Finance & Accounting Coordinator

University of Chicago; Chicago (IL); On-site; USD 55,000 - 85,000; Full time

Job summary

The University of Chicago’s Development Innovation Lab seeks an Accounting, Grants and Finance Associate to support operating and capital budgets across divisions and units. The role contributes to long- and short-term financial goals, and assists in forecasting, reporting, and ensuring data integrity in financial systems.

You will collaborate with research teams and the Finance & Grants Manager to manage sponsored projects, perform journal entries, reconciliations, and post-award activities,

Qualifications

• Experience supporting budgets and forecasting for multiple units.
• Strong ability to create and review financial reports and data summaries.
• Familiar with grants lifecycle, including post-award activities and compliance.
• Ability to coordinate with research teams and finance leadership.

Responsibilities

• Meet with Research Teams and Portfolio Managers to review accounts.
• Maintain unit costing spreadsheets and perform cost allocations in Workday.
• Prepare journal entries and reconcile accounts for data integrity.
• Review transactions in financial systems for compliance and accuracy.
• Support post-award activities, reporting, and close-out processes.
• Develop tools to track financial data and support annual budgeting.

Skills

Budgeting

Financial reporting

Journal entries

Grant management

Post-award

Tools

Workday

Job description

Department

SSD Development Economics Center: Staff and Temporary Employees

About the Department

The Development Innovation Lab at the University of Chicago uses the tools of economics to develop innovations with the potential to benefit millions of people in low- and middle-income countries. It was founded and is led by Nobel laureate Michael Kremer.

Job Summary

The job provides professional support in monitoring the operating and capital budgets for divisions and/or University-wide administrative units. At the instruction of others, performs work that contributes to development of long and short term financial goals, business strategies/plans, and financial forecasts/models for major service programs and initiatives. Utilizes rudimentary knowledge of finance to help coordinate quarterly and year-end reporting for the operating budget.

The Accounting, Grants and Finance Associate will support the operations of a portfolio of funding including sponsored research awards for UChicago Development Innovation Lab (DIL). This role will report to the Finance and Grants Manager and will collaborate with DIL Research Teams on a portfolio of DIL projects. This position is responsible for supporting and sharing knowledge, expertise, and best practices with other finance and grant management staff members. This is a great opportunity to gain experience and take on responsibility in finance, accounting, sponsored research, and general operations in a non-profit research environment.

Responsibilities

• Meet consistently with Research Teams and Research Portfolio Managers to review account portfolios.
• Maintains unit-wide costing allocation spreadsheet for each fiscal year and executes cost allocation updates within Workday, ensuring data accuracy and consistency across records.
• Creates and executes journal entries to support correction of mis-posted items in the financial system, and performs regular account reconciliations to ensure financial data integrity.
• Review and facilitate approving transactions within the university's financial and procurement systems as a project manager for grants and IADF's, assuring compliance with approved budgets and obtaining additional stakeholder input as needed.
• Examine financial reports for consistency, accuracy, and compliance. At the direction of the Finance & Grants Manager and research teams, resolve errors and work collaboratively to prevent repeat occurrences.
• With the Finance & Grants Manager, develop and maintain tools for tracking key financial data. Maintain project specific budgets, prepare forecasts with research teams, and assist in tracking expenses to budget with research managers across the organization.
• Every month, review the budget to actual financial reports and payroll allocations with the research teams and the Finance & Grants Manager, and conduct data entry to execute the team's spending plan.
• Assists the Finance & Grants Manager in annual or monthly fiscal closing, including preparing supporting schedules and reconciliation.
• Drafts financial reports and data summaries for internal stakeholders, ensuring clarity, accuracy, and consistency of data presentation.
• Maintains organized digital record keeping of financial and accounting data to support accessibility, transparency, and audit readiness.
• Attends institutional and outside training classes that cover financial, payroll and reporting systems.
• May be assigned special projects or other related work as needed.
• Coordinates all post award activities for the assigned portfolio within DIL.
• Coordinates and executes active grant management activities, including preparation and submission of interim and final close-out financial reports and award modifications, amendments, no-cost extensions, re-budgeting, PI concurrence and carry-over requests.
• Partners with University Research Administration (URA) to monitor post-award activities, such as timely submission of applications and financial reports; draft budget summaries, and requests for no-cost extensions; Handles straightforward post-award activities including account creations, regulatory and compliance monitoring, salary allocations, effort reporting, grant projections, cost allocations, cost center charges, equipment inventory (if any), invoice and contract preparation for procurement, grant closing process, and account closing.
• Maintains organized, accurate, and audit-ready grant records and documentation across systems, ensuring data integrity throughout the grant lifecycle.
• Work collaboratively with DIL Researchers and DIL partners to develop spending plans for new projects, proposals, and other initiatives.
• Take the steps needed, gathering information and ensuring grant compliance, to execute on the spending plan as outlined by the PI, Research Managers, or Research staff.
• Support the Research Portfolio manager with proposal development by understanding sponsor formatting guidelines, preparing supporting documents, and collecting proposal elements.
• Assist in mai