Introduction

Avenir often works closely with our clients in not only hiring but scoping out roles.  A popular one is a finance or senior financial analyst. While considered entry-level, this position can have a significant impact on the business and gives senior finance members significant leverage. Below we outline some lessons learned and feedback and input from the hiring managers we work with.

Invest in Designing the Role

Upfront alignment on the role, the responsibilities, and the requirements is critical, and is the foundation to set up a financial analyst for success. Spending time thinking through what is required and what may be optional can also allow you to make trade-off decisions when it comes to the process and candidates (e.g. will I take someone with only some of the skillsets but who really knows the industry or can start immediately?).  This means spending time to do the following where applicable:

• Determine business needs and current gaps/weaknesses (e.g. is this person doing consolidated financial modeling, business partnering, data analytics, etc.)

• Determine key tasks, roles, and responsibilities

• Consider any unique qualities and opportunities your business or this role presents that could drive candidate interest (e.g. opportunity to work on M&A)

• Determine reporting structure and consider growth trajectories and career opportunities (e.g. will there be a FP&A specific vertical or is this person expected to be a manager within 3 years)

• Determine compensation range and structure

Core Attributes of a Strong Candidate

While there are likely some unique business needs to account for, the key attributes our hiring managers have generally shared are:

Technical Proficiency: This is the ability to execute financial modeling, excel or data analysis, create presentations, etc. Determine how much experience and expertise you need here, and your ability to train someone vs. needing day 1 capability.  Potential areas of expertise include:

• 3 Statement financial modeling (we see this most often)

• Analytics (e.g. pivot tables, VBA familiarity, etc.)

• ERP system familiarity

• SQL or other data table expertise

This tends to be easier to evaluate and determine in the interview process, typically from a modeling or case exercise.  Typically, analysts that come from investment banking, private equity, corporate finance backgrounds will have strong financial modeling skillsets.

Natural Curiosity & Initiative: If your FP&A team is expected to be true business partners across the organization, someone who has natural curiosity and ability to really learn the business and functional areas is critical.  Candidates who show a penchant to truly understand the why behind everything they do will allow them to learn the business, build relationships, and add value across many parts of the business that you may not be able to anticipate today. This can be difficult to evaluate but can be teased out to a degree by asking candidates to share processes, insights, and decisions they may have impacted, changed or implemented that are not strictly financial in nature.

Communication: Yes, even in finance or especially because they are in finance - an ability to communicate complex concepts and information in a salient way for all the various stakeholders at the appropriate level is important.  (i.e. can the same person help put together a board presentation as well as a KPI meeting with sales - very different audiences that require different levels of information and communication style). Ask to see some prior work examples and tease out through interviews with non-finance team members.

Timeliness, Accuracy, Organization: Finance work flows are often highly time constrained, and so it will be important to be able to meet deadlines with accuracy, even if it may require work outside of normal hours. Ask candidates about examples of when they’ve gone above and beyond to achieve deadlines and their role in helping their current company achieve financial calendars and timelines.

Other Considerations

While there is a lot to consider, it is important to remember that ultimately, this is an entry-level position and will require some teaching and development.  Unless there is ample time and budget, there will likely be trade-off decisions to be made, and having an idea of what’s most critical will be helpful as you go through the hiring process.

Interested in learning more or need talent acquisition help?  Contact Avenir at recruiting@avenirtalent.com