Budget Specialist

Budget Specialist

The Whiting School of Engineering's Department of Mechanical Engineering is seeking a Budget Specialist. This position will provide day-to-day financial and administrative support to the department. This position will report directly to the Grants and Contracts Manager and will be primarily responsible for ordering, expense reimbursements, accounts payable, student hiring along with their payroll, and account reconciliation.

The Budget Specialist is responsible to work with the department or unit administrative staff and / or faculty in the compilation of information related to expenditures and / or revenues for a variety of accounts, e.g., general funds, grants, contracts, endowments, revenues, gift accounts.

Specific Duties & Responsibilities :

• Provide day-to-day maintenance of budgets based on an awareness of the status of department or unit funding sources, including most of the following, monthly account reconciliation, ongoing monitoring of expenses, processing travel expenses, coordinating procurement processes and vendor payments, coding invoices, initiating cost transfers and / or wire payments.
• Assist in developing budgets and budget projections, based on a basic knowledge of funding sources, by performing basic calculations and analyses, generating standard reports, and applying approved processes and procedures.
• Assemble budgets for grants and contracts in pre-award period and monitor post award budgets based on established processes and procedures.
• Process student awards, sub-awards, and budget reallocations for grants managed by exempt-level budget staff.
• Track and monitor revenue and expenditures to identify variances and to provide up-to-date expenditure and balance information.
• Review and process payroll and accounting transactions and verify expenditures against approved budgets to ensure compliance with university guidelines and / or sponsor requirements and restrictions.
• Using templates, review and assess budget patterns and project expenditures.
• Prepare routine, standard, and ad-hoc reports for sponsoring agencies based on knowledge of existing data.
• Assist in development and maintenance of budget monitoring systems by setting up electronic and paper files, recommending and following workflow, and suggesting process improvements.
• Use various software applications, such as spreadsheets, relational databases, statistical packages, and graphics packages to assemble, manipulate, and format data and / or reports.
• Other duties as assigned.

Position Specific Details - Supplemental Duties & Responsibilities :

Minimum Qualifications :

Preferred Qualifications :

Technical Skills & Expected Level of Proficiency :

The core technical skills listed are most essential; additional technical skills may be required based on specific division or department needs.