Senior Financial Planning and Operations Partner

Job Description

Job Description

As our Senior Partner, you will be a hands-on finance partner focused on many restaurant planning responsibilities, focusing primarily on operating expenses, pre-opening spend, and operational planning support. You will help build budgets and forecasts, analyze performance, identify risks and opportunities, and translate financial results into clear recommendations for Operations and cross-functional leadership. This role is especially important during budgeting season. We are looking for someone who can ramp quickly, understand the mechanics of restaurant-level financials, work comfortably with large datasets, and partner with operators and cross-functional teams to keep assumptions, reporting, and decisions moving.

We are looking for someone who is very familiar with emerging technology, including new methods of collecting and applying data insights.  This individual must be passionate about the restaurant business and our brand.

 

What You’ll Do:

·       Support budgeting, forecasting, and monthly performance analysis for restaurant OPEX and pre-opening line items, ensuring assumptions are clear, current, and tied to operational drivers.

·       Own variance analysis for assigned expense lines, comparing actual results to budget, forecast, and prior year while identifying the key drivers, risks, and opportunities behind performance.

·       Partner closely with Operations, Development, Accounting, and Finance to understand cost trends, validate inputs, resolve data gaps, and support decisions across the restaurant portfolio.

·       Build and maintain planning models, recurring reports, dashboards, and tools that help leaders monitor OPEX, pre-opening costs, and restaurant-level performance.

·       Support budget season execution by preparing templates, collecting and validating inputs, reconciling version-to-version changes, documenting assumptions, and helping leaders stay aligned on timing and outputs.

·       Assist with month-end close activities related to assigned expense areas, including accrual support, prepaid reviews, expense validation, and follow-up on unusual trends.

·       Translate financial results into concise commentary and action-oriented insights for field leaders, cross-functional partners, and FP&A leadership.

·       Act as a trusted finance partner who communicates promptly, manages deadlines, and brings a practical operator-oriented lens to financial planning. Improve reporting and planning processes by reducing manual work, strengthening controls, and creating scalable tools for recurring analysis.

·       Conduct ad hoc analysis and scenario modeling to support operational decisions, new restaurant openings, cost management, and leadership requests.

·       Support other restaurant-level expense and revenue planning and analysis as needed

The Qualifications:

Education & Experience

•         3-5+ years of experience in FP&A, financial analysis, accounting, consulting, operations analytics, or a related analytical role.

•         Experience supporting restaurant, retail, hospitality, or other multi-unit operations is strongly preferred.

•         Hands-on experience with budgeting, forecasting, variance analysis, financial modeling, and management reporting.

Financial & Operational Skills

•         Strong understanding of P&L drivers, controllable expenses, accruals, prepaids, expense recognition, and operational cost management.

•         Ability to connect financial movement to operational behavior and explain results clearly to non-finance partners.

•         Comfort working through ambiguity during planning cycles, especially when assumptions, ownership, or actuals need to be reconciled quickly.

•         Ability to build concise recommendations from detailed analysis and identify when a trend requires action, escalation, or deeper review.

Technical Skills

•         Advanced Excel skills, including complex formulas, pivots, lookups, model hygiene, and scenario analysis.

•         Experience working with large datasets from financial systems, ERP tools, data warehouses, BI tools, or restaurant/workforce systems.

•         Exposure to SQL, Tableau, Power BI, Databricks, Snowflake, Hyperion, Oracle, SAP, or similar tools is a plus.

•         Curiosity about automation, reporting improvements, and better ways to collect, validate, and apply financial and operational data.

Communication & Collaboration

•         Clear written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to tailor financial messages for operators, finance partners, and senior leaders.

•         Highly organized and detail-oriented, with strong follow-through during deadline-heavy periods.

•         Collaborative mindset with the confidence to ask good questions, pressure-test assumptions, and keep stakeholders informed.

•         Ability to work independently, manage multiple priorities, and remain steady during budgeting season and other high-volume planning moments.

Physical Requirements:

•         Ability to maintain stationary position to be able to operate a computer and other office equipment

•         Must be able to identify, analyze and assess details

•         For certain positions, must be able to occasionally move or transport items up to 50 pounds

•         Ability to communicate with others and exchange information accurately and effectively

•         Constantly positions self and moves about to support ordinary restaurant or food production support or office operations, as applicable

•         Ability to work in a constant state of alertness and in a safe manner  

 

What we offer:

•         Competitive salary, plus bonus and long-term incentives*

•         Early Wage Access!

•         Unlimited PTO, paid parental leave, plus paid opportunities to give back to the community

•         Health, Dental, Vision, Telemedicine, Pet Insurance plus more!

•         401k enrollment with CAVA contribution

•         Company-paid STD, LTD, Life and AD&D coverage for salaried positions*

•         Free CAVA food

•         Casual work environment

•         The opportunity to be on the ground floor of a rapidly growing brand

*Indicates qualifying eligible positions only
*Compensation range is an all-cash range 

 

CAVA – Joining “A culture, not a concept”

As an equal opportunity employer, CAVA considers applicants for all positions without regard to race, color, sex, religion, national origin, disability, age, height, weight, marital status, sexual orientation, familial status, genetic information or any other characteristic or protected classes as defined by federal, state, or local law.