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About the Role
The Business Planning & Resource Manager will work closely with the Director of Estates to lead unit-wide planning across staff and non-staff resources. The role is central to resource planning, including presenting proposals to senior stakeholders such as the Vice-Chancellors Executive (VCE) Panel, Chief Financial Officer (CFO), and other Finance colleagues. A key responsibility of the role is the development, coordination, and critical assessment of business cases and feasibility studies, either as reviewer or lead author, ensuring financial robustness and supporting the organisation’s annual financial planning cycle.
You will also oversee legacy financial responsibilities not covered by Finance Business Partner roles, working closely with Central Finance to ensure smooth financial operations. In addition, the post holder acts as Estates’ internal procurement expert, leading or supporting procurement exercises for works and services, ensuring compliance, value for money, and operational effectiveness. The role involves close collaboration with the Director of Estates, leadership and business partners, as well as hands-on financial administration, tracking, ordering, and forward resource planning.
Key Responsibilities
- Lead unit-wide business planning with the Director, covering finance, staffing, future forecasting, risk, and presentation to the VCE Panel in collaboration with Finance and People Business Partners.
- Hold lead responsibility for legacy financial activities outside FBP roles, including ordering, expenditure and income tracking, supplier liaison, invoice queries, and use of the SPA Ariba system.
- Conduct ad hoc internal financial and procurement audits to ensure compliance with policies and devolved responsibilities.
- Prepare management information and financial analysis (spend patterns, trends, datasets) to support operational needs, business cases, and feasibility studies, avoiding duplication with FBPs.
- Support capital budgeting and accounting by identifying capitalisable items, preparing budgets where required, and maintaining capital reporting with FBPs.
- Prepare financial information and supporting data for grant applications and external funding enquiries.
- Act as Unit Purchasing Card holder, authorising purchases, reconciling transactions, and approving payments.
- Play a key role in business cases and feasibility studies, ranging from contributor to lead author, including drafting, critique, stakeholder engagement, and presentation of rationale to diverse audiences.
- Provide bespoke financial input to Estates feasibility studies, ensuring data robustness and presenting findings clearly to multiple stakeholders.
- Identify and manage financial, planning, and procurement risks, contributing to and maintaining the unit risk register.
- Lead and support unit procurement activities, including sourcing strategies, tenders, quotations, evaluations, financial checks, award documentation, supplier communication, and value‑for‑money assessments.
- Maintain contractor and supplier records, support annual insurance and estates management returns, advise on tax status of self‑employed contractors, and undertake ad hoc departmental tasks and projects as required.
About You
Essential
- Degree‑level qualification in Business, Financial Management or Procurement (or equivalent professional experience).
- Proven experience in workforce/people data analysis within a complex organisation.
- Strong capability to work closely with senior leadership, Finance and People Business Partners, and administrative teams.
- In‑depth knowledge of unit planning, forecasting (staff and non‑staff), and operational practices, supporting Directors with current and future resource planning.
- Sound understanding of devolved procurement, procurement systems, supplier engagement, and value‑for‑money principles, acting as an internal procurement expert.
- Demonstrated experience in capital budgeting and the development, appraisal, and presentation of business cases and feasibility studies.
- Solid understanding of budgeting, reporting, and financial administration within operational projects.
- Advanced data analysis and management accounting skills, including handling and interpreting sensitive personal data.
- Strong stakeholder engagement skills, particularly with Strategy and Finance functions.
- Ability to carry out robust qualitative and quantitative analysis, identify risks and trends, and clearly communicate insights to technical and non‑technical audiences.
- Excellent teamwork, workload planning, prioritisation, and decision‑making skills, with the ability to work independently under pressure.
- High‑level communication, digital, and reporting skills, including use of business intelligence tools, KPI reporting, P‑Card controls, and standard collaboration software (e.g. MS Office).
Desirable:
- Demonstratable experience of project management and quality assurance.
- Data analysis experience with proven ability to understand complex business questions and take a lead role in the development of a coherent analytical framework which delivers insight into performance.
- Understanding of University Governance and Professional Service networks and process requirements including EDI, BIA and EIA requirements.
- Knowledge of impact evaluation and stakeholder engagement strategies.
Support with your application
If you have any questions, or need support or adjustments relating to your application, the recruitment process, or the role, please contact us on 01908 541111 or email careers@open.ac.uk quoting the advert reference number.
What's in it for you?
At The Open University, we offer a range of benefits to recognise and reward great work, alongside policies and flexible working that contribute towards a great work life balance. Get all the details of what benefits we offer by visiting our Staff Benefits page (clicking this link will open a new window).
Flexible working
Please note that this role is based on site at our Milton Keynes campus and will require the successful candidate to work on campus for their full working week.
We are open to discussions about flexible working. Whether it’s a job share, part time, compressed hours or another working arrangement. Please reach out to us to discuss what works best for you.
Next steps in the Recruitment process
We anticipate that face-to-face interviews for this role will be taking place on-site at our Milton Keynes campus during the week commencing 1 June 2026.
Early closing date notification
While most roles will remain open until the advertised closing date, applications may be reviewed on an ongoing basis. In some cases, vacancies may close earlier if a sufficient number of suitable applications has been received and equality impacts have been appropriately considered. All roles will remain advertised for a minimum of one week before any early closure is implemented. If you have started an application or were in the process of applying when the advert closed, we encourage you to get in touch. We are committed to understanding individual circumstances and can offer further support where needed, including reasonable adjustments for applicants with protected characteristics.
How to apply
To apply for this role please submit the following documents:
- CV
- A personal statement of up to 1000 words. You should set out in your statement why you are interested in the role and provide examples of where your skills and experience meet the required competencies for this role as detailed in the job description.
You can view your progress and application communications when you are logged into our recruitment system. Please check your spam/junk folders if you do not receive associated email updates.
