Senior Finance and Grants Officer at Mercy Corps

The Position Summary

• The Senior Finance and Grants Officer is responsible for conducting pre-award assessments, post award management and close outs for Sauti subcontracts and sub awards. S/he will also support efforts to build the capacity of downstream partners to meet finance and compliance requirements of USAID, so that these partners develop professional personnel and systems. The Senior Finance and Grants Officer is responsible for review of financial files/records both soft and physical to ensure that partner files are up to date.

Essential Job Responsibilities

Process

• Conduct day to day management and implementation of the grants work plan under Sauti.
• Propose revisions to grant processes and procedures based on experience and lessons learned and coordinate proposed changes with the Finance and Grants Manager.

Pre-Award

• Participate in the solicitation and selection of sub recipients and subcontracts, working closely with the technical team to identify potential areas of support, eligibility and evaluation criteria
• Work with selected grantees to ensure budgets are in line with program activities and that costs are reasonable, allowable and allocable.
• Conduct due diligence assessments on all grants including business feasibility, evaluate environmental requirements and pre-award assessment of financial responsibility to ensure sub recipients have the capacity to comply with the terms of subcontract agreement, is free of conflicts of interest and are eligible organizations.
• Assist with drafting and reviewing of sub-award agreements, ensuring use of correct agreement templates, standard terms and conditions are included, follow up with both Mercy Corps and partner signing and ensure that a fully executed subcontract agreement is filed by both Mercy Corps & partner
• Develop financial monitoring plans for partners

Post-Award

• Conduct post-award trainings for the sub-recipients on grants administration, applicable donor regulations and reporting requirements.
• Identify sub-recipient/grantee capacity building needs and provide technical assistance where needed and trainings to assure compliance.
• Conduct financial monitoring office visits to ensure that the use of funds and the activities performed are in compliance with the terms and conditions of the subcontracts.
• Review sub-recipient/grant financial reports for accuracy and completeness and regularly monitor their budgets vis-a-vis financial reports
• Review sub-recipient/grant funds requests for accuracy and completeness and process payments/reimbursements as appropriate.
• Maintain complete and accurate files for all sub-recipient/grant files as per the Field Finance Manual.
•  Review and post the financial reports in Navigator ensuring they are reconciled to partner financial reports regularly.
•  Review status of subcontracts reports ensuring milestones in Navigator are up to date
• Serve as primary point of contact for all correspondence and notifications to partners.
• Facilitate sub-award modifications
• Maintain a log of details of all Sauti partners including name of sub-contractor, contact details (including address, email, telephone and contact names), types of services provided and duration of sub-contract
• Monitor grantee assets by ensuring that grantee assets are reported on and disposed of in accordance with donor rules
• Facilitate sub award modifications

Close-out

• Review final financial reports for accuracy and completeness
• Conduct final funds reconciliation and liquidation of sub contracts
• Participate in final close out reviews
• Review consortium partners and downstream files to ensure that partner records are complete
• Follow up on asset disposition ensuring that all assets purchased by the partners with Sauti funds are disposed of in accordance with donor rules
• Prepare final Close-out checklists and notification to consortium and downstream partners

Others

• Responsible for the preparation of monthly and quarterly reports for grant activities that feed into the Sauti report.
• Ensure that project activities comply with Mercy Corps internal policies and procedures, as well as Donor rules and regulations.
• Participate in the development and implementation of the project’s annual work plans.
• Support Finance team with other grants or finance sector activities.
• Coordinate expenditure verification and project audits and follow up on management decisions regarding audit findings ensuring these are documented and communicated to the partners
• Ensure that field staff are familiar with grants management procedures.

Supervisory Responsibility

None

Accountability

Reports directly to: Senior Finance and Grants Manager,

Works directly with: Chief of Party, Finance and Compliance Director, Programme Teams, Field Finance/Grants Team, Consortium and downstream partners.

Accountability to Participants and Stakeholders

• Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our program participants, community partners, other stakeholders, and to international standards guiding international relief and development work. We are committed to actively engaging communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.

Minimum Qualification & Transferable Skills

• A Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, Finance, Economics or relevant field; an advanced degree is preferred.
• Professional accounting certification CPA(K).
• At least five (5) years of demonstrated professional experience managing grants, subcontracts, procurement and compliance with donor regulations, preferably Donor-funded projects.
• Strong accounting skills and experience, including management of the general ledger, journal entries, payables and balance sheet.
• Demonstrated experience applying clauses and negotiating without heavy management oversight including developing amendments and modifications as a result of negotiations.
• Experience providing capacity-building training to staff partner organizations.
• Strong analytical and computer skills, with emphasis on budget and financial analysis and advanced computer skills in MS Office, particularly Excel are required.
• Fluency in the English Language is required.
• Other required competencies and skills include:

Grants Administration

• Knowledge and application of best practices in grant management.
• Demonstrated knowledge of financial and management systems, regulations and reporting requirements. Evidence of ability to be creative and flexile within those requirements.
• Analytical capabilities with accounting procedures and processes for structuring projects.
• Knowledge of grants management software and information technology skills.

Management and Communications

• Ability to communicate technical, budgetary and program details to staff, grantees and applicants.
• Ability to design and implement effective workflow processes and procedures.
• Capability to foster an atmosphere which recognizes and respects cultural and individual differences.