Senior Delivery Manager - Financial Services (Contract Role - Inside IR35)

About us

We are The Very Group, and we’re here to help families get more out of life. We know our customers work hard for their families and have a lot to balance in their busy lives. That’s why we combine amazing brands and products with flexible payment options on Very.co.uk to help them say yes to the things they love.

We’re just as passionate about helping our people get more out of life too—building careers with real growth, a sense of purpose, belonging, and wellbeing.

About Financial Services

Our Financial Services team helps customers say yes to the things they love by offering flexible and responsible ways to pay. From credit products to insurance and account management, we make sure every financial interaction is simple, transparent, and customer-focused. It’s a dynamic environment where data-driven decisions and regulatory compliance go hand in hand with innovation—delivering fair outcomes and great experiences for millions of customers

About the role

We’re looking for a Senior Delivery Manager to lead the end-to-end delivery of medium to large initiatives and optimisation programmes within Financial Services while also ensuring small change and BAU land smoothly. You’ll drive delivery excellence, foster a high-performing culture, and embed continuous improvement.
You’ll manage complex, high‑risk products and services, orchestrating multi-disciplinary teams (including third parties) to deliver on time, on cost, and with quality—unlocking value early and often.

What you will be doing

Team Leadership and Delivery

• Lead cross‑disciplinary delivery teams (direct, matrix, and third parties) to deliver outcomes on time, to budget, and to the right standard for our customers.
• Facilitate squad ceremonies (stand‑ups, planning, reviews, retrospectives) and remove blockers.
• Create and manage delivery plans; align dependencies across squads and initiatives.
• Partner with Product and Engineering on roadmaps; refine and prioritise backlogs with Product Managers and Business Analysts.
• Coach teams to ship high‑quality solutions regularly and predictably, using metrics to drive continuous improvement.
• Role-model excellent delivery principles and a culture of performance, accountability and learning.

Planning and Prioritisation

• Lead planning cycles across squads and contribute to quarterly/portfolio planning.
• Balance technical and product priorities across multiple roadmaps to maximise value delivery.

Risk, Issues and Dependency Management

• Proactively identify and manage risks, issues, assumptions and dependencies affecting delivery and benefits realisation.
• Escalate appropriately through Portfolio Management and portfolio governance where needed.

Governance and Change Control

• Build and run fit‑for‑purpose governance across projects, small change and BAU in liaison with portfolio governance (ePMO).
• Ensure decisions are documented with the right level of sign‑off.
• Keep delivery in scope; manage change requests and surface impacts early.

Resource and Capacity Management

• Manage squad capacity and align resources to priorities; resolve bottlenecks with the Portfolio Manager.
• Coordinate internal teams and partners to maintain flow across services and squads.

Financial Management

• Manage squad/initiative budgets; track spend and hold regular cost reviews, escalating issues as required.
• Input into business cases and benefits tracking; support investment decisions with clear advice and data.
• Report on productivity and flow metrics (e.g., value delivered, burndown, cycle time, lead time).

Stakeholder Engagement and Communication

• Build trusted relationships with senior leaders, Heads of Product, Heads of Tech and delivery teams.
• Provide clear, timely updates on progress, risks and changes to portfolio governance and business stakeholders.
• Foster a high‑trust, collaborative culture across internal teams and external partners.

Change Management and Transition

• Ensure effective transition of changes into BAU with a focus on adoption, stability and measured benefits.

Reporting and MI

• Provide regular initiative and roadmap reporting, highlighting risks and mitigations.
• Deliver accurate, timely reporting on KPIs and delivery metrics to drive decisions.

About you

• A proven ability to govern large, complex, and cross-functional initiatives
• Good commercial and financial acumen.
• Proficient in Agile, waterfall and Hybrid delivery models.
• Strong grasp of Kanban
• Good capacity planning.
• Can recognise when something does not work and encourage a mindset of experimentation.
• Able to listen to the needs of technical and business stakeholders and interpret them.
• A bias towards action, always finding ways to remove barriers to rapid delivery.
• Strong stakeholder and 3rd party management skills.
• Manages stakeholder expectations and facilitate discussions about high risk and complexity even within constrained timescales.
• Actively addresses the most complicated risks, issues and dependencies including where ownership exists outside the team or no clear ownership exists.
• Can identify dependencies in plans across services and coordinate delivery.
• Engages colleagues with enthusiasm and commitment. They are able to bring people together to form a motivated team. Knows how to optimise the delivery flow of teams, managing the pace and tempo.
• They fully understand the environment they work in and can prioritise the most important or highest value tasks.
• Has the ability to reflect, and be resilient
• Clear, concise communication; strong facilitation and negotiation

How to apply

Please note that the talent acquisition team are managing this vacancy directly, and if successful in securing this role, you will be required to undertake a credit, CIFAS, Right to Work checks and if a specific requirement of your role a DBS (criminal records) check. Should your application progress we require you to let the team know if there is anything you need to disclose in relation to any of these checks prior to them being undertaken, including any unspent criminal convictions.

What happens next?

Our talent acquisition team will be in touch if you’re successful so keep an eye on your emails! We’ll arrange a short call to learn more about you, as well as answer any questions you have. If it feels like we’re a good match, we’ll share your CV with the hiring manager to review. Our interview process is tailored to each role and can be in-person or held remotely.

You can expect a two-stage interview process for this position:

1st stage - An informal 30-minute video call with the hiring team to discuss your skills and relevant experience. This is a great opportunity to find out more about the role and to ask any questions you may have.

2nd Stage – A one-hour formal interview where you can expect both competency and technical questions (task based) This can be held either in-person or remotely.

As an inclusive employer please do let us know if you require any reasonable adjustments.

If you'd like to know more about our interviews, you can find out here.

Equal opportunities

We’re an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate based on race, religion, colour, national origin, sex, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.

We will ensure that individuals with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodation to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and to receive other benefits and privileges of employment. Please contact us to request accommodation.