Senior Finance and Operations Manager, Кyiv

The purpose of the USAID Economic Resilience Activity is to improve the overall economic resilience of eastern Ukraine. Resilience is “the ability of people, households, communities, countries, and systems to mitigate, adapt to, and recover from shocks and stresses in a manner that reduces chronic vulnerability and facilitates inclusive growth.” This activity aims to improve the economic resilience of eastern Ukraine through accomplishing the following objectives:

• Inclusion: building the capabilities of vulnerable populations to capitalize on entrepreneurial and MSME economic opportunities;
• Growth: helping micro, small and medium businesses innovate, invest, and expand markets; and
• Transformation: working with coalitions and leaders to articulate a vision for the future and put in place a modern, diverse, SME-friendly economy.

By accomplishing these objectives, the economy of eastern Ukraine will be more diversified, more integrated with the rest of Ukraine, less dependent on Russia, and the region’s residents will be better equipped to compete for the jobs of the future, thereby improving the economic resilience of the region.  The activity will work primarily in the Donetsk and Luhansk oblast—together known as the “Donbas” region—but will also be active in the surrounding oblasts and throughout Ukraine as required to achieve the objectives.

About the job

The Senior Finance and Operations Manager is a key member of the USAID ERA leadership team. The position plays a pivotal role in overseeing adherence to project’s Field Operations Manual (FOM), USAID regulations, contract requirements and limitations, financial policies, procedures, controls, and reporting systems. The role ensures compliance of all accounting and financial reporting functions, oversees cost and general accounting, accounts receivable/payable, payroll, risk management, and partner’s relationships, audit backup documentation, and directly supervise and support a team responsible for finance, accounting, administration, logistics, and procurement. The Senior Finance and Operations Manager supervises the Finance team consisted of five staff members. The Senior Finance and Operations Manager reports to Deputy Chief of Party, Operations.

 Your main duties and responsibilities will be:

Financial Management:

• Manages banking relationships and coordinates periodic updates for checking account signers
• Reviews and approves bank reconciliations performed by the field accountant
• Prepares and reviews project cost data prior to submitting Oracle data reports to DAI Washington
• Conducts regular cash flow analyses to ensure availability of funds and the accurate maintaining of bank balances
• Responsible for ensuring petty cash is maintained at a feasible level for operational activities and that petty cash procedures are followed
• Ensures the safeguard of bank checks, and cash receipts
• Ensures proper segregation of duties within the Finance/Accounting Department
• Establishes guidelines for maintaining sub-grant and other partnership files and activities as applicable
• Directs the schedule of financial activities to ensure the timely preparation of budget related reports
• Ensures non-billable expenses are thoroughly reviewed and are kept to a minimum
• Ensures that foreign taxes paid, if any, are tracked, recorded, and reported to USAID in accordance with ADS guidelines
• Reviews wire requests for field project implementation
• Monitors procedures to ensure accurate and timely payment of travel advances, reimbursements for staff and partner travel
• Controls procedures to ensure accurate and timely reconciliation of travel advances
• Ensures control of outstanding advances and aging reports for accuracy
• Ensures the timely and accurate processing and review of all payroll transactions, assuring compliance with established employment agreements and modifications.
• Approves overtime expenses (if applicable per Project Schedule of Authorities)
• Ensures staff compliance with timekeeping policy and recordkeeping
• Serves as backup for payroll processing when applicable

Financial Reporting:

• Develops and maintains reports of status of financial management activities (i.e. monthly and quarterly reporting)
• Responsible for ensuring project assets/inventory report is balanced against the general ledger/FAS prior to submission to USAID.
• Responsible for ensuring that any/all contractual financial reporting requirements are identified and complied with in a timely and accurate manner.
• Ensures that tax reporting procedures are well documented to facilitate preparation and submission in a timely manner
• Reviews and submits monthly reconciliation reports
• Monitors and submits advance, commitment, and grant reports as applicable
• Develops and submits other project reports necessary and based on registration requirements to local authorities
• Oversees the reporting of expenses by regional offices
• Monitors and reports on partner/vendor payment schedules and obligations
• Provides annual budgets of expenditure as well as quarterly forecasts against budget statements (accruals, pipelines, etc.) as applicable

Audit and Compliance:

• Responsible for gaining comprehensive knowledge of project’s Field Operations Manual (FOM) and for identifying areas where policies, procedures and/or practices may not be fully aligned with project practice and advising project management with options and recommendations
• Manages preparation of internal and external audits; Supports responses and actions to internal audit comments
• Conducts daily reviews of backup documentation to ensure completeness, accuracy, and full compliance with all regulations and the Field Operations Manual (FOM)
• Performs regular spot audits on project’s files.
• Ensures adequate backup documentation is uploaded to relevant system according to set deadlines
• Ensures that accounting policies and practices are carried out in accordance with GAAP standards; project internal controls are established and implemented in accordance with DAI policies, USAID rules/regulations and the terms of the contract.

Financial Systems:

• Oversee and Monitor use of field accounting system (FAS), cloud software for backup documentation, DAI’s project management system (TAMIS), etc.
• Communicates with home office system support teams on system or operations troubleshooting technical issues
• Trains finance staff in any financial system knowledge gap
• Ensures that voucher files are scanned and uploaded to DAI’s System for the Electronic Archival of Financial Documentation – BOX

Staff Supervision:

• Trains, supervises, and mentors financial staff
• Plans, assigns, and directs work; appraises performance, addresses and resolves problems
• Responsible for providing training, guidance and direction to project Accounting/Finance staff
• Responsible for coordinating documentation requirements with various departments, i.e. procurement, grants, logistics, human resources, the technical team and other areas
• Responsible for providing training to staff on finance procedures and documentation requirements

Operations Management:

• Maintain communication with DAI’s home office staff on administrative and operational aspects of the project.
• Maintain all personnel policies to ensure compliance with local labor law, tax law, and USAID regulations.
• Review salary justifications and supporting documentation to verify the compensation rates for long-term employees and consultants. This includes reviewing biodatas, employment / consulting agreements, pay stubs, and other supporting information or resources to establish compensation rates that are in compliance with ERA’s prime contract with USAID and DAI policies and procedures.
• Identifying gaps in internal controls or other compliance and operational areas and propose corrective actions for management’s actions.
• Implementing operational, accounting, and internal controls policies and procedures to ensure they comply with USAID and DAI rules and regulations.

About you

• MA Degree in Accounting, Finance, Business Administration, Management or equivalent. Advanced degree MBA, CPA, PMP or equivalent preferred;

• 8+ years of relevant experience and progressive responsibility in finance and accounting, office administration, project operations at the senior level of an organization;
• Experience managing budgets of $10 million or more;
• Experience leading and managing the financial aspects of USAID projects, including a demonstrated understanding of applicable finance-related USG contracting regulations;
• Accuracy in working with large amounts of data;
• Ability to respond effectively to the most sensitive inquiries or complaints;
• Experience with enterprise accounting software, and Microsoft office suite;
• Demonstrated knowledge of internal controls and audit processes (e.g. procurement, local subcontract agreements, etc.);
• An articulate individual who possesses excellent communications and personnel management skills and who can relate to people at all levels of an organization;
• An energetic, forward-thinking and creative individual with high ethical standards and appropriate professional image;
• An extremely well organized and self-directed individual with sound technical skills, analytical ability, good judgment, and strong operational focus;
• Fluency in English and Ukrainian is required.

Job Expectations

In this position, you are expected to share the DAI four core values:

• Integrity: commit to civil and ethical behavior, play by the rules, and do the right thing;
• Responsibility: be accountable to clients, partners, grant recipients, beneficiaries, colleagues, and communities where we work. If you fall short, you own up, fix the problem, and get it right the next time;

• Excellence: adhere to the highest technical and professional standards in innovation, learning, and service;
• Global Citizenship: respect cultural diversity and treat everyone everywhere with professionalism and dignity to make the world a better place.

WE OFFER

Contract length: 12-months employment agreement with a possibility of extension until August 2024.

Salary Level: We offer competitive market-based salary level for candidates with relevant experience.

Duty station: Kyiv

Benefits: all benefits envisaged by Labor Code of Ukraine, corporate medical insurance for employees and immediate family members.

Start date: September 2021

Application process

All applicants must send a cover letter and updated CV (no longer than four pages) in English to [email protected], please mention in the subject Inclusion Officer 

Closing date for applications: August 31, 2021

For further information about the DAI GLOBAL LLC, please consult our website dai.com If you want to learn more about Economic resilience Activity, please visit our facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/ERAUkraine.