Day-One Finance Integration Authority — Specialty Insurance Combination

The mandate

Regulatory approval arrived earlier than the base plan and the finance-integration lead resigned seven weeks before completion. Legal-entity, chart, close, treasury, tax, actuarial feed and control decisions remain open across two insurers with different underwriting calendars. The group needs an executive who can secure Day One without disguising unresolved accounting and regulatory dependencies as completed integration.

The interim must start within ten days for twelve months, owning close readiness, controlled consolidation, finance-process integration, three quarter ends and successor induction. The permanent search begins after the first combined close. Six weeks are protected for overlap; the role will not extend to underwriting integration, broad operating-model redesign or legal-entity simplification beyond approved finance dependencies.

Handover requires one accountable combined close calendar, reconciled opening ledgers and intercompany positions, controlled actuarial and underwriting feeds, signed regulatory responsibilities, stable treasury authority and three quarter closes within agreed tolerance. The successor must chair an unseen late-reserve and acquisition-accounting adjustment, then accept residual system, entity and historical-data debt.

The interim may set finance integration priorities, freeze non-essential changes, assign temporary process owners, approve designs within the authorised £42 million budget and sign delegated internal finance decisions. The CFO and Audit Committee retain accounting policy, external reporting and excess spend; boards retain statutory approvals. The interim cannot change underwriting appetite, dismiss permanent executives or alter transaction consideration.

Claims, distribution and technology integration unrelated to finance control are outside scope, as are post-close acquisitions and wholesale ERP replacement. The authority may require evidence-bearing interfaces from those functions but does not own their transformation. The assignment is bounded to Day-One financial control, reliable combined reporting and a permanent finance-integration operating model.

Why this seat is open

The accelerated approval compressed a complex close, then the integration leader’s resignation removed the only cross-company finance authority. Existing controllers can protect their entities but cannot arbitrate combined priorities while performing normal reporting. Temporary leadership must bridge completion through three tested closes before handing to a permanent appointee.

What you will own

• Decide the Day-One finance control perimeter across ledgers, actuarial feeds, treasury authority, tax, consolidation and regulatory reporting.
• Reconcile opening balances, acquisition entries, intercompany positions, chart mappings and retained legacy adjustments before combined reporting.
• Establish one close calendar with named evidence owners, issue thresholds, escalation rights and explicit provisional treatments.
• Command quarter-end scenarios for late reserve change, premium-feed failure, currency movement, tax adjustment and entity-access disruption.
• Allocate the approved integration budget across critical controls, temporary capacity, interfaces and independent close assurance.
• Govern progress through close accuracy, reconciliation ageing, manual journals, control exceptions, regulatory timeliness and dependency burn-down.
• Transfer authority after three quarter closes and successor acceptance of systems, entities, policy matters and historical-data limitations.

Candidate qualifications

• Held executive finance-integration authority through completion and post-close reporting for a regulated insurance acquisition or merger.
• Combined general-ledger, actuarial, premium, claims, treasury, tax and regulatory evidence across materially different close calendars.
• Established Day-One controls while acquisition accounting, legal-entity and technology decisions were still moving.
• Led several reliable combined closes under audit and regulatory scrutiny without concealing provisional treatments or manual dependencies.
• Worked with statutory directors, actuaries and external auditors while preserving their formal judgements and sign-off duties.
• Handed an integration office to permanent leadership through live reporting and adversarial late-adjustment exercises.

Non-negotiables

• Available within ten days for exclusive London service through completion and all three quarter-end windows.
• Has led finance integration in regulated insurance; general post-merger transformation experience is insufficient.
• No undisclosed relationship with either transaction party, external auditor, integration supplier or competing bidder.
• Will preserve statutory, actuarial and audit authority even where provisional treatment would accelerate reported integration.

1. 49 words maximum. State your London availability and one Day-One finance decision you made before every dependency was resolved.
2. 49 words maximum. How did you produce a controlled combined close while acquisition accounting remained provisional?
3. 49 words maximum. Which unseen late-reserve adjustment would qualify the permanent integration leader?