The Senior Cost Proposal Officer, Finance (SCPOF) contributes to African Wildlife Foundation’s (AWF) Program Design (PD) unit within the International Policy & Government Relations (IPGR) department by helping raise funds for key programs and ensuring compliance with agreements between AWF and public donors. The SCPOF will be responsible for financial components of the program design team’s work, including developing cost applications, budgets and budget narratives for project proposals in coordination with country, program and finance teams in order to raise public funds for existing and planned program activities. The SCPOF will also represent the Finance team in grants management activities to ensure compliance with AWF’s agreements with donors. Tasks include developing templates and cost reference materials as well as researching, budgeting, review financial project reports, writing and submitting cost proposals to public donors. The SCPOF will also hold regular meetings with program and grants management teams to assess progress and compliance with donor requirements as well as strengthen capacity within programs to understand how to implement projects according to different donor expectations.
This position reports to the Director of Finance with a dotted line to the Senior Manager, Program Design, International Policy & Government Relations on matters of the Program Design team’s work.
Occasional trips to the field may be required
Responsibilities
Proposal Development and Budgeting (60%)
As a part of the proposal development team within Program Design and in very close collaboration with the finance and program/field teams, conducts the full range of activities required to research, prepare and submit cost proposals in order to secure public funding.
- Working under the leadership of “account managers” and “proposal process managers” on the PD team, supports responding to Request for Proposals:
- Serves as the main point of contact for cost related matters on proposals and budget modifications;
- Working with team leads from PD, finance and programs, developing professional and competitive cost proposals and budget narratives;
- Providing guidance on various elements of costs, template and budget notes to support cost proposals;
- Provide direction and instructions to partners for the development of sub-award/grantee budgets for inclusion in AWF led bids; and provide high quality review and feedback on their proposal budgets;
- Liaise with account managers and PD team members in Nairobi to support proposal development and cultivation activities as needed;
- Support program staff with developing cost-related responses to post submission questions.
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- Putting together designated sections of proposal packages, such as organizational background, certifications and representations, qualifications summaries and past performance;
- Assist in executing proposal development team meetings, including agenda development, meeting facilitation, documentation, and follow-up items;
- Working closely with the Director of Finance:
- Develop and standardize internal budgeting/costing processes for cost proposals;
- Create budget templates and tools for efficient and effective cost proposal development, compliant to donor requirements;
- Develop and update a database for cost figures relevant for AWF offices and landscape/field programs for easy utilization during project budgeting;
- Liaise with Human Resources department on costs of employment for staff and keep track of existing and projected level of efforts of staff for proposal budgeting purposes;
- Funding gap analysis report for both personnel, office, core and programmatic funding gaps;
- Track and analyze financial data on the existing programs to inform new calls for proposals and ensure value for money.
Project Grant Management and Compliance (40%)
Working closely with AWF’s grants management team, ensure that programs understand grant agreement and contract requirements and have the capacity to implement in compliance with those regulations and that any required changes to donor funded projects are escalated to PD account managers as needed. These functions include, but are not limited to:
- Lead the processing of grants in coordination with PD “account managers”, Finance and Program/Country teams.
- Work closely with Program Design, Grant Management, Finance, Administration, and Program teams to help them ensure compliance and that contractual obligations to donors are met during implementation and reporting:
- o Preparing key items to be discussed in Kick-off/inception and project review/evaluation meetings;
- o Support regular grants management meetings occur for all large publicly funded projects;
- o Strengthening the capacity of program, finance, and administrative staff to understand and comply with donor agreements;
- o Review donor contracts and support in capacity building and development of donor reference guides for use by the program teams, ensuring adequate flow down of donor requirements to partners;
- o Support/input in due diligence and downstream partner assessment in accordance with AWF requirements.
- Work with account managers to conduct any conversations or negotiations necessary with donors during implementation and reporting.
- · Provide PD input to financial reports and secures finance input into technical reports to public donors.
- · Assists program teams in completing budget realignments and other financial modifications as necessary.
- · Ensure AWF’s accounts on donor portals are up to date.
Requirements
- Bachelor’s degree and experience in finance, economics, accounting, business or other relevant field.
- Minimum of 6 years of relevant work experience.
- Certification such as CGMA, CPA or other related certifications
- Experience with major public donor agencies such as USAID, EU, the GEF or Germany.
- Excellent budgeting skills are a must, including the ability to work with technical leads to build accurate cost proposals.
- Must possess database management skills.
- Must possess strong skills in Microsoft Excel.
- Must be proficient in research, interpreting, and analyzing diverse data and processes.
- Must possess the ability to work collaboratively and independently to achieve stated goals.
- Must be highly organized with the ability to implement systems and follow-up process.
- Must possess strong analytical skills.
- Must pay attention to detail.
- Must have the ability to meet deadlines.
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