The best thing you can do over the next twelve months is stop hiring roles and start building a team. A single good appointment fixes a gap for a quarter. A well-sequenced team gives you a function that runs without you in every meeting.
That shift in thinking is the difference between a busy year and a productive one. Here is how to approach it.
Why does the single-hire mindset keep failing you?
Most finance leaders hire when the pain gets loud. A month-end slips, a board pack is late, someone resigns, and you open a requisition to plug the hole.
The problem is that each hire is judged in isolation. You fill the seat, the noise stops, and you move on until the next gap appears.
Meanwhile the shape of your function never gets designed. You end up with a team assembled by emergencies rather than intent.
Building a team means asking a different question. Not "who do I need now", but "what does the layer below me need to look like in twelve months, and what is the order I build it in".
What should the layer below you actually do?
Start with your own week. Write down where your time goes for a fortnight.
You will find a pattern. Too much of your time sits in work that a strong Financial Controller or Head of FP&A should own. Reconciliations you are chasing. Commentary you are rewriting. Questions you are answering because nobody else can.
The layer below you exists to absorb that work. A good number two runs the close, owns the controls, and hands you a clean set of numbers with the story already attached.
When that layer is right, you spend your week on the things only you can do. Capital, commercial decisions, the relationships that move the business. When it is wrong, you are the most expensive Finance Manager in the building.
How do you sequence hires over twelve months?
Sequence matters more than speed. The order you build in decides whether each hire lands on solid ground or props up a wobbly one.
A workable sequence usually looks like this.
First, secure the control layer. If your Financial Controller or Financial Accountant seat is weak, fix it before anything else. Everything above it depends on numbers you can trust.
Second, build the reporting and analysis layer. Once the close is reliable, a Head of FP&A or FP&A Manager turns clean data into decisions.
Third, strengthen the transactional base. A calm purchase ledger and a tidy billing function stop problems flowing upward.
Do it in that order and each hire inherits a stable foundation. Do it out of order and you hire an analyst to interpret numbers nobody trusts.
How do you hire for the gap and the growth?
Every hire has two jobs. Solve the problem in front of you, and carry weight later.
When you interview a Finance Manager, picture them as your Financial Controller in two years. Ask whether they show the judgement, not just the technical skill. Can they explain a variance to a non-finance colleague. Do they push back when something looks wrong.
This is where a good recruitment partner earns their keep. At Harper May we spend as much time on trajectory as on the current spec, because the appointment that grows is worth far more than the one that simply fits.
Hire only for today and you rebuild your team every eighteen months. Hire for the arc and your best people stay because they can see where they are going.
What do you do about retention while you build?
Building a team is pointless if the good people leave while you do it. Retention is part of the build, not a separate exercise.
The people most at risk are your reliable performers. The Financial Accountant who never misses a deadline. The FP&A Manager who quietly holds the model together. They rarely complain, so they rarely get attention.
Give them a reason to stay. Real ownership, a visible path, and honest conversations about what comes next. A promotion planned twelve months out will hold someone far better than a counter-offer made in a panic.
When you do need to go to market, move deliberately rather than fast. If you want a sense of who is available at each level, our finance jobs board is a useful gauge.
How do you know the team is working?
You know it is working when your week changes shape. The close runs without your intervention. The board pack arrives finished, not half done. Questions get answered before they reach you.
That freeing up of your week is the real measure. Not headcount, not org charts, but how much of your time returns to the work that only you can do.
Build toward that over twelve months and you will end the year with a function, not a pile of solved vacancies.
Common questions
Should I hire a strong number two before anything else?
Usually yes, if your control layer is weak. A reliable Financial Controller or Head of Finance stabilises everything above them and gives you room to build the rest with a clear head.
How do I build a team when I have no extra budget?
Start by redesigning roles rather than adding them. Redistribute ownership, promote from within where you can, and make the case for one targeted hire that removes the most work from your own week.
