Deputy Chief Financial Officer

Would you like to join a centre of excellence in rural and remote healthcare?

Site North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust Town Carlisle Salary £112,782 - £129,783 Per Annum, Pro Rata Salary period Yearly Closing 28/09/2026 23:59 Interview date 01/10/2026

Job overview

We are seeking an exceptional and strategically focused Deputy Chief Financial Officer to join North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust at a pivotal time in our organisation's development. Working closely with the Chief Financial Officer (CFO), you will play a key leadership role in shaping the Trust's financial strategy, supporting organisational transformation, and ensuring the delivery of high-quality, sustainable healthcare services for the communities we serve.

As Deputy CFO, you will provide both strategic and operational financial leadership, helping to drive financial sustainability across a large and complex NHS organisation. You will support the delivery of a high-performing finance function, ensuring robust financial planning, governance, reporting, and assurance arrangements are in place to meet the Trust's evolving needs.

Interviews will be held on 1st October 2026

Main duties of the job

• Leadership of the strategic and operational financial planning processes.
• Leadership on the development, implementation and monitoring of the Trust’s Medium Term Financial Recovery Plan as part of the Intensive Recovery Programme to include development of benchmarking across the Trust.
• Support to CFO in negotiation and review of contract / service line agreements. Development of collaborative relationships with ICB in their strategic role as commissioners.
• Overall responsibility for financial performance reporting to Trust’s Executive Team, Senior Leadership Team, Board Sub - committees and Trust Board.
• Leadership on specific financial projects as delegated by the CFO.
• Review, scrutiny and analysis of highly complex business cases including alignment of non-financial information presented and provision of recommendations to the Trust’s Executive Team, Senior Leadership Team, Board Sub - committees and Trust Board.
• Leadership with Associate Director of Finance (Financial Services & Reporting) on engagement with external auditors, internal auditors and Local Counter Fraud Service.
• Within national and ICB financial payment mechanisms work to identify and deliver the structure to provide assurance that all income due to the Trust is received. This will require engagement with Information, Clinical Coding and PLICS / SLR teams.

Working for our organisation

At NCIC, we have an ambition to deliver outstanding healthcare services to the population of North Cumbria. The Trust is committed to creating a centre of excellence in providing rural and remote healthcare and provides a wide range of community and acute services throughout our county.

Our 5 key principles demonstrate our belief in the delivery of ‘safe, high quality care every time’:

• Being a clinically led organisation
• Quality and safety at the heart of our Trust
• A positive patient experience every time
• A great place to work
• Managing our money well

As an organisation we are serious about supporting a diverse workforce that reflects our local community and are very much focused on being an inclusive and compassionate place to work.

Across the North East and North Cumbria we are working together to deliver our ambition to be the greenest region in England by 2030. All staff are expected to support sustainability.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Please see attached job description and person specification for further information regarding the role and the essential and desirable criteria required to be met by applicants.

CERTIFICATE OF SPONSORSHIP

Please note, due to changes implemented by the Government to the UK immigration policy, individuals who require a Health and Care Visa or a Skilled Worker Visa may no longer be eligible for sponsorship where the UKVI salary threshold is not met or if the occupation is not included in the updated Immigration Salary List (ISL). Applicants must check their eligibility to be employed in any role they are interested in applying for, prior to completing an application for employment.Any applicants who do not meet the eligibility criteria will not be progressed. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).

If you are applying under the Disability Confident Scheme or Armed Forces Covenant and you meet all the essential criteria for a post, you will be guaranteed an interview.

Relocation assistance may be available for successful applicants moving to the region for certain posts. Please see our Policy for eligiblevacancies.

Disclosure and Barring Service:

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

The cost of the DBS must be met by the successful candidate(s) through salary deduction. DBS charges are as follows if applicable to the post:

Standard Check: £21.50 + Administration cost of £5.90 = £27.40. Deducted from salary over a 4 month period or a one-off payment.

Enhanced Check: £49.50 + administration cost of £5.90 = £55.40. Deducted from salary over a 4 month period or a one-off payment.

NCIC can offer successful future employees the following benefits

• 27-day holiday scheme rising to 33 after 10 years
• NHS Discounts*
• Salary Sacrifice schemes including lease cars and Cycle to Work*
• Vivup is a free, confidential counselling and information service to assist with personal or work-related problems
• *Subject to eligibility

Please ensure that you document evidence of meeting all the essential criteria in the supporting information.

Candidates who have been successfully shortlisted for interview will be asked via an email notification to log on to their Trac account to select an interview time. This will usually be within 2 weeks of the closing date.

Person specification

Qualifications & Training

• Educated to degree level.
• Professionally qualified accountant (Member of CCAB approved body – CIPFA, ICAEW, CIMA) with significant post qualification experience. Evidence of relevant continued professional development.

Skills and Aptitudes

• Significant post qualification experience at a senior level in a complex organisation
• Knowledge of NHS and the acute sector
• Expert specialist knowledge of financial and accounting procedures including current legislation and NHS accounting policies.
• Experience of annual report / account production
• Experience of the NHS planning process, contracting environment and payment by results.
• Significant staff and budgetary management experience.
• Experience of representing and negotiating contracts and service level agreements on behalf of a Trust.
• Experience of contract management processes
• Extensive experience of collecting complex data from a number of sources, forming opinions, identifying options, making recommendations and presenting to diverse audiences.
• Solid experience of managing a programme of project work, including major organisational and/or service change.
• Experience of taking a finance team through transformational change to enhance the service provided to customers and stakeholders.
• Experience of managing shared service procurement contract.
• Experience in leading the strategic and operational financial planning processes for the Trust.
• Experience in leading the development, implementation and monitoring of the Trust’s financial sustainability plan to include development of benchmarking across the Trust.
• Experience in the review, scrutiny and analysis of highly complex business cases including alignment of non financial information presented and provision of recommendations to the Trust’s Executive Team, Senior Leadership Team, Board Sub - committees and Trust Board.
• Experience of managing engagement with external auditors, internal auditors and Local Counter Fraud Service.
• Significant experience at Deputy Director of Finance level.
• Significant experience within healthcare.
• Acute provider experience. Understanding of complex Group accounting
• Understanding of new technologies and their application to the Finance function.

Personal/professional attributes

• Excellent interpersonal, influencing and negotiating skills. Highly developed communication and written presentation skills.
• Ability to work under pressure and be resilient in times of change

Employer certification / accreditation badges

The postholder will have access to vulnerable people in the course of their normal duties and as such this post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service to check for any previous criminal convictions.