TEAM: Finance
REPORTS TO: Executive Director/Director of Operations
LOCATION: Flexible
THE ROLE
The National Forum for Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention’s mission is to advance health equity and prevent heart disease and stroke nationwide. As part of an ambitious expansion of its federally funded programs, the National Forum (NF) is seeking a Finance Officer to manage all grant accounting, financial reporting, invoicing, and compliance activities. The incumbent will work with NF partners, funding agencies, consultants, and auditors to ensure all grant accounts are accurate, up-to-date, and allocated to correct accounting and system codes. In addition, the incumbent will be responsible for all administration of government reporting systems and oversee the timely filing of grant and organizational financial reports, including drawdowns from the federal payment system. The incumbent will also recommend and implement changes and updates to internal procedures and practices to ensure compliance with Federal regulations. The NF grants portfolio may include foundation and corporate grants that will also fall under the Finance Officer’s purview. The Finance Officer will be responsible for time and effort reporting, finance records for audit review, partner monitoring and payment, program, and annual budget while serving as the primary organizational manager for all grant-related accounting, finance, and compliance issues.
THE RESPONSIBILITIES
Planning and Analysis Support (10%)
- Lead in the forecasting and budget process on both the organization and program level, particularly when pertaining to restricted funding
- Provide organization analytical modeling for budgeting, forecasting, and in-year modeling
- Provide analytical support to projects related to organization’s financial decision-making and strategy support and evaluation
- Provide analyses related to financial performance analysis including ROI
- Support management reporting activities
- Responsible for ad hoc analytical requests that have an organizational impact
Grants Management (70%)
- Develop trainings related to execution of org-wide effort certification process and other key grant administration activities
- Analyze grant spending, advise both internal and external stakeholders, and course correct where necessary to enable compliant, efficient drawdown
- Complete reconciliations, invoicing and reporting necessary for grant drawdown
- Demonstrate exemplary financial management at the org level through completion of fiscal surveys, grant-specific audits, single and financial statement audits, and regular monitoring of compliance level of grants
- Oversee all government reporting systems and the timely filing of grant and organizational financial reports, including drawdowns from the federal payment system
Process Improvement (15%)
- Develop improved systems and processes for the overall recordkeeping of all financial transactions and donor pipelines
- Streamline all contractor records and effort reporting for accurate allocations across all organization programs
- Increase accuracy of expense allocation and tagging within current accounting and finance systems while exploring more viable solutions
- Develop and implement an automated expense allocation tool for all programmatic expenses across the organization
Team Activities (5%)
- Serve as an active and engaged member of the organization leading monthly/quarterly finance meetings, participating in team-building activities, and engaging in professional development opportunities to help better position the organization financially
THE MUST-HAVES
- B.A in Accounting or Finance, an additional MBA and/or CPA is preferable
- Thorough familiarity with the federal Uniform Guidance and its cost principles, with a proven track record of managing federal grants finance
- Four-six years working in a planning, analysis, and grants finance position, preferably focusing on DHHS or Centers for Disease Control funding Skills, as well as private and corporate grants.
Finance Officer Value Added to NF
- Increased Efficiencies and Savings Through SW Hall Capacity Reduction
- Most accounting and expense classification responsibilities would live in house resulting in reduced turnaround time of adjustments and reporting requests
- An approximate 80% capacity reduction from SW Hall will reduce the monthly invoiced amount
- Grant expertise, allocations, and adjustments would also live in house resulting in decreasing errors in accounting and reporting of grant expenditures by at least 50%
- Stronger Financial Position with Increased Grant Infrastructure Support
- A dedicated role for direct federal funding through continuing education and staying current with changing federal regulations and guidelines provides a better position for federal funding for the organization
- Time and effort would be full-time as opposed to contractor part-time efforts who pose the risk of not being the same over time through ongoing programs of grant portfolio continues to grow, having a full-time role working on the organization’s funding map (what’s funded versus not funded) would provide more visibility on development pipeline strategies and opportunities resulting in a 25% increase in success rate dedicated time to completely revamp the grant tracking/reporting structure within QuickBooks resulting in increased accuracy of organization’s expenditures while in turn reducing audit flags to zero experience with dedicated non-profit financial accounting software (Blackbaud Financial Edge) that would lead to better grants management and reporting ongoing support for expense compliance review while implementing improved compliance measures to eliminate audit flags in grant reporting
- Payroll Reduction and Increased Support Capacity
- Consolidation of budgeting, consulting, and other grant/finance efforts resulting in overall cost savings to the organization by reducing the headcount of external contractors by at least 25%effort and cost
- Will be the main point of contact regarding financial activities alleviating efforts from the Director of Operations and Executive Director
- Improved Accuracy and Compliance Within Internal Processes and Systems
- Overall financial tracking system (Finance Tracker) overhaul will reduce manual errors, and duplicative work, and increase ease of use resulting in more streamlined and accurate information available to the leadership team
- Review and develop an improved process of recording all contractor efforts and grant tagging to better streamline towards compliant federal grant guidelines