Our new UK Group Chief Financial Officer (CFO), Stephen Symonds, joined the company at the end of July. Stephen trained as an accountant and spent the earlier part of his career working in professional practice. For the past decade, he has been working in companies in, or associated with healthcare.
Progressing through a number of accountancy firms with a wide variety of clients, Stephen’s most recent role was as the CFO at Cambridge Cognition, a medical-tech company specialising in the measurement of cognitive function. Prior to that, he worked with a pre-clinical research company which serviced the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries.
“I was really attracted to the role with Sonic Healthcare UK as I liked the fact that so many of the senior team have been with the company for a long time, and demonstrate a real passion for what they do. It is also a new experience for me working directly with the NHS.
Plus, this is a company, and a sector that is fast moving, and changing all the time which offers any number of opportunities to improve on what we do, and how we do it. My first challenge, though, is to take on board the sheer quantity and range of things we are doing now.”
We Need to Get Out More!
Stephen will lead the finance team numbering around 50 people. His aim is to provide high quality financial information to facilitate the decisions that SHUK managers need to make to be more efficient and effective. As part of that, he is encouraging his team to interact more with all areas of the organisation to help spread the message about the ways in which the finance function can support them.
“Of course, there’s a lot of day-to-day transactional information and monthly reporting we need to do as part of the finance function, but we also need to take a broader, more strategic view. I call this business partnering – this is where more of our team are on the shoulders of people delivering the operational aspects of the business, and helping them make good, well informed decisions.”
Finance and Fitness
Stephen lives in Suffolk with his wife and two children. As if his daily commute to the Halo was not gruelling enough, Stephen’s rigorous fitness regime makes for a very early start to his day. Frequently bootcamping three times a week, he also enjoys running and cycling.
“I have been impressed by how welcoming people have been and how receptive they are to trying new things. It’s very energising to have so much going on and exploring the vast opportunities that we have at SHUK.”