Skipton Building Society Head of Decision Support
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Skipton Building Society Head of Decision Support Candidate information pack Aquista Limited, Central Services Team, The Old Estate Office, North Stainley, Ripon, North Yorkshire, HG4 3HT T. 01765 635 105 E. [email protected] W. www.aquista.com INDEX Page Introduction from Bobby Ndawula, Group Finance Director, Skipton Building Society 2 Overview of Skipton Building Society Group 4 Role description 9 Person specification 12 Recruitment and selection process 16 Further information 17 1 INTRODUCTION FROM BOBBY NDAWULA, GROUP FINANCE DIRECTOR, SKIPTON BUILDING SOCIETY Dear Reader Thank you for the interest you have shown in this role. We have prepared this pack to provide you with some information about the Skipton Building Society Group, the role itself and the recruitment process. However, before looking through this document perhaps you would allow me to offer my own personal introduction. Skipton Building Society is the fourth largest society in the UK, with £16bn of assets, almost 795,000 members and a national presence of branches and agencies. Our members benefit from our dedication to mutuality, since instead of maximising profits to pay shareholders, we focus on ensuring a balance exists in our measures of success: supporting our members, generating sufficient profit to maintain a strong balance sheet and taking long term decisions to invest in the future development of the business and its employees. We have a clear vision of ‘Building a better Society’, and the key pillars to this comprise: putting the customer at the heart of our business by providing a compelling and differentiated proposition; ensuring that we have the right people who empathise with and deliver a great experience for our customers; making it easy for our customers to do business with us; and ensuring that we continue to maintain our financial strength. It is important to note that the Society is at the heart of the Skipton Group, which also includes well known businesses that add significant value to our members; such as Connells Group, one of the UK’s largest estate and property services groups; and Skipton Financial Services, a Top 20 national financial advisory firm. As part of our increasing focus upon ensuring robust and long term strategic planning, we have created a new role of Head of Decision Support who will report directly to myself. As a member of the Senior Leadership Team you will support both myself and the wider Executive Committee in the development of Group strategy. This will include helping to identify organisational objectives which drive profitability, enhance customer satisfaction and ensure a culture focused on the effective management of prudential and conduct risk. You will also work in partnership with a wide range of business areas to help them deliver against their agreed objectives as outlined in the Corporate Plan and to provide analytical support to ensure that their decisions are based upon sound evidence. You will be supported by four teams; focused respectively on mortgages, savings, distribution and strategy and planning. In terms of your background, it is essential that you have gained relevant experience within the retail financial services industry and furthermore, this must have been with a balance sheet product manufacturer. Ideally this will have been with either a bank or building society, but we would also consider exceptional candidates from life & pensions and insurance companies. It is essential that you have supported an organisation or a business unit in developing its strategic thinking and provided analytical support to one or more business units/functions to help them deliver against their agreed objectives; and this means that you must possess expertise in a range of financial and business planning/modelling tools and techniques. Ideally accounting or MBA qualified, you might be currently working in one of a number of different functional areas, including finance; a separate strategy/corporate planning team; or within a commercial finance team attached to a specific functional area. Above and beyond your experience, it is critical that you have the right personal approach. You must possess a good strategic mind set and a commercial orientation, underpinned by excellent analytical capabilities. In addition, you must possess rounded people leadership and development skills, combined with the ability to build effective and supportive working relationships across different functions and to influence at the most senior levels. Clearly 2 this must go hand-in-hand with excellent written and verbal communication skills that convey complex issues and their related solutions with clarity and incisiveness. Strong planning and organisational skills are also a prerequisite. Underpinning all of this will be a strong streak of self-motivation and personal drive. I firmly believe that this is an attractive opportunity for a number of reasons. Firstly, the Skipton Building Society is a very successful business with a great culture. Secondly, our Group companies are equally as successful and are testament to a culture which is more entrepreneurial than many of our peers. Thirdly, we have a strong and able Board that is increasingly focused upon ensuring robust and long term strategic planning. Fourthly, this role will give you considerable exposure to the Board and to a wide range of business areas across the Group; thus affording you an excellent opportunity to make a mark for yourself and hence progress to more senior positions in the future. Finally, it has to be noted that we are based in a great location. Skipton was recently named by The Sunday Times as being the best place to live in the UK. Located within the Yorkshire Dales, and boasting some of the highest performing state schools in the country, Skipton enjoys low crime rates, reasonable housing costs, independent shops and good transport links, as well as close proximity to other desirable locations such as Ilkley, Harrogate and Leeds. A relocation package is available for exceptional candidates. If what I have said above has stirred your interest, then I urge you to read on. This is an excellent opportunity to help make a significant contribution to the long term success of an organisation that combines the inherent strengths of mutuality with a business model that is highly distinctive and progressive in our sector. Regards Bobby Ndawula Group Finance Director Skipton Building Society 3 OVERVIEW OF SKIPTON BUILDING SOCIETY GROUP Our business model and group structure Skipton Building Society is the fourth largest building society in the UK, with £16bn of assets, almost 795,000 members and a national presence of branches and agencies. In 2014, Group profit before tax from continuing operations was up 53% to £156.8 million. The Group’s business model is based on a divisional structure and each division fulfils a distinct purpose aligned to the Group’s overall strategy. The Society is at the heart of the Skipton Group and the key member of the core Mortgages and Savings division, whose business model is built on providing a secure home for our members’ savings which allows us to lend to borrowers and enable home ownership. The Group’s business model also includes our interests in Estate Agency (through the Connells Group) which provides a significant income stream that further strengthens the Society’s financial position, and the provision of financial advice through Skipton Financial Services as part of the extended Society offering. In addition, the Group holds interests in a number of other smaller companies as part of the Investment Portfolio. The Board is the chief operating decision making body and reviews the performance of the Group across a number of reportable segments as detailed below. Each segment offers different products and services and is managed on a divisional basis in line with the Group’s management and internal reporting structure. The divisions are: Mortgages and Savings – the core division of the Group, principally the Society but also including specialist mortgage businesses Amber Homeloans Limited (AHL) and North Yorkshire Mortgages Limited (NYM), as well as deposit taking and mortgage lending in the Channel Islands and the UK through Skipton International Limited (SIL). The division also includes the Group’s special purpose vehicles (SPVs) Darrowby No. 1 plc, Darrowby No. 2 plc and Darrowby No. 3 plc, formed to acquire funds from the wholesale markets, and the intermediate holding company Skipton Group Holdings Limited (SGHL). Estate Agency – provision of estate agency and other property related services through the Connells Group which is one of the largest and most profitable estate agency groups in the UK with a c.£250 million annual turnover. The group now has 520 branches operating under the Connells brand and other well-known local names including Allen & Harris, Bagshaws Residential, Barnard Marcus, Brown & Merry, Fox & Sons, Jones & Chapman, Manners & Harrison, Roger Platt, Shipways, Swetenhams, William H Brown, Sharman Quinney and Pattison Lane. As well as residential sales, the group also offers services in surveys and valuations, conveyancing, lettings, asset management, land acquisition and mortgage broking markets. Connells is consistently named Best Large Estate Agency at the Estate Agency of the Year awards in association with the Sunday Times, winning the top prize for six of the past eight years. It is also highly acclaimed in the New Homes category, winning Gold six times in the last eight years; and in the Financial Services category in which it has won the Gold prize for the second consecutive year. Financial Advice – provision of financial advice through Skipton Financial Services (SFS) which is a Top 20 national financial advisory firm whose specialities include advising on investments and inheritance tax planning for people of any age. It provides professional advice to over 100,000 clients nationally and due to its outstanding reputation has been entrusted with placing investments of £3.5 billion. Investment Portfolio – includes a small number of trading companies that do not fall within the core operating segments.