Accountant (Children's)

About Us

At Salford City Council, we are committed to delivering highquality services that improve outcomes for our residents. Our Finance function plays a vital role in supporting informed decisionmaking, protecting public funds, and ensuring value for money across the organisation.

Our management accountancy teams work closely with services to understand how resources are used, identify financial risks early, and support sustainable delivery. Collaboration, constructive challenge, and forwardlooking financial insight sit at the heart of what we do.

This is an exciting time to join Salford. We are implementing a new finance and procurement system, modernising the way we work and strengthening financial management across the Council.

About the Role

We currently have an Accountant vacancy. Although this role sits on the Council’s standard Accountant role profile, this post is firmly focused on management accounting and financial business partnering supporting schools and Children's Services.

This is not a transactional finance, treasury, or financial accounts role.

The purpose of the role is to support budget holders to manage their resources effectively by providing robust budget monitoring, forecasting, and meaningful variance analysis, alongside constructive challenge and advice.

You will work closely with managers to understand financial performance, explain variances, identify risks, and support decisions about spend and resources.

What you will spend most of your time doing

• Owning budget monitoring and forecasting for assigned service areas
• Producing clear and insightful variance analysis, explaining drivers rather than just reporting movements
• Working directly with budget holders to understand spend patterns, pressures, and resource plans
• Challenging assumptions, profiling, and value for money in a constructive and professional way
• Providing forwardlooking financial analysis to support operational and strategic decisions
• Identifying emerging financial risks early and supporting managers to take corrective action
• Supporting continuous improvement, including the implementation of the new finance and procurement system

This role involves regular engagement with nonfinance colleagues and requires confidence in explaining financial information clearly and pragmatically.

About You

We are looking for someone who can demonstrate:

• Strong management accounting experience, including budget setting, monitoring, forecasting, and variance analysis
• Experience working directly with budget holders or nonfinance managers and preferably within a local authority or education finance setting.
• Confidence to challenge financial assumptions and spending decisions in a supportive and evidencebased way
• An ability to translate complex financial information into clear, actionable insight
• Strong written and verbal communication skills
• A proactive and collaborative approach to improving financial management and ways of working

This role is not suitable if you are primarily looking for:

• Accounts payable or accounts receivable roles
• Treasury or cashmanagementfocused positions
• Financial accounting, audit, or statutory reportingled roles
• Roles with limited stakeholder engagement or financial challenge

What success looks like in this role

Within your first months, you will be a trusted finance partner to servicesproviding meaningful variance analysis, producing reliable forecasts, and helping managers understand and actively manage their financial position.

Contact and Application Information

To find out more about this role, please contact Natalie Mannion at:
Natalie.mannion@salford.gov.uk

Please do not send CVs to this email address, as they will not be accepted.

When applying, please ensure your supporting statement clearly sets out how your experience meets the requirements of the role, including examples of budget management, forecasting, and variance analysis.

Want to know more about Salford?
As an authority we are dedicated to improving the lives of our residents, and as an employer we are passionate about helping individuals to thrive in their work. We are committed to developing a diverse and inclusive culture and are proud of our professional accreditations which champion this.

Find out about our city as a place to live, work & grow, and learn more about the amazing work we are doing. You’ll also find out about the wealth of benefits we have to offer you here!

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