Group Head of Tax

About the Role

Are you a collaborative tax leader looking for a fresh challenge where no two days look the same?

We are looking for a Group Head of Tax to lead our tax strategy and drive tax operations across our vibrant organization. With a turnover of £900m and £1bn in net assets, this is a broad, high-impact role where you’ll balance strategic vision with hands-on, practical guidance across all areas of tax.

You will lead a team of specialists covering VAT, Business Taxes, Employment Taxes, and Global Mobility. Beyond managing day-to-day compliance, you’ll be at the heart of key organizational milestones—from supporting spin-out business structures and global mobility policies to playing a key role in our upcoming finance system upgrade.

What You’ll Be Doing

• Shape Strategy & Maintain Compliance: Lead worldwide tax strategy, compliance risks, and group operations, while maintaining a transparent, proactive relationship with HMRC.
• Lead & Inspire a Specialist Team: Motivate, develop, and support our talented team to deliver a helpful, customer-focused service.
• Drive Business Transformation: Act as the lead tax authority on our major SAP system replacement project, ensuring tax requirements are embedded seamlessly from day one.
• Advise across Diverse Operations: Provide pragmatic advice on commercial contracts, spin-out company structures, subsidiary initiatives, capital projects, and international working policies.
• Build Tax Awareness: Educate, upskill, and guide non-finance colleagues across all departments, making complex tax requirements clear, accessible, and easy to follow.

Who We Are Looking For

You might have a specific tax specialism in direct or indirect tax, but you’ll need a solid working knowledge across all main tax types (including Global Mobility and Employment Taxes). You should have CTA, ACA, or equivalent professional qualification, or substantial high-level work experience in a complex environment.

Prior experience in Higher Education or the charity sector is desirable, but we welcome strong applications from industry or Big 4/private practice backgrounds.

A track record of managing, mentoring and developing teams, and clear communication skills are essential.

Most importantly, we want someone who pairs strong technical capability with an approachable, pragmatic mindset.

Working With Us

We are a hard-working, professional team, but we don't take ourselves too seriously. We pride ourselves on being friendly, approachable, a little bit quirky, and genuinely supportive. We believe the best solutions come from collaboration, straightforward advice, and a positive team environment.

What We Offer

The University of Sheffield is a remarkable place to work. Our people are at the heart of everything we do. Their diverse backgrounds, abilities and beliefs make Sheffield a world-class university.

We offer a fantastic range of benefits including a highly competitive annual leave entitlement (with the ability to purchase more), a generous pensions scheme, flexible working opportunities,a commitment to your development and wellbeing, a wide range of retail discounts, and much more.

Find out more at sheffield.ac.uk/jobs/benefits and join us to become part of something special.

We build teams of people from different heritages and lifestyles from across the world, whose talent and contributions complement each other to greatest effect. We believe diversity in all its forms delivers greater impact through research, teaching and student experience.

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