Senior Grants & Contracts Specialist, Research Administration

The University of Texas at Austin; Austin (TX); On-site; USD 70,000 - 100,000; Full time

Job summary

The University of Texas at Austin is seeking a Senior Grants and Contracts Specialist to support the Department of Computer Science in the School of Computing. You will manage a broad portfolio, handle pre-award, grant management, and post-award tasks, and collaborate with faculty and staff to ensure compliance and successful funding outcomes.

This role emphasizes mentorship, complex portfolio management, and proactive problem solving in a dynamic university environment on UT's main Austin

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree and at least three years of related experience at the Grants and Contracts Specialist level, and at least five years of related experience at the Senior level.
• Progressively responsible experience in grants management or sponsored programs administration, preferably in a higher education, nonprofit, research, or public-sector setting.
• Excellent oral and written communication skills including the ability to explain contract, financial, and compliance requirements.

Responsibilities

• Assist with award set-up and perform fiscal management of awards, including budgeting, spending projections, budget modifications, financial reporting, and review of expenditures. Monitor post-award activities to ensure compliance. Coordinate sub-award agreements as needed. Assist PIs with effort certification.
• Provide accounting information for purchases on research funds. Process invoices, reimbursements, vendor onboarding forms such as PIFs, and travel authorization requests for PIs, researchers, and students traveling on research funds. Assist PIs with arrangements for invited researchers and speakers. May process a high volume of documents with tight deadlines. Coordinate with event planning staff to ensure adherence to event budgets using sponsored project funds and eligibility of expenses on accounts.
• Monitor and report account balances and spending, reconcile accounts, and maintain account overviews and PI dashboards in Smartsheet. Analyze and interpret budgetary financial data related to sponsored research to advise faculty on strategic and appropriate fund use. Gather financial and non-technical report components in coordination with PI to ensure timely submission of reports and adherence to required reporting timelines.
• Provide the human resources team with assignment details for sponsor-funded student and staff positions and visitors. Process Tuition Reduction Benefits (TRBs) for graduate research assistants. Process summer salary in Workday for faculty within PI portfolio.
• Collaborate with PIs, department staff, university staff, and external stakeholders to identify and resolve pre- and post-award research administration issues through critical thinking and problem-solving strategies.
• Participate in internal and external professional development and research administrator networks to remain current with UT, local, state and federal guidelines, and regulations. Contribute to the work of the research administration team, the larger finance and administrative team, and to a positive workplace culture.

Skills

Communication

Teamwork

Attention to detail

Problem solving

Education

Bachelor's degree

Tools

Smartsheet

Workday

UTRMS

eRACommons

Research.gov

Job description

The University of Texas at Austin is seeking a Senior Grants and Contracts Specialist to support the Department of Computer Science in the School of Computing. You will manage a broad portfolio, handle pre-award, grant management, and post-award tasks, and collaborate with faculty and staff to ensure compliance and successful funding outcomes.

This role emphasizes mentorship, complex portfolio management, and proactive problem solving in a dynamic university environment on UT's main Austin