Job advert - Head of Finance
Based
Remote working in the UK. You will either work from home all the time, or if you are near Devon can spend 1-2 days per week in Totnes. Depending on your circumstances we would also be keen on a secondment to Ghana in your first year. The postholder will expected to undertake frequent travel to Ghana and Uganda.
Summary
This is a unique opportunity for a Finance expert to join a fun, high impact, mission driven organisation. This could be an ideal opportunity for a Finance expert who’s gained experience in another sector and is looking to transition to a not for profit. Lively Minds is a dynamic and fast-growing organisation. You will have the opportunity to work on varied and cutting-edge topics and contexts. You’ll be part of a lively ambitious organisation, determined to have a major positive impact on the world. We work hard, at a fast pace, in a challenging environment. Our work is demanding but provides plenty of opportunity for innovation, responsibility, growth, collaboration, creativity and fun. We want all staff to be happy, fulfilled and to feel appreciated and valued in their work. . You will be offered the opportunity to develop through targeted learning support which will include external learning opportunities or Coaching.
We are looking for a Head of Finance to manage all aspects of the organisation’s finances. Our current annual budget is approximately £3m and we plan to grow this to £5m by 2025. Your role includes, setting and managing budgets, supporting fundraising strategy and proposals, overseeing spend and financial controls and processes. You will lead the finance teams in Ghana and Uganda made up of a Finance Manager in Ghana, four Finance Officers, and a Procurement and Logistics Officer.
For a detailed understanding of the role and person criteria, please see the Job Description.
About us
Our mission is to get preschool children in rural Africa school-ready. At present over 250 million children worldwide fail to receive the education and care they need in their early years which means they are less likely to do well in school, find gainful employment, and are at greater risk of early marriage, early parenthood and even criminality. Current approaches to solving this crisis are not proving effective or scalable in lower middle income countries.
That’s where Lively Minds comes in. We have developed an award-winning Early Childhood Development programme that has been proven to get pre-schoolers in hard-to-reach communities school-ready, so they have a greater chance of succeeding in school and in life. The programme provides marginalised Mothers with a parenting course that empowers them to run educational Play Schemes for pre-schoolers and to provide better home-based care, using cheap local resources. The programme is delivered through government partners, is cheap and highly scalable. It genuinely has the potential to play a transformative role in ending the global ECD crisis.
Over the past few years the Lively Minds programme, currently operating in over 1000 communities in rural Ghana and Uganda is reaching over 120,000 children, with this figure set to triple over the next few years. During COVID we launched a radio programme for parents and this is now reaching over 2 million households each week. We are extremely proud that the Government of Ghana have now adopted the programme and we have a ground-breaking partnership with them to support them to institutionalise it, fund it and to scale it to 60 education districts, reaching over 4000 communities and 1 million children. We see this partnership as the test case that will provide the blueprint to take the programme to scale in Uganda and elsewhere within the next 5 years.
How to apply
Please send your CV and cover letter to emma@livelyminds.org before the deadline. We love a well-written cover letter, please ensure you outline why you would be perfect for the role.
Deadline for applications: 11:59pm GMT on Sunday 29th May 2022.