FinOps Associate

Valarian: Innovating for the new era of digital sovereignty Valarian Technologies is a dual-use technology company building critical tools to safeguard the future in an era of evolving global security challenges. We're rethinking security beyond traditional military domains, addressing asymmetric threats that impact our technological advantage, economic strength, and democratic institutions. We build Acra – the platform foundation for everything we do as a dual-use technology company. The platform’s name, rooted in the Greek word for citadel (or, fortress), reflects the design and purpose of our infrastructure-agnostic secure enclaves: protecting critical data. Some of the government and commercial workflows include: increased operational resiliency for mission-critical systems and functions; enabling organisations to more quickly and widely adopt emerging technologies while ensuring the integrity of their intellectual property; information flow during disaster response scenarios, and zero-trust / least-privilege environments for M&A, attorney-client privileged communications, etc. And we’ve only scratched the surface. At our core, we're driven by a shared mission and a belief in making a tangible impact on our world. Whether you join our London HQ or the wider global organisation, you’ll be a part of collaborative, high-performing teams, creating cutting-edge software, platforms, and infrastructure. The Role We are looking for a hands-on Assistant Accountant to join our growing finance team as our second finance hire. This is a broad, high-ownership role in an early-stage business where the finance function is still being built. You will support the day-to-day running of finance while helping introduce better controls, clearer processes, stronger accountability, and more reliable reporting. This role is ideal for someone who enjoys operating in a fast-moving environment, is comfortable with ambiguity, and wants to help build the finance foundations of a scaling company. This is not a narrow transactional finance role. You will be expected to roll up your sleeves, keep the basics running, spot issues, improve processes, and help create discipline across the business. What you’ll do Finance operations Own day-to-day accounts payable, including supplier onboarding, invoice processing, coding, approval tracking, payment runs, and supplier queries. Support accounts receivable, including customer invoicing, payment tracking, reconciliations, and debt follow-up where needed. Manage employee expenses and company card processes, ensuring spend is correctly coded, approved, and supported by receipts. Maintain accurate finance records in the accounting system and ensure transactions are posted on a timely basis. Perform regular bank reconciliations and investigate unreconciled or unusual items. Help maintain clean supplier, customer, and general ledger data. Month-end and reporting Support the month-end close process, including journals, accruals, prepayments, fixed assets, deferred revenue, and balance sheet reconciliations. Help prepare monthly finance packs, management reports, and variance analysis. Track spend by department, vendor, and budget owner, highlighting unusual movements or missing approvals. Support cash flow tracking, burn analysis, and runway reporting. Help improve the accuracy, consistency, and timeliness of financial reporting. Controls, processes, and accountability Help design and embed basic finance controls across purchasing, approvals, payments, expenses, billing, and reconciliations. Create and maintain simple, practical finance processes, checklists, and documentation. Follow up with budget owners and employees to ensure finance deadlines, approvals, and policies are met. Identify process gaps, control weaknesses, duplicated work, and recurring errors, then help fix them. Support the implementation or improvement of finance tools, workflows, and reporting processes. Help establish a culture where financial o…