Senior Business Analyst

Senior Business Analyst – Finance, Payroll & Data

Contract | Outside IR35 | 6 Months | Remote

Day rate: Competitive, dependent on experience

The Role

We're recruiting a Senior Business Analyst for a 6-month contract, engaged on an Outside IR35 basis, working primarily remotely. This role sits within the Finance space, supporting a Finance & Data-focused programme, and requires a candidate who can hit the ground running with strong domain knowledge of Finance and Payroll business processes.

This is a proactive, hands-on role — the successful candidate will need to confidently command and lead workshops with stakeholders across Finance, Payroll, Data, and Technology teams, driving requirements gathering and analysis without heavy oversight.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead and facilitate workshops with senior Finance, Payroll, and Data stakeholders to elicit, challenge, and document business requirements
• Analyse and document current-state (as-is) and future-state (to-be) Finance and Payroll business processes
• Translate complex Finance and Data requirements into clear functional and non-functional specifications
• Work closely with Data teams to ensure Finance/Payroll data flows, definitions, and structures are accurately captured and aligned to business needs
• Identify process gaps, inefficiencies, and risks within existing Finance & Payroll operations, recommending improvements
• Produce high-quality BA deliverables: process maps, requirements documentation, user stories, and data mapping artefacts
• Act as the key liaison between Finance business stakeholders and technical/data delivery teams
• Support UAT planning and execution, ensuring solutions meet documented Finance and Payroll requirements
• Proactively manage ambiguity, taking ownership of analysis workstreams with minimal direction

Essential Experience

• Proven track record as a Senior Business Analyst, ideally within Finance transformation or Finance & Data programmes
• Direct experience working on Finance & Data projects — this is a core requirement, not a nice-to-have
• Strong working knowledge of Finance and Payroll business processes (e.g. general ledger, reconciliation, payroll processing, financial reporting, month-end close)
• Confident, experienced workshop facilitator — able to lead sessions with senior stakeholders and drive outcomes
• Highly proactive, self-directed working style, comfortable operating with autonomy
• Strong requirements-gathering, process mapping, and documentation skills
• Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills across business and technical audiences
• Experience working within Agile, Waterfall, or hybrid delivery environments

Desirable

• Experience with Finance/ERP systems (e.g. SAP S/4HANA, Oracle Financials, Workday)
• Data-specific BA experience (data mapping, data governance, data migration)
• Formal BA certification (e.g. BCS, CBAP, IIBA)
• Experience within regulated or complex organisational environments