Manager - Business Analyst

Produce payroll, labour-cost and people-cost analysis — by department, by location, by show

Produce departmental cost analysis, utilisation reporting and bench analysis

Prepare and Post monthly payroll journal ensuring payroll costs, taxes and benefits, bonuses and accruals are accurately recorded

Support headcount reporting and analysis across UK, Montreal and Mumbai

Surface areas of concern, variance against budget and commercial opportunity for the Commercial FD and leadership team to act on

Extract, clean and integrate data from production systems (Shotgun, Ftrack or equivalent), HR and payroll systems, and Xero

Build and maintain reporting tools in Power BI or equivalent BI platform

Develop and improve data pipelines so that operational data flows into finance reporting with minimum manual intervention

Document data sources, definitions and refresh cadences so the reporting is reproducible and not dependent on a single person

Provide the Commercial FD with reforecast inputs, margin analysis and pipeline reporting

Contribute to budgeting and planning cycles with show-level, departmental and historical labour-economics analysis

Prepare clear, well-structured analysis to enable senior decisions — the role facilitates the challenge to producers and operations leads rather than leading it directly

Work closely with show producers and operations leads across UK, Canada and India to source the right data

Partner with HR and payroll on people-cost reporting and headcount analysis

Coordinate with the broader Mumbai finance team under pastoral leadership of the Senior Finance Manager

Strong SQL and proven experience building reporting in Power BI, Tableau or equivalent

Advanced Excel — modelling, complex formulas, Power Query

Demonstrable experience working with operational and financial data in a project-based, people-intensive business (VFX, post-production, animation, agency, architecture, consulting or similar)

Understands the economic model of a service business — rate card, utilisation, realised rate, bench, labour cost — and how operational decisions translate to margin

Finance literacy — P&L, margins, contribution, working capital — and able to connect operational data to financial outcomes

Strong written communication; produces clear, well-structured analysis that supports senior decision-making

Curious and self-directed — willing to dig into data to find the story rather than waiting to be told what to look for

5+ years' relevant experience

Light scripting (Python or similar) to extract and transform data from production system APIs

Experience of Xero or similar cloud accounting platforms

Experience of Shotgun, Ftrack or other VFX production tracking systems

Accountancy qualification (part-qualified, qualified or qualified-by-experience)

Exposure to creative industries, VFX, post-production, animation or media

Experience working with payroll and HR data

Intellectually curious — wants to understand why the numbers are what they are, not just report them

Pragmatic — comfortable building something good enough fast, then iterating

Strong documenter — builds reproducible processes, not personal knowledge silos

Discreet — handles sensitive payroll and people data with appropriate care

Confident working across time zones with UK and Mumbai-based colleagues

If you think Outpost sounds like a good fit for you, or you simply want to chat with someone about the role and our culture, get in touch today!

At Outpost we believe that our strength lies in our differences. These help us to take different perspectives, challenge norms and create a special environment based on mutual respect. Outpost is an equal opportunities employer. Employment with us is based on a person’s extraordinary talent and potential. No candidate will receive any less favourable treatment based on their age, gender, race, ethnicity, disability, sexual preference, or any other factor that has no bearing on an individual’s ability to perform their job.