Senior Budget and Reporting Manager

Job Description

Job Title: Senior Budget and Reporting Manager
Band/ Level / Grade: 7A
Department: Operations
Location: Yemen | Aden, YE
Overtime Eligible: per local law

BACKGROUND:The International Rescue Committee (IRC) responds to the world’s worst humanitarian crises and helps people to survive and rebuild their lives. Founded in 1933 at the request of Albert Einstein, the IRC offers lifesaving care and life-changing assistance to refugees forced to flee from war or disaster. At work today in over 40 countries and 22 U.S. cities, we restore safety, dignity and hope to millions who are uprooted and struggling to endure. The IRC leads the way from harm to home.

The IRC Yemen began its programs in October 2012. Since establishing its presence in the Southern of Yemen, in the Red Sea Coastal city of Aden, the organization has grown from just an implementing small projects to handling large scale emergency and relief operations. Following the war which broke out in Yemen in March of 2015 and the humanitarian disaster, IRC launched an emergency response program in the southern governorates of Aden, Lahj, Abyan, Shabwah and Aldalea.  Currently IRC Yemen is operating in eight governorates in Yemen including Ament Al Asama and Hodeidah through direct programming and through local partnership, in Health, WASH, Nutrition, Economic Recovery Development, Education, Child Protection, Gender and Women Protection and Empowerment.


JOB SUMMARY: The purpose of this position is to have an individual with specialized, trained to dedicate the majority of  time to support the functions of program development, grant management and various financial reports. This versatile individual should also be able to get involved in other accounting tasks, as necessary and as time permits. Comprehensive accounting skills and experience combined with managerial and supervisory abilities will also be required. Flexible approach to ad hoc tasks as they emerge will be paramount.

The budget and report manager assist the Deputy Director Finance (DDF) by managing the day-to-day budget and grants management functions. Under the guidance of deputy director of finance, the senior budget and reporting manager ensures that budgets and grant’s financial management issues are immediately attended to and submitted on time to the relevant stakeholders. In addition, Sr. budget and reporting manager  will ensure that grants are fully implemented in compliance with donor regulations and IRC requirements and will ensure timely submission of donor and government reports, will develop budget management tools and conduct training to improve efficiency, financial reporting and compliance.

WORKING RELATIONS:
Position Reports to:  Deputy Director of Finance (DDF).
Communicate and work with other team members: Finance, Supply Chain, Liaison, Program Coordinators and Grants

MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES:

1) Budgeting
- Review and supervise updating of country office-operating budget to ensure that it is up to date for all funding sources; that the costs are adequate in terms of completeness and reasonableness; that the country office has a plan for funding “gaps”, if any
- Ensure there is a participative approach in the budgeting process which involves finance, procurement, logistics, administration, programs, human resources, Liaison, Field management and grants unit
- Ensure that there is available standard budgeting information, which is current, on shared expatriate costs, in the IRC format, to grants and program staffs to enable them prepare budgets with accurate figures.
- Ensure that there is available standard budgeting information, in the IRC format, on shared costs for all offices in Yemen.
- Ensure that approved grants budgets for each T1 are entered in SUN promptly
- Ensure that mapping of budgets from the IRC format to the donor format is correctly done
- Review budgets to ensure that all costs have been fairly allocated, unit costs fairly arrived at, TU costs adequately budgeted, ICR correctly allocated etc before forwarding the same to the Finance Director.
- Submit to DDF the complete package of donor proposal for review and approval before submission to the donor. These includes the checklist, budget narrative, budget in donor format, budget in IRC format, budget in MOPIC/SCMCHA format etc.
- In consultation with Liaison Manager and DDF ensure the donor and IRC internal budget templates are linked to MOPIC/SCMCHA budget templates at the time of budget drafting 
- Timely address/respond to feedbacks from government authorities related to finance (budget or expenditure) in consultation with DDF and Liaison as required
- Participate with grants and program staff on all budget realignments ensuring that the process is being done correctly taking into account the latest available information
- Prepare monthly, quarterly or yearly report as per the donor and government  financial report requirement ensuring they are complete, accurate and produced on a timely basis to ensure adequate review, approval and submission to the grants or Liaison unit.
- Ensure all reports produced are in agreement with the balance as per the SUN system, before submission to DDF for approval.
- Work with the grants and Liaison unit to identify any matters arising in the financial reports and ensure that appropriate action is taken.
- Prepare all final financial reports to donors/government for review and approval by DDF, ensuring they are complete, accurate and agree to our SUN data base.
- In liaison with the Finance Manager – Accounting – ensure that any adjusting entries that need to be passed as a result of findings in financial reports are addressed within the month identified. Ensure that a hard and soft copy of all donor and government reports submitted are filed appropriately for ease of future reference
- Train staff on the preparation of reports in the various donor formats
- Ensure that all relevant grant codes are available to all relevant staff through out the country office.

2) Grant and Contracts management:
- Establish and maintain a proper filing system for all financial related documents for all grants. These include but are not limited to copy of the signed contract, all financial reports sent out, any modifications, any important email communication etc.
- Inform relevant staff of any new updates on donor rule and regulations related to finance
- Represent finance on project opening meeting (POM), project Implementation (PIM), project close out meetings (PCM) and Sub-agreement kick-off meetings.
- Work with the grants unit to ensure that all donor related information is disseminated to program, finance and logistics staff to enable them to abide by donor rules and regulations

3) Budget versus Actual (BvA) Reports
-On a monthly basis prepare Budget Versus Actual expenditure reports and send this out to all relevant staff on a monthly basis. The expenditure report should include a brief commentary on matters arising as identified from the report
- Follow up with the same staff to get feedback on any matters arising out of the financial report that need to be clarified.
- Ensure that any proposed adjusting entries are reviewed and acted upon within the month identified to avoid recurrence of the same issues.
- Train staff on how to interpret the financial reports and what appropriate action to take so as to address matters arising

4) Staff Training
- Train grant staff and finance staff on the different donor reporting format and requirements
- Train staff on IRC budgeting process
- Train staff on Shared Program Cost allocation methodology
- Assess the skill and experience of the Finance staff and provide training, in both the field offices and the main office on matters related to grants, contracts and budgets
- Train Project/Field Managers/coordinators on how to monitor their budgets, code expenses and the proper use of T3’s and T2’s.

5) Internal Control Assessment
- Ensure that there is appropriate allocation of shared costs to grants as supported by the SPC calculation methodology which can be justified to auditors
- Ensure that all relevant/senior staff are aware of various donor rules and regulations that play a role in their work, especially procurement and inventory management staff.

6) Personnel Management
- Serve as a technical resource person for the accounting department. Assist on matters relating to grants and budgeting and serves as the finance focal person on these issues

7) Administrative Duties
Supervise all activities with respect of grants and budgets

8) Logistics Duties
- In liaison with Logistics department, reviews commitment lists every month for financial obligations already entered into but not captured in financial reports, 

9) Finance/Accounting
- Act at all times in accordance with country law and standards of accounting practice.
- Review, with the objective of gaining a clear understanding, budget guidelines and instructions.
- Review funding allocations to enable proper guidance to programs and proper coding.
- Provide training to program staff on finance issues.
- Be receptive to training provided and to develop their technical and professional competence.
- Follow any new procedures and guidelines designated in circulars from the Country Director and DDF.
- Provide feedback and input for periodic reports as required by DDF or Country Director.

This job description is not exhaustive and additional tasks in the remit of the role may be added / removed according to operational changes.