Finance Analyst, Reward & Governance

Job Description

At Aberdeen, our ambition is to be the UK’s leading Wealth & Investments group.

Strengthening talent and culture is one of our strategic priorities. We strive to make Aberdeen a great place to work so that we can attract and retain the industry’s best talent.

Our people put our stakeholders at the heart of everything they do by helping us to make a positive difference to the lives of our clients, customers, colleagues, shareholders, and society.

We are focused on growing our direct and advised wealth platforms and repositioning our specialist asset management business to meet client demand. We are committed to providing excellent client service, supported by leading technology and talent.

Aberdeen comprises three businesses, interactive investor (ii), Investments, and Adviser, each of which focuses on meeting and adapting to our clients’ evolving needs:

• interactive investor, the UK’s second largest direct-to-consumer investment platform, enables individuals in the UK to plan, save, and invest in the way that works for them.
• Our Adviser business provides financial planning solutions and technology for UK financial advisers, enabling them to create value for their customers.
• Our Investments business is a specialist asset manager that focuses on areas where we have both strength and scale to capitalise on the key themes shaping the market, through either public markets or alternative asset classes.

About the Department

The Finance function (approximately 160 people, with primary hub in Edinburgh) is led by the Chief Financial Officer and comprises three specialist, centralised teams, and three business-focused commercial teams, supported by a small CFO Office to run the function.

• Business CFO teams – responsible for supporting Business CEOs by driving the commercial agenda of the business and rely on the other areas to produce core materials.
• Group Finance Control, Performance & Planning – responsible for all external reporting activity (group, statutory and regulatory) with the goal to produce high quality reporting materials, on time and reflective of best practice.  Oversight and development of the Finance control environment also sits here, together with the management of the relationship with external audit and the Audit Committee. In addition, responsible for all performance and planning activities centrally for the group, including coordination of planning, forecasting, quarterly business reviews.  Coordination with investor relations, which reports to the CEO, also sits here.
• Capital and Tax – responsible for running all capital and tax matters centrally for the whole group, as a global, specialist function.
• Finance Operations – responsible for all processing and production activity is centralised here, largely on an outsourced basis.  The goal is to combine maximum efficiency and increasing automation with robust controls. All P&L, balance sheet and ledger control activity, including outsourced oversight, is brought together here.

About the Role

The Finance Analyst, Reward and Governance plays a critical role in supporting the financial management, accounting, forecasting and governance of the Group's variable compensation and share-based payment arrangements. The position sits within the Group Finance Control, Performance & Planning team and acts as a key link between Finance, Reward, Technical Accounting, HR and senior business stakeholders.

This role combines technical accounting expertise, strong analytical capability and stakeholder management skills to ensure the accurate accounting, forecasting and reporting of executive and employee remuneration programmes. The successful candidate will support the financial analysis underpinning Remuneration Committee (RemCo) decision-making whilst maintaining robust controls over deferred share schemes, long-term incentive plans (LTIPs) and wider variable compensation arrangements.

The role offers exposure to senior stakeholders across the organisation, including Executive Directors, Reward specialists, Technical Accounting teams and members of the Group Finance leadership team. 

Key Responsibilities

• Maintain and develop accounting models supporting deferred share, fund-linked and share-based payment schemes
• Calculate monthly variable compensation accounting entries
• Ensure the completeness and accuracy of remuneration accounting balances and associated reconciliations
• Support the audit process by providing calculations, evidential support and responses to audit queries
• Maintain robust controls, documentation and governance over all remuneration-related financial processes
• Develop forward-looking views of existing deferred compensation schemes and future P&L impacts
• Support annual planning, forecasting and quarterly performance review processes
• Analyse variances between actuals, forecasts and plans, identifying key drivers and emerging trends
• Support scenario modelling relating to incentive plan structures
• Maintain RemCo working files and governance documentation
• Produce analysis covering Executive Director bonuses, LTIP vesting outcomes and other incentive arrangements
• Provide financial insights and commentary to support RemCo papers
• Build effective relationships with Reward, HR, Technical Accounting, Financial Control and Business Finance teams
• Act as a trusted finance partner on variable remuneration matters
• Communicate complex financial information clearly to both finance and non-finance stakeholders

About the Candidate

The role will require an experienced individual capable of working autonomously within a complex global business. Skills and experience will need to include:

• Qualified accountant (essential)
• Understanding of financial systems and processes, in particular general ledger (essential)
• Excellent analytical ability with good attention to detail (essential)
• Asset management or financial services background (desirable)
• Experience of share-based payment accounting (IFRS 2) (desirable)
• Understanding of executive remuneration and incentive scheme structures (desirable)

We are proud to be a Disability Confident Committed employer. If you have a disability and would like to apply to one of our UK roles under the Disability Confident Scheme, please notify us by completing the relevant section in our candidate questionnaire. One of our team will reach out to support you through your application process.

Our benefits

There's more to working life than coming home with a good salary. We have an environment where you can learn, get involved and be supported.

When you join us, your reward will be one of the best around. This includes 40 days’ annual leave, a 16% employer pension contribution, a discretionary performance-based bonus (where applicable), private healthcare and a range of flexible benefits – including gym discounts, season ticket loans and access to an employee discount portal. You can read more about our benefits here.

Our business

Enabling our clients to be better investors drives everything we do. Our business is structured around three distinct areas – our vectors of growth – focused on our clients’ changing needs. You can find out more about what we do here.

An inclusive way of working

Whatever way you like to work, if you have the talent and commitment to join our team, we’d like to hear from you.

At Aberdeen we’ve adopted a ‘blended working’ approach. This approach combines the benefits of face-to-face collaboration, coaching and connecting in our offices with the flexibility of working from home. It enables colleagues to find a balance that works for their roles, their teams, our clients and our business.

An inclusive culture, where diverse perspectives drive our actions, is at the core of who we are and what we do. If you need assistance with your application, or a reasonable adjustment to your interview arrangements – for example, because you are neurodivergent, or have a physical, sensory, cognitive, mental, visible or invisible disability – please let us know and we’ll be happy to help.

We’re committed to providing an inclusive workplace where all forms of difference are valued and which is free from any form of unfair or unlawful treatment.  We define diversity in its broadest sense – this includes but is not limited to our diversity of educational and professional backgrounds, experience, cognitive and neurodiversity, age, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, religion or belief and ethnicity and geographical provenance.  We support a culture that values meritocracy, fairness and transparency and welcomes enquiries from everyone.

If you need assistance or an adjustment due to a disability please let us know as part of your application and we will assist.