Practical Action

ABOUT US

About Us

We are an international development organisation putting ingenious ideas to work so people in poverty can change their world.

We help people find solutions to some of the world’s toughest problems. Challenges made worse by catastrophic climate change and persistent gender inequality. We work with communities to develop ingenious, lasting and locally owned solutions for agriculture, water and waste management, climate resilience and clean energy. And we share what works with others, so answers that start small can grow big.

We’re a global change-making group. The group consists of a UK registered charity with community projects in Africa, Asia and Latin America, an independent development publishing company and a technical consulting service. We combine these specialisms to multiply our impact and help shape a world that works better for everyone.

Our Aims

We help people find solutions to some of the world’s toughest problems, made worse by catastrophic climate change and persistent gender inequality. Our aims are to:

• Make agriculture work better for smallholder farmers, many of them women, so they can adapt to climate change and achieve a good standard of living
• Help more people harness the transformational effects of clean affordable energy and reduce avoidable deaths caused by smoke from indoor stoves and fires.
• Make cities in poorer countries cleaner, healthier places to live and work.
• Build disaster resilience into the lives of people threatened by hazards – reducing the risk of hazards and minimising their impact on lives and livelihoods.

How We Work

We work on holistic solutions that change systems and have a framework to help us achieve our aims:

• Analyse the root causes of a poverty and vulnerability
• Define the change at scale we need to make
• Develop activities along three complementary paths: Demonstrate, Learn and Inspire.
• Demonstrate that our solutions are sustainable in the real world
• Learn by capturing evidence and adapting our approach
• Inspire wider support to multiply our impact.

Our Organisation

Practical Action is an unconventional, multi-disciplinary change making organisation

• A highly innovative community development charity operating in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Practical Action community projects use ingenious ideas to design, test, refine and prove new ways to overcome poverty and disadvantage and then ‘open-source’ knowledge of what works so that it can be implemented at a greater scale by others.
• A world-class consulting operation that helps socially responsible business, government policy makers and other development organisations. This draws on learnings from our own development work as well as the combined brainpower of a roster of over 2,000 expert consultants. Practical Action Consulting helps to extend the reach of our influence by providing the best advice to others, whose work can make a bigger difference.
• A well respected specialist development publisher. Practical Action Publishing brings together development practitioners, researchers and thought leaders to create publications that stimulate discussion, strengthen peoples’ capabilities and inspire sustainable change.

About the Role

The Finance Manager plays a leadership role within the Country office and is accountable for providing operational leadership and management for all areas of finance in the organisation. The Finance Manager is a member of the senior management team.

The Finance Manager will lead the team of finance to:

• Oversee all financial management and ensure strong controls
• Oversee risk management at multiple levels ensuring that data analysis informs decision making
• Ensure organisational and donor policies and procedures are applied appropriately
• Ensure functional support to project delivery especially in budget management and compliance
• Work with the management team to ensure operational efficiency across all units of the organisation

Key Responsibilities

Leadership, Management and People

• Contribute to the development and implementation of Practical Action in Bangladesh Strategic Plan and annual operating plans.
• Take initiative to lead changes to financial policy and practice, in consultation with the Country Director and International Finance Team.
• Ensure our policies and procedures are understood and applied at all times
• Develop and maintain effective working relationships with other SMT members to understand their financial support requirements.
• Lead a high performing finance team in Bangladesh encouraging joined up ways of working across all office functions.
• Proactively support the professional growth of team members by offering quality feedback and opportunities to progress and grow
• Conduct timely quarterly people management conversations with direct reports, set objectives in line with the strategy and provide feedback and support to achieve the set objectives.

Achieving Change Ambitions and Delivery of Impact

• Contribute to the budgeting and forecasting process by providing the SMT with effective financial analysis and realistic propositions.
• Contribute to routine reporting against the Strategic Business Plan (SBP) – lead the preparation of financial sections.

Generating Funding and Managing Relationships

• Ensure that the Business Development team is supported in developing proposals ensuring that we maximize cost recovery and that proposals are taking into account all costs.
• Build a strong understanding of cost recovery across all teams.. Ensure we maintain accurate trackers of costs and coverage so that they can be built into proposals.
• Manage operational relationships with internal and external auditors and partners.

Delivering Performance

Finance management and accounting

• Disseminate accounting guidelines and information provided by relevant accounting bodies to ensure adherence to professional ethics and standards of accounting
• Consolidate financial information and provide the SMT with timely, accurate and relevant, monthly accounts for decision making.
• Analyse risks and opportunities associated with finance management, develop mitigation strategies, and ensure these are agreed with the SMT and UK finance team.
• Ensure accurate accounting records meet internal, donor and statutory requirements.
• Review and monitor management accounts and adjust where necessary and ensure flow of information, requirements, and effective financial management with the concerned teams
• Ensure our salary proposals are affordable and consistent with market.

Treasury and Tax

• Monitor overall liquidity in the balance sheet, set appropriate petty cash levels and manage bank accounts and operated by the Country Office to ensure prudent operations.
• Actively manage foreign currency balances, exchange rate exposure, debtors, partner balances and supplier terms to optimize working capital requirements. 
• Forecast multi-currency cash flow based on base, award, and reporting currencies.
• Keep up to date knowledge of taxation laws and future changes in the taxation environment and their implication for Practical Action.
• Advise internal stakeholders on taxation and most appropriate taxation structure
• Ensure that all statutory and non-statutory deductions are made correctly, promptly and are remitted to the respective authority as required by law.

Controls, Risk and Fraud Management

• Develop, implement, and maintain financial management procedures and control measures to ensure compliance with Practical Action’s group overall policies, generally accepted accounting standards, external donor requirements and national laws and regulations
• Create a well-defined financial and budgetary delegation of responsibilities in consultation with the Country Director and ensure this is reviewed and approved by relevant members of the international finance team.
• Ensure segregation of duties to prevent fraud and mismanagement
• Build organizational understanding and awareness of fraud and ensure this is regularly monitored
• Review and monitor organizational risk and audit actions and course adjust where necessary
• Ensure compliance with relevant financial regulations and laws, especially tax laws
• Ensure a strong financial internal control environment that safeguards organizational assets and inventories.
• Ensure proper maintenance of the financial records of the country office and safekeeping of all sensitive documents. Liaise with CD, IT Coordinator and P&C team as relevant.
• Develop and implement procedures for assessing the value for money that Practical Action obtains in all its activities

Statutory financial Reporting and Audit

• Lead the preparation and submission of a full set of financial statements and responses to management letter issues, providing interpretation of specific notes and articulating variances to previous years. 
• Facilitate and co-ordinate both internal and external audits and lead the development and implementation of action plans based on audit recommendations, monitoring progress on achievements.

Donor reporting

• Ensure the timely completion and submission of donor financial reports which are coordinated with the narrative.
• Ensure donor balances are accurate and reconciled each month, that the donor financial audits are completed on time are reviewed sufficiently before submission. 

Project & Award Management

• Maintain oversight of the funding position and grant management
• Review of all restricted funding applications to ensure the budget reflects realistic operational plans and support costs are being sufficiently recovered.
• Monitor financial progress of projects/awards in collaboration with the Programme Delivery team raising issues with SMT and informing International Finance teams if issues are unresolved.
• Ensure monthly budget holder reports are prepared, shared, reviewed, and addressed as necessary, in particular for high-risk awards.
• Build capacity of budget holders in forecasting and planning to improve performance.
• Ensure financial compliance with donor award requirements, including reporting.
• Support Programme Delivery team with management of all sub-awards, providing regular finance monitoring of sub-awardees, being involved in pre-award assessments, and supporting compliance.
• Support compliance on administration and procurement in accordance with organisational policies and donor rules.

Strengthening Profile

• Represent Practical Action on operational matters and actively contribute to the development of our brand essence and positioning

Experience, Knowledge & Skills

Overall

• ACCA/CIMA/ ACA or equivalent professional qualification
• At least seven years relevant work experience in finance or business administration, preferably in the international development sector, with at least half of that at management level.
• Proven leadership skills and the ability to support organisational change.
• Ability to effectively represent the country office, the organisation, and Practical Action’s work
• Commitment to development principles and Practical Action’s vision, mission, and ambition

Technical

• Proven ability in budgeting, planning and control of medium or large size organisation
• Ability to forecast financial challenges and provide strategic inputs
• Proven experience of contributing to development of proposals
• In-depth knowledge and experience in financial reporting requirements
• Strong understanding of donor rules
• Ability to identify, assess, monitor, and manage risks including developing mitigation strategies
• Excellent report writing, strong analytical, networking and communication skills (verbal and written)

Working with others

• Experience working with government, donors, partners, and multilateral agencies coupled with excellent communications skills.
• Proven ability to coordinate and collaborate with colleagues, building cohesion and buy-in

Management

• Proven ability to lead and manage a high performing team
• High levels of demonstrated skills in prioritising task and meeting deadlines
• Able to work remotely and independently with an understanding of working across multiple sites.

The opportunity to work for an organisation that is making a positive difference to the lives of people worldwide, a friendly and supportive culture, working with values driven and highly engaged colleagues, work life balance and flexible working – these are just some of the reasons we think Practical Action is a great place to work.

In addition, the compensation and benefit details are mentioned below:

Salary

​Monthly consolidated BDT 160,000 to 190,000/- including all other benefits and allowances.  Experienced and skilled candidates would be offered with appropriate packages. 

How to apply

​Please apply online by uploading your CV and Cover Letter by 22nd August. Consider applying as soon as possible because applications will be considered on rolling basis. Qualified female candidates are strongly encouraged to apply. 

​We treat all applications for employment on their merits and do not take into consideration any factors that are not relevant to the job such as disability, race, age, religion, gender, gender reassignment or sexual orientation. 
​Only shortlisted candidates will be called for interview. 

​Practical Action are committed to safeguarding and protecting children and vulnerable adults and as such candidates will be subject to pre-employment checks.