Financial Systems Specialist

If you’re passionate about building a better future for individuals, communities, and our country—and you’re committed to working hard to play your part in building that future—consider WGU as the next step in your career.

Driven by a mission to expand access to higher education through online, competency-based degree programs, WGU is also committed to being a great place to work for a diverse workforce of student-focused professionals. The university has pioneered a new way to learn in the 21st century, one that has received praise from academic, industry, government, and media leaders. Whatever your role, working for WGU gives you a part to play in helping students graduate, creating a better tomorrow for themselves and their families.

ALL INTERNAL APPLICANTS MUST APPLY BY:11:26:24

Job Profile Summary:

The Financial Systems Specialist supports and provides technical and functional expertise regarding the Financial Systems.  Works closely with department staff members, functional leaders, organizational units, and subject matter experts to identify, develop, and deploy new business processes that enable teams and integrate all practices in a seamless and efficient manner.  Establishes and maintains a positive and productive work culture. Manages day-to-day workflows and connects various teams who are crucial to student success.

Essential Functions and Responsibilities:

• Serves as a technical liaison between the department and EdTech, as well as other cross-functional departments.
• Assists with the implementation of new processes affecting the department’s office systems.
• Assists with the maintenance of current applications and implementation of new applications.
• Responsible for testing system upgrades and defining user software needs.
• Trains and advises department employees on any updates, upgrades, or changes to Financial Systems.
• Maintains the reports needed for reconciliation and auditing purposes.
• Utilizes analytical and project management skills to gain a thorough understanding of department technology needs and translates these into specific initiatives and short- and long-range plans.
• Develops and documents organizational content, practices, and objectives, including those for relatively undefined reporting or system initiatives.
• Is widely recognized as a go-to person.
• Formats and delivers accurate data, using programs or reports, which will enable leadership to make informed business decisions, as well as enable employees to better serve student needs and ensure student success.
• Works with cross-functional teams on projects to discover insights that will guide strategic decisions and uncover optimization opportunities.
• Fluidly manages multiple tasks and responsibilities in a high-pressure environment and guides others on the team in collaborative efforts.
• Develops and implements quality controls and departmental standards to ensure quality standards, organizational expectations, and regulatory requirements.
• Elicits requirements and specifications through use of interviews, document analysis, workshops, surveys, business process descriptions, use cases, scenarios, business analysis, and task and workflow analysis.
• Anticipates future demands of initiatives related to people, technology, and business within own department and designs/implements solutions to meet these needs.
• Develops skills as a subject matter expert in database management, systems architecture, Excel, higher education systems and customer relationship management (CRM) system. Must be technologically competent with data analysis, database navigation, data interpretation and MS Office suite programs.
• Performs other related duties as assigned.

Knowledge, Skill and Abilities:

• Personal drive to continually increase the standard of work.
• Strong organization skills with a high attention to detail.
• Strong SQL skills and ability to perform effective querying involving multiple tables and subqueries.
• Ability to manage and report data on several projects or initiatives at once.
• Excellent oral and written communication skills.
• Ability to drive communication between team members and project stakeholders through mainly electronic platforms.
• Ability to collaborate with colleagues inside and outside the department, to gather information.
• Ability to work with minimal supervision in a fast-paced environment.
• Ability and temperament to proactively consider the needs of others.
• Strong problem solving, quantitative and analytical abilities.
• Creative mindset for recommending new initiatives.
• Ability to create and track data related to project impact.
• Ability to plan and meet schedules.
• Work equally well in self-managed and team-based projects.
• Proficient working knowledge of Microsoft Office applications, specifically in Microsoft Excel.
• Ability to work with Microsoft Power Platform tools.
• Working knowledge of Nelnet payment processing systems, Banner, and Salesforce
• Ability to learn new applications and platforms as needed.

Competencies:

Organizational Impact:

• Works to achieve operational targets within job area with some impact on department, function, or office results.
• Work is performed independently on moderately complex projects and assignments with guidance required for direction and complex tasks.

Problem Solving and Decision Making:

• Responsible for adjusting or recommended enhancements to systems and processes to solve problems or improve effectiveness of job area.
• Problems faced may require understanding of a broader set of issues and job areas.

Communication and Influence:

• Communicates with contacts typically within the job area to obtain or provide information requiring some explanation or interpretation.  May work to influence parties within own job area at an operational level.

Leadership and Talent Management:

• May provide guidance and assistance to entry-level professionals and/or support employees.
• Demonstrates the WGU leadership principles in all aspects of service to students, employees, and partners of WGU.

Job Qualifications:

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in related field.
• 2 or more years of related experience.
• In lieu of a degree, 5 years of related experience may be accepted.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Salesforce Admin Certification.
• Experience within the higher education sector.
• Experience using Banner, Nelnet, Salesforce, Oracle SQL Developer, Appworx.
• Experience using Tableau, Databricks, ThoughtSpot.
• Data Analytics Certification or applicable certification.
• Change management training.
• Experience developing and analyzing PowerBI reports.
• ITIL certifications (v3 or later).
• A+, Network+, or Security+ certification.
• Experience constructing and running basic SQL queries.

The salary range for this position takes into account the wide range of factors that are considered in making compensation decisions including but not limited to skill sets; experience and training; licensure and certifications; and other business and organizational needs.

At WGU, it is not typical for an individual to be hired at or near the top of the range for their position, and compensation decisions are dependent on the facts and circumstances of each case. A reasonable estimate of the current range is:
 

How to apply: apply online

Full-time Regular Positions (FT classification, standard working hours = 40)

This is a full-time, regular position that is eligible for bonuses; medical, dental, vision, telehealth and mental healthcare; health savings account and flexible spending account; basic and voluntary life insurance; disability coverage; accident, critical illness and hospital indemnity supplemental coverages; legal and identity theft coverage; retirement savings plan; wellbeing program; discounted WGU tuition; and flexible paid time off for rest and relaxation with no need for accrual, flexible paid sick time with no need for accrual, 11 paid holidays, and other paid leaves, including up to 12 weeks of parental leave.

The University is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability or protected veteran status.