team on how data is constructed.

 

Assistant Management Accountant – Statistics

This role takes an active part in how the firm compiles and reports statistical information in both a financial and non-financial capacity. This role primarily focuses on how non-financial data is collated and utilised by the Group Finance function worldwide, ensuring that accuracy is maintained and parameters applied where appropriate.

  • Construct a month-end headcount dataset covering both fee-earners and non-fee earners for use worldwide in all financial reports. This takes into account time recording data for fee-earners to reflect recorded activity / behaviour;
  • ‎Take an active view on headcount dependent numbers including utilisation, gearing ratios, working days (reflecting working patterns of different locations) and KPIs such as profit per lawyer;
  • Ensure statistics being reported reflect the true position in each office and practice group and correlate with the financial position;
  • Work with both systems and reporting sub-teams to ensure statistics data is robustly held in the systems and accurately reported;
  • Work with HR on people data, regional accounting teams for local insight into current work patterns and Management Office for proactive involvement in new initiatives.

KEY REQUIREMENTS

  • Part qualified or newly qualified ACA or equivalent;
  • Ability to gain a good overview as well as being prepared to get involved in the detail;
  • Confident when communicating with staff and management at all levels;
  • Numerate, methodical and proactive;
  • Excellent attention to detail;
  • Must be a team player.

BENEFITS

Our reward package is designed to offer you a competitive salary, a comprehensive range of employee benefits and the potential to receive an additional bonus each year, recognising the contribution you make to the firm.

You can choose from a variety of insurance policies, services and products to help you secure your financial future, protect your health and fitness, and make your life easier. You will receive 26 days’ holiday each year, with the option to purchase additional days, plus free access to market-leading health and wellbeing websites and services.

As you would expect, we will support you through the major events in your life, so we offer competitive maternity, flexible working and leave policies.

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