Grants Management Specialist

This position is located in FEMA's Region Ten Grants Division. The ideal candidate for this position will be a motivated grants professional with full life-cycle experience including regulations, financial monitoring, awards, reports, amendments, closeouts, working in grant management systems, and process improvement. Tribal Nations experience is a plus. What will I do in this position if hired? In this position, you will serve as a Grants Management Specialist in FEMA's Region Ten Grants Division, Non-Disaster Grants Branch. Typical assignments include: Evaluating applicants' financial health, business integrity, and overall capacity to manage Federal funds, which includes performing application budget reviews. Negotiating terms and conditions of financial assistance awards (primarily grant agreements). Managing and administering agreements through all phases of their life-cycle including pre-award planning, active-phase performance monitoring, modifications, and final closeouts ensuring compliance with federal regulations and the Federal Emergency Management Agency policies. Reviewing, analyzing, and reconciling required Federal Financial Reports (FFR) and providing continuous oversight of all financial and management aspects of grants. Conducting analyses to resolve a broad range of grant-related challenges or problems, prioritizing tasks, and making recommendations for change or improvement. Providing guidance, policy decisions, and regulatory interpretations to internal and external customers. Using grant and financial management systems to process awards, reports, amendments, and closeouts; resolve system errors; and support improvements to data quality and business processes. What else do I need to know? At FEMA, our mission is to help people before, during and after disasters, and every employee at FEMA has a role in emergency management. Every FEMA employee has regular and recurring emergency management responsibilities, though not every position requires routine deployment to disaster sites. All positions are subject to recall around the clock for emergency management operations, which may require irregular work hours, work at locations other than the official duty station, and may include duties other than those specified in the employee's official position description. Travel requirements in support of emergency operations may be extensive in nature (weeks to months), with little advance notice, and may require employees to relocate to emergency sites with physically austere and operationally challenging conditions. Promotion Potential: Future promotions will be dependent on your ability to perform the duties at a higher level, the continuing need for an employee assigned to the higher level, and administrative approval. The qualification requirements listed below must be met by the closing date of this announcement. GS-09 To qualify for this position at the GS-09 level, you must possess one full year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the GS-07 level in the Federal government, which has equipped you with the skills needed to successfully perform the duties of the position. Experience may be obtained in the Federal or Private Sector and must demonstrate all of the following: Assisting with reviewing grants or grant recipients for compliance; OR, Assisting with reviewing financial reports, grant application budgets; OR, Assisting with stakeholder coordination related to grants management. • OR- the successful completion of a Master's or equivalent graduate degree (such as an LL.B. or J.D.) or at least two full years of progressively higher level graduate education leading to such a degree in a related field (Transcript required). • OR- possess a combination of specialized experience, as described in the vacancy announcement, and related graduate level education, beyond the first full year of graduate level study, that when combined, meet the qualification requirements for this position (Transcript required). GS-11 To qualify for this position at the GS-11 level, you must possess one full year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the GS-09 level in the Federal government, which has equipped you with the skills needed to successfully perform the duties of the position. Experience may be obtained in the Federal or Private Sector and must demonstrate all of the following: Reviewing grants or grant recipients for compliance; OR, Supporting the review of financial reports, grant application budgets; AND, Supporting financial monitoring. • OR- the successful completion of a Ph.D. or equivalent doctoral degree or at least three full years of progressively higher level graduate education leading to such a degree or LL.M. in a related field (Transcript required). • OR- possess a combination of specialized experience, as described in the vacancy announcement, and related graduate level education, beyond the first two years of graduate level study, that when combined, meet the qualification requirements for this position (Transcript required). GS-12 To qualify for this position at the GS-12 level, you must possess one full year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the GS-11 level in the Federal government, which has equipped you with the skills needed to successfully perform the duties of the position. Experience may be obtained in the Federal or Private Sector and must demonstrate all of the following: Conducting grant recipient risk assessments to support monitoring and compliance; AND, Reviewing financial reports to identify trends, missing data, reporting issues, cost schedules, funding changes, or award documentation; AND, Interpreting grant related laws, regulations, policies, or award terms; AND, Advising with stakeholders on technical grant requirements or issues. GS-13 To qualify for this position at the GS-13 level, you must possess one full year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the GS-12 level in the Federal government, which has equipped you with the skills needed to successfully perform the duties of the position. Experience may be obtained in the federal government, a state or local government, or private sector, and must demonstrate the following: Analyzing grant budgets and cost estimates; AND, Analyzing financial reports to identify trends, missing data, and reporting issues; AND, Advising and interpreting grant related laws, regulations, policies, or award terms; AND, Conducting risk assessments, on-site financial reviews, desk reviews, or internal control evaluations. Please read the following important information to ensure we have everything we need to consider your application: Do not copy and paste the duties, specialized experience, or occupational assessment questionnaire from this announcement into your resume as that will not be considered a demonstration of your qualifications for this position. Your resume serves as the basis for experience related qualification determinations, and you must highlight your most relevant and significant work experience and education (if applicable), as it relates to this job opportunity. Please use your own words, be clear, and specific when describing your work history. We cannot make assumptions regarding your experience. Are you qualifying based on your work experience? Qualifications are based on your ability to demonstrate in your resume that you possess one year of the specialized experience for this announcement at a comparable scope and responsibility. To ensure all of the essential information is in your resume, we encourage you to use the USAJOBS online Resume Builder. If you choose to use your own resume, it must contain the following information organized by experience/position: (1) job title, (2) name of employer, (3) start and end dates of each period of employment (from MM/DD/YY to MM/DD/YY), (4) detailed description of duties performed, accomplishments, and related skills, and (5) hours worked per week (part-time employment will be prorated in crediting experience). Federal experience/positions must also include the grade level, occupational series and dates in which you held each grade level. Are you a current or former FEMA Reservist/Disaster Assistance Employee (DAE)? To accurately credit your experience from intermittent positions and Reservist Deployments, you must list the dates (from MM/DD/YY to MM/DD/YY) of deployments that are relevant to your qualifying experience, along with the job title and specific duties you were responsible for during each deployment. Determining length of General or Specialized Experience is dependent on the above information. Failure to provide the above information in your resume may result in your application being found "not qualified. Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional, philanthropic, religious, spiritual, community, student, social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills, and provides valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience. For additional information on crediting experience and/or education, please reference the OPM General Schedule Qualification Standards. To ensure the accomplishment of our mission, DHS requires every employee to be reliable and trustworthy. To meet those standards, all selected applicants must undergo, successfully pass, and maintain a background investigation for moderate risk as a condition of placement into this position. This may include a credit check after initial job qualifications are determined, a review of financial issues, such as delinquency in the payment of debts, child support and/or tax obligations, as well as certain criminal offenses and illegal use or possession of drugs (please visit: Mythbuster on Federal Hiring Policies for additional information). For more information on background investigations for Federal jobs please visit OPM Investigations. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) must authorize employment offers made to current or former political appointees. If you are currently, or have been within the last 5 years, a political Schedule A, Schedule C, Non-career SES or Presidential Appointee employee in the Executive Branch, you must disclose this information to the Human Resources Office. Please ensure you meet the qualification requirements described below. Key Requirements: You must be a U.S. citizen to apply for this position. You must successfully pass a background investigation. Selective Service registration required. Current federal employees must meet time-in-grade requirements. You must be able to obtain and maintain a Government credit card. You must be able to deploy with little or no advance notice to anywhere in the United States and its territories for an extended period of time. Please review the Additional Information section for additional key requirements. Education substitution: This position permits applicants to qualify based on education (or a combination of education and experience), as outlined in the "requirements" section. If you are using education to qualify, you must submit a copy of your transcripts (unofficial are acceptable) with your online application. Once selected and prior to appointment, applicants must provide official college transcripts. Education completed in foreign colleges or universities may be used to meet Federal qualification requirements if you can show that your foreign education is comparable to education received in accredited educational institutions in the United States. For example, specific courses accepted for college-level credit by an accredited U.S. college or university, or foreign education evaluated by an organization recognized for accreditation by the Department of Education as education equivalent to that gained in an accredited U.S. college or university. It is your responsibility to provide such evidence with your application. Visit the Department of Education's Recognition of Foreign Qualifications for more information.