Grant Manager

Princeton University seeks a highly motivated, highly experienced individual to serve as Grants Manager (GM) in the Department of Molecular Biology. This position is fully remote. The GM’s primary responsibilities are pre- and post-award activities related to sponsored project grants, including faculty research grants and career awards, as well as fellowships/career development awards for graduate students and postdoctoral associates. The person in this position must have experience with sponsored academic research awards either at the pre- or post-award stage. The ideal person will have both. This position requires minimum supervision and reports to the Senior Grants Manager. Submission of resume and cover letter is required.

Pre-award activities require preparation of applications for federal and private granting agencies and the ability to work with web-based proposal submission sites such as NIH Commons/ASSIST, NSF Fastlane, grants.gov and Proposal Central. The GM prepares budgets and budget justifications and takes responsibility for administrative tasks involved in the submission of proposals. Tasks include but are not limited to:

• regular and independent communication with faculty members, postdoctoral staff and graduate students in a university academic department setting;
• experience with tight deadlines and preparation of documents for review by the Office of Research & Project Administration (ORPA) for submission to funding agency in Princeton ERA;
• knowledge of biomedical granting agencies to search for appropriate funding; and
• ability to understand program announcements and "terms & conditions" for each agency. 

Post-award activities require communication with the award sponsors and coordination with PIs, Sponsored Research Accounting (SRA), and ORPA. This position is responsible for sponsored awards plus departmental or other internal accounts and requires independent management of post-award monitoring activities for grants. Post-award tasks include:

• facilitating PI submission of annual progress reports and close-out documents for sponsored projects, fellowships and subcontracts;
• monitoring allowable and allocable costs, spending patterns, and balances;
• using PeopleSoft Prime for journals to transfer costs and monitoring costs with special requirements (e.g. travel, computers);
• monitoring personnel effort allocation, updating salary information using Labor Accounting; and coordinating with department administrators concerning personnel on grants.

The candidate will produce spending projections for faculty lab groups, including projected data for personnel, facility and lab costs. The successful candidate must be independent in their ability to: analyze and present financial forecasts; organize monthly monitoring and reporting of expenditures and “burn rate” on grants; communicate effectively with faculty members; set up and close out accounts in compliance with agency and University policy; and monitor individual faculty members’ non-sponsored funds. This position is independently responsible for keeping up-to-date grant records in a shared system and following through on all sponsors’ policies and regulations.

The qualified candidate must be detail oriented and have excellent organizational, interpersonal, verbal and written communication skills, the ability to exercise discretion and independent judgment, the capability to plan and prioritize a diverse workload, creatively solve problems, take initiative and function autonomously as well as function effectively in a team.

• BA/BS in business, finance, accounting or equivalent, a background in biological sciences is helpful.
• Minimum 5 years’ grants experience.
• Candidate must be proficient in Microsoft Office: Excel, Access, and Word and have an understanding of accounting basics.
• Biomedical/biology or other life science grants experience in a University setting strongly preferred.
• Familiarity with University policies and procedures regarding sponsored awards preferred.
• Familiarity with the University's personnel and fiscal management policies, and the University's financial system applications such as Princeton ERA, Labor Accounting, Information Warehouse, and PeopleSoft PRIME is desirable.
• Experience with shared record-keeping systems such as OnBase and SharePoint also preferred.

Princeton University is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. KNOW YOUR RIGHTS