Westlab is a Ballarat-based business employing more than 40 people and supplying customers across Australia, New Zealand and Canada. We provide laboratory equipment, consumables and solutions to the scientific, healthcare, education, and industrial sectors, as well as delivering specialist laboratory fit-out projects. We are committed to quality products, expert advice and exceptional service, helping our customers achieve their goals through innovative and reliable solutions.

Westlab – in every discovery.

The role

Westlab is hiring its first full time Financial Controller. You will own the month-end close, the controls, the cash, the working capital and the reporting, and you will lead a finance team of three.

You are picking up solid foundations. The ledger is reliable, the technology is good and the business is open about where it wants to improve. What you bring is the appetite and the experience to lift what is already there, contributing the practices you have seen work on your way up.

You will report to the Finance Director, and you will work alongside an experienced fractional CFO who provides the strategic and forward-looking capability above the role, and who will coach you directly. This means you will be exposed to and involved in best practice strategic finance, FP&A; and forward planning work that most people at your stage might wait years to see and touch.

Who we are looking for





We are not necessarily looking for a seasoned Financial Controller. Rather, we are looking for the person who is ready to become one.

You are probably a senior financial accountant or finance manager now. You have worked for a good Controller or CFO and you have seen how a finance function should run. You are hungry, you move quickly, you respond to what is broken, and you want to be coached rather than left alone.

Essential

- You have worked in finance inside an operating business. If your entire career has been in public practice, audit or advisory, this role is not for you

- CA or CPA qualified

- You have owned a month-end close and stood behind your own numbers

- Ballarat or Melbourne based, and able to be in Ballarat at least two days a week. This is not a remote role

Well regarded

- Experience in a manufacturing, product or project-based business, with inventory and cost of goods

- Some exposure to forecasting, driver-based budgeting and business partnering. You need not have led it, but you should have seen it done properly

- Comfortable with modern systems and an appetite for improvement, including AI, automation and better ways of working

What is on offer A finance team to lead, a CFO to learn from, and a business that is eager to level up its finance function.

Applications close 18 December 2026, though we will be reviewing and interviewing as applications arrive, so please do not wait.

📌 Financial Controller (Ballarat)
🏢 Westlab
📍 Ballarat