Responsible for a portfolio of externally funded research projects, providing pro-active financial management and administration of projects throughout their lifecycle.- Providing expertise, guidance and support to Principal Investigators, project managers, research finance staff and researchers with post-award administration and project management of their research grants and contracts.- Ensuring compliance with funder’s terms and conditions, UCL’s financial regulations, analysis of costs for accuracy and eligibility, reporting criteria and deadlines are met.

- Responsible for the day-to-day financial operations, invoice, costing and journal approvals and management of five Research Funding Officers supporting SGUL and SGFT grant funding.-Ensuring research funding policies and procedures are enforced for the transparent delivery of research finances and to provide an excellent service to academics and clinicians.-Advising on research funding opportunities and costing grant applications to facilitating robust financial management of awarded research grants.

- Developing process improvement within the Research Funding Team, streamlining procedures and seeking efficiencies.- Pro-active horizon scanning and dissemination of research opportunities.- Accurately project costing against funder criteria.- Ensuring timely submission of detailed project proposals to funder and subsequent monitoring, financial management and reporting against key project milestones through-out the life of the project.- Providing a main point of contact for academics within a Research Institute for research funding issues, both at application stage and during post-award management.- Providing pro-active support to academics and to the management of the Research Institute.

A pivotal role ensuring departmental and research funds are professionally managed. Involves close liaison with academic and administrative colleagues at all levels of seniority, as well as external stakeholders.Duties include:• Developing and implementing policies and procedures for effective financial management of departmental research projects.• Providing information to inform decision making by principal investigators.• Maximising claims from projects whilst ensuring compliance with external funders’ terms and conditions.• Working with the Business Manager on monitoring management accounts • Supporting the Business Manager in balancing the academic and financial objectives of the Department.• Setting standards and monitoring procedures which impact upon longer-term financial planning.• Identifying issues that may arise from projects and providing expert advice.Highlight:Used accounting background and skills in Microsoft Excel to completely refresh reports to principal investigators (PIs). Using feedback from researchers I was able to develop a template providing both a summary and, if required layers of detail, ensuring PIs had all the information they might require in order to manage their grant efficiently.

A key role ensuring high quality financial data is provided to academic and financial departments within two faculties. The role involved close liaison with academic and administrative colleagues at all levels of seniority, as well as external stakeholders.Duties included:• Supporting the Faculty's departments and offices with varied finance-related issues; becoming an invaluable first point of contact and providing a professional financial service.• Assisting in the production of reliable financial data in accordance with stringent deadlines, including management accounts, budgets, forecasts & variances, and ad hoc reports.• Maintaining and promoting a strong internal control environment.Highlight:Through creative thinking and expertise in Microsoft Excel streamlined a number of procedures and processes resulting in an increase in accuracy and far less manual intervention in reports, producing a saving of two full working days per month.

Duties included:• Production of standard reports from the university's finance system.• Invoice and journal processing.• Providing routine advice and guidance on procurement procedures to ensure compliance with university and EU Procurement legislation.• Maintenance of contracts database including detailed analysis and reporting.Highlight:Professionalism and potential recognised by the Assistant Director of Finance (Health); effectively head-hunted into next role.

During my time with the Fundraising Department I earned two promotions; starting out as Finance & Data Assistant, I was promoted to Finance Coordinator and finally achieved a further promotion to Finance Officer.Duties included:• Completion of three monthly cumulative reconciliations of all philanthropic income (ordinarily greater than £1M per month) to the multiple organisations’ bank accounts.• Overseeing gift administration including managing a team of three Finance Assistants to ensure accurate records and a flawless service to donors.• Developing systems and procedures to ensure effective gift processing.• Liaising with overseas branches and managing international receipts.• Providing cover and working collaboratively with the other Finance Officer (Reporting) to ensure the availability of accurate and timely financial reports in order to keep a variety of audiences informed and enable senior management in decision making.Highlight:Played lead role in the merge of financial processes of three separate charities into a single system and implementing a monthly reconciliation process. A hugely demanding and complex project that appealed to me as I was able to develop my skills in data analysis and streamlining procedures.

Duties included:• Providing an enquiry and counter service for students, staff and general public.• Producing official student documentation.Highlight:Created a new procedure for processing mitigating circumstance appeals which enabled the efficient administration of a complicated and often time consuming process.

Undertook several roles starting out as cashier and progressing on to qualify as an account opener and lastly to managing a demanding foreign bureau in a flagship City branch.Highlights: • Achieving a £0 operational loss for the foreign bureau.• Qualifying as an account opener, including becoming General Insurance Standards Code accredited.• Achieving a 98% first time pass rate for new accounts opened and forwarded to the Account Quality Checking Unit.• Nomination to Local Directors Office for excellence in customer service.