Controller

Position Summary/Objectives

The Controller serves as the Finance Department’s senior accounting professional and is responsible for overseeing SOWIB’s day-to-day finance and accounting operations. The position provides leadership and oversight for the integrity of the general ledger, monthly financial close, fund and grant accounting, account reconciliations, accounting workflows, financial systems, and grant financial management.

Working within a complex nonprofit and grant-funded environment with approximately 50 funding sources, the Controller applies strong technical accounting knowledge, analytical judgment, and problem-solving skills to maintain accurate, timely, and reliable financial operations and information.

The Controller partners closely with the Finance Director to support financial reporting, financial analysis, regulatory and grant compliance, internal controls, and informed organizational decision-making.

Responsibility and Decision Making

The Controller is expected to independently manage and resolve accounting, grant accounting, reconciliation, system, and operational matters. The position requires the accounting expertise and professional judgment necessary to perform these responsibilities with limited technical direction. The Controller provides oversight of transaction processing by monitoring workflow quality, reviewing transactions and supporting documentation as appropriate, reviewing exceptions, and ensuring established procedures are followed. The Controller's review should focus on accounting accuracy, compliance, unusual activity, exceptions, and matters requiring professional judgment.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

Accounting Operations and General Ledger Management

• Manage accounting operations and Finance workflows.
• Maintain the accuracy, completeness, and integrity of the general ledger.
• Manage the monthly accounting close and ensure timely and accurate completion of required close activities.
• Ensure accounting batches, imports, journal entries, and other transactions are completely and appropriately posted as part of the accounting and close process.
• Prepare and review recurring journal entries, accruals, payroll-related entries, corrections, and other routine accounting activity.
• Manage account reconciliations, including bank, credit card, balance sheet, accounts receivable, accounts payable, and payroll accounts; investigate and resolve reconciling items, discrepancies, and unusual balances.
• Maintain approved account, fund, grant, program, project, and other accounting dimensions and attributes.
• Generate reliable closed financial data, preliminary financial statements, and supporting schedules for reporting and analysis.
• Serve as backup for payroll processing.

Fund and Grant Accounting

• Manage grant and restricted funding accounting across approximately 50 funding sources throughout the award lifecycle.
• Ensure revenues and expenditures are accurately coded to the appropriate fund, grant, program, account, and other required dimensions.
• Monitor grant and funding source balances, award periods, budget utilization, burn rates, pass-through funding activity, and other financial indicators.
• Manage routine grant revenue recognition, receivables, deferred or conditional revenue, and reimbursement activity in accordance with established accounting policies.
• Prepare or oversee grant reimbursement requests and required financial reports.
• Monitor compliance with financial provisions of grant agreements and applicable funding requirements, including resolving questions of allowability, allocability, funding source, and accounting treatment within established policies.
• Maintain appropriate accounting support for net assets with and without donor restrictions.
• Maintain accurate accounting for pass-through and subrecipient funding, including amounts reported, and charged to applicable awards; reconcile related activity and ensure appropriate treatment in grant, financial, and management reporting.

Program and Grant Financial Management

• Serve as the primary Finance contact for routine program financial matters.
• Lead recurring budget-to-actual and financial discussions with program staff.
• Analyze program and grant financial performance, including budget variances and funding utilization, and identify significant variances, projected underspending or overspending, funding gaps, coding issues, and compliance concerns.
• Partner with program leadership on expenditure projections and proposed budget revisions for individual awards.
• Provide timely financial information and guidance to program staff.

Accounts Payable and Expense Management

• Manage SOWIB's accounts payable and employee expense processes.
• Monitor the quality, completeness, and timeliness of AP and expense processing and ensure established procedures are consistently followed.
• Resolve non-routine or complex coding, documentation, funding, allowability, and accounting issues.
• Ensure AP and expense activity is completely and accurately reflected in the general ledger.

Financial Systems Administration and Accounting Integrity

• Maintain the operational and accounting integrity of Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT and its interfaces with BILL, Expensify, Paycor, Omatic, and other Finance systems.
• Monitor system integrations and ensure transactions are completely and accurately transferred to the general ledger.
• Resolve failed imports, unposted batches, mapping exceptions, and other routine system or data flow issues.
• Maintain approved accounting mappings and routine system configurations.
• Test and validate system enhancements, reporting changes, integrations, and configuration changes from an accounting and operational perspective; support related documentation, data cleanup, and post-implementation stabilization activities.
• Identify and recommend improvements to financial systems, workflows, and accounting processes, and partner with the Finance Director and technical resources to implement approved enhancements.

Compliance, Audit and Internal Controls

• Monitor adherence to established accounting policies, procedures, internal controls, and applicable financial requirements; identify control weaknesses, recurring issues, and process risks and recommend corrective actions.
• Maintain accounting schedules, reconciliations, documentation, and other records necessary to support audit and monitoring activities; prepare audit schedules and coordinate routine audit information requests.
• Support grant monitoring, financial reviews, and other compliance activities.

Financial Reporting and Analysis Support

• Prepare grant, program, management, audit, and supporting Board reporting schedules as assigned.
• Provide variance explanations, accounting exceptions, supporting schedules, and other information necessary for management reporting and analysis.
• Support development and testing of new or enhanced financial reports.
• Provide accounting data and supporting analysis for forecasting and other financial reporting initiatives.

Finance Operations Leadership

Supervise Finance staff, including establishing work expectations and priorities, providing technical guidance, monitoring performance and recurring deadlines, and addressing workflow, processing, or quality issues.

• Maintain accounting procedures, close checklists, and other operational documentation.
• Promote cross-training and documented backup procedures for key Finance functions to strengthen departmental continuity and capacity.
• Serve as the Finance Department's primary operational leader and maintain continuity of accounting operations in the Finance Director's absence.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities

• Advanced knowledge of generally accepted accounting principles, general ledger accounting, and financial reporting.
• Strong working knowledge of fund, grant, and restricted funding accounting principles and practices.
• Ability to interpret and apply grant, contract, accounting, and financial compliance requirements.
• Strong analytical and critical thinking skills, including the ability to identify unusual financial activity, evaluate underlying causes, and exercise sound accounting judgment.
• Strong understanding of integrated financial systems, accounting dimensions, system interfaces, and data flows.
• Ability to manage competing priorities, recurring deadlines, and accounting workflows in a complex, multi-funded environment.
• Ability to communicate financial and accounting information clearly to Finance, program, and organizational staff.
• Advanced proficiency with Microsoft Excel and computerized accounting systems.

Minimum Education and Experience

• Bachelor's degree in accounting, finance, or a closely related field.
• At least five years of progressively responsible accounting experience, including substantial responsibility for general ledger accounting, monthly close, account reconciliations, journal entries, accruals, financial reporting, and accounting analysis.
• Professional experience with fund accounting, grant accounting, or restricted funding in a multi-fund, multi-grant, or similarly complex funding environment, including responsibility for accounting across multiple programs, grants, contracts, funds, or other accounting dimensions.
• Demonstrated experience supervising or providing substantive leadership to accounting or Finance staff.
• Demonstrated ability to independently analyze accounting activity, investigate discrepancies and unusual financial results, and resolve accounting problems.
• Experience working with integrated accounting or ERP systems.

Preferred Qualifications

• CPA, CPA candidate, CMA, relevant advanced degree, or other applicable professional credential.
• Nonprofit, governmental, workforce development, or other complex grant-funded accounting experience.
• Experience with federal awards and Uniform Guidance.
• Experience accounting for indirect cost and shared cost allocations in a grant-funded environment.
• Experience with Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT or another sophisticated fund accounting ERP.
• Experience with BILL, Expensify, Paycor, Omatic, or comparable integrated financial systems.
• Experience supporting annual financial statement audits and grant monitoring.

Performance Expectations

Successful performance in this position is characterized by reliable accounting, strong independent judgment, timely close, accurate fund and grant coding, effective problem resolution, and operational ownership to ensure continuity of accounting operations.

The Controller is expected to know the accounting operation well enough to identify financial activity or results that warrant further investigation, independently evaluate the underlying issue, and either resolve it or bring the Finance Director a clearly defined issue with analysis and recommended action.

Work Environment: Work is performed remotely and involves interaction with a diverse range of staff, partners, and stakeholders.

Travel: None.

Medical, Vision, Dental, Life & AD&D Insurance

401K - 6% Employer match

Paid Time Off