Head of Working Capital

Kennedys is looking for a Head of Working Capital to join our global finance team based in our Chelmsford office, with travel to London as required. This is an exciting opportunity to shape and lead the UK and EMEA working capital team for a growing, global law firm. The role offers significant exposure to senior leadership, the opportunity to influence firm-wide performance, and the chance to drive meaningful operational and financial transformation across an international platform.

The Head of Working Capital is responsible for leading and optimising the firm's end-to-end working capital cycle across the UK and EMEA region and practice groups, including receivables, payables, inventory, and cash management, driving strategies that enhance cash flow, reduce financing costs, and improve the overall financial health of the firm.

As the finance team looks to transform traditional processes to better align with the strategic goals of the firm, this role will champion transformation initiatives. This role will drive improvements in lock-up, billing, collections, cash conversion and client financial management while ensuring alignment with the firm's broader financial objectives.

Working closely with Partners, Practice Group Leaders, Regional Finance leads and the Global Financial Operations Director, the role will develop and execute a working capital strategy that enhances cash flow, improves financial discipline, and supports sustainable growth.

The successful candidate will combine strong leadership capabilities with deep expertise in legal-sector working capital management, stakeholder engagement and operational transformation.

Team

Kennedys Finance team supports the firm globally through the delivery of timely, accurate financial and management information, commercial insight, reporting solutions and operational support that underpin decision-making across the business. The team plays a key role in enabling sustainable growth, improving performance and ensuring operational excellence is provided to the firm's internal and external clients.

Our Finance function includes Financial Reporting, Tax, Treasury, Business Intelligence, Business Partnering and Analytics, Procurement, Finance Systems and Financial Operations, working in partnership with practice and business services leaders across the firm's international network.

Kennedys operates across the UK, EMEA, LATAM, APAC and the US, and this role will play a key part in delivering consistent, high-quality financial operations across the firm's international office network.

Key Responsibilities

Working Capital Performance

• Take ownership of the working capital strategy and development across the UK and EMEA ensuring consistency with global operations, and that the team and systems provide the optimum solution needed to support the efficient and effective working of the firm now and in preparation for future growth
• Act as the senior subject matter expert and trusted advisor for working capital management across the firm.
  Partner with senior leadership to identify opportunities for operational efficiencies and process enhancement
• Champion and lead transformation initiatives to continuously optimise cash conversion, improving WIP management, billing timeliness, debtor recovery and overall lock-up performance
• Monitor and analyse key performance indicators including: WIP days, debtor days, lock-up days, billing realisation, collection effectiveness and cash conversion metrics
• Ensure consistent application of billing and collections policies
• Responsibility for ensuring that the team meet the KPI set for cash collection, billing and working capital management
• Development of reporting that demonstrates the effectiveness of the teams operations that can be used to identify opportunities for change.

Partner and Stakeholder Engagement

• Build trusted relationships with Partners and Practice Group Leaders to drive accountability for working capital performance
• Provide commercial insight and challenge where necessary to improve financial outcomes
• Lead presentations and discussions with leadership regarding working capital performance.

Team Leadership

• Lead, develop, motivate and mentor a team of working capital and revenue professionals
• Create a sustainable high-performance culture focused on service excellence, accountability and continuous improvement
• Establish consistent operating procedures and best practices
• Identify capability gaps and implement development plans for team members.

Process Improvement and Transformation

• Identify opportunities to automate, streamline and standardise working capital processes
• Sponsor and lead transformation projects relating to billing, collections, eBilling, matter management and finance technology
• Collaborate within finance and wider business services teams to improve financial operational processes
• Leverage data analytics and reporting tools to enhance decision-making and forecasting.

Governance and Risk Management

• Ensure compliance with the SRA accounts rules and all other statutory and regulatory requirements
• Ensure strong discipline and internal controls to reduce risk and comply with both firm policies and client agreements Manage escalation processes for high-risk debtor positions and significant client exposures
• Support audit requirements and financial governance initiatives.

Required Experience

• Relevant experience in finance, accounting, or business operations is essential. A bachelor's degree in Finance, Accounting, Business Administration or a related field, and/or professional qualifications such as CPA, CMA or CFA are desirable.
• Significant experience in a working capital management leadership role, in a law firm environment
• In-depth understanding of cash flow management, credit control and inventory management
• Demonstrated success in improving lock-up performance, collections and cash flow at scale
• Experience managing geographically dispersed teams in a global environment
• Experience in driving change and continuous improvement initiatives
• Proven track record of working with and influencing cross functional teams, senior stakeholders and partners
• Strong analytical, financial modelling, and problem-solving skills
• Excellent negotiation and communication skills
• Proficient in ERP systems, financial software, and MS Excel.

Please let us know if you require any additional support or adjustments to be made in order to submit your application to Kennedys.

About Kennedys

Kennedys is a global law firm with expertise in dispute resolution and advisory services. With over 3,000 people in 45 offices across 18 countries around the world we have some of the most respected legal minds in their field.

Our lawyers handle both contentious and non-contentious matters, and provide a range of specialist legal services, for many industry sectors but we have particular expertise in litigation and dispute resolution, especially in defending insurance and liability claims.

We're a fresh-thinking firm, and we're not afraid to bring challenging new perspectives to the table way beyond the traditional realm of legal services. We empower our clients with a diverse range of ideas, tools and technology to make their lives easier, as well as delivering exceptional results, every time.

What do we have to offer?

We welcome high-performing lawyers, business services professionals, secretaries, graduates and apprentices to join our rapidly expanding global firm. Whatever your role at Kennedys, you'll be involved in exciting and stimulating work, where your input will make a difference.

Our culture and values form a big part of who we are and we take them seriously. We make a difference by being approachable, straightforward, supportive, distinctive and ambitious. Our are at the core of who we are and what make us a great firm to work with and for.

The Firm recognises the value of investing in our people's development and believes our culture and values contribute to the quality of our work and of our client relationships. With a culture of on-the-job and experiential learning, peer to peer learning, mentoring, resources and tools that enable you to drive your career, we can support your development in your current and future roles. A variety of other opportunities are available including secondments to clients and our global offices.

We strive to celebrate empower our people and ensure everyone can bring their authentic selves to work. We've created a culture based on client service, professional excellence, hard work and trust, where diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) is a key priority. We recognise that many of our people want to work for an employer that is aligned to their values, which is why we are building an inclusive culture, decarbonising our operations and supporting our people to thrive at work. Our people are the key to driving this change and helping us to make a difference to our clients, our people and the communities in which we live and work.

Kennedys is an equal opportunities employer and is committed to ensuring our recruitment processes are as inclusive as possible. We expect all employees to be aware of and comply with all relevant policies and procedures within their jurisdiction, including those relating to Information Security, Data Protection and Quality Management, refer any breach promptly to Risk & Compliance and to complete all mandatory training when requested.