Location: Seattle,WA, USA
As a UW employee, you have a unique opportunity to change lives on our campuses, in our state, and around the world. UW employees bring their energy, creative problem-solving skills to their work and are dedicated to building stronger minds and a healthier world. UW is Committed to attracting and retaining a diverse staff, your experiences, perspectives, and unique identities will be honored at the University of Washington. Together, our community strives to create and maintain working and learning environments that are inclusive, equitable, and welcoming.
The Finance, Planning, and Budgeting (FPB) encompasses the major central financial, planning, and budgeting functions for the University of Washington, including:
* Finance & Budget Strategy
* Institutional Analytics & Data Support
* Policy, Planning & State Operations
* University Business Services
As a Customer Service Specialist, this position supports efficient and compliant use of UW procurement and financial systems and delivers a range of customer services for UW academic and central departments on all UW campuses. The position supports customers who are using newly implemented functionality in the procurement system. The customer base for the information extends across the University, with a wide diversity of technical and fiscal sophistication.
Reporting to the Assistant Director of Travel & Procurement Customer engagement, this role will be responsible for supporting both internal and external communications, addressing business operations and campus support needs, and working within the financial and procurement system. The specific duties will include triaging and troubleshooting reported issues related to Workday and integrated systems. Additionally, as a proactive team member focused on continuous improvement, the incumbent will be expected to identify process issues, evaluate opportunities for enhancement, and contribute to the implementation of recommended solutions to support ongoing Workday processes and business operations.
Duties & Responsibilities:
Provide Customer Service and System Expertise
Perform front-line customer support services, serving as first point of contact for procurement, financial and reporting systems
Act as a subject matter expert in various UW financial and procurement systems, including new functionality or enhancements and compliance or regulatory changes
Maintain expertise in the procure-to-pay cycle and act as a subject matter expert for supplier onboarding through procurement, payment and budget and data reporting, including all procedures and policies at federal, state and university levels
Communicate effectively with both internal and external customers via direct contact by telephone and standard forms of written communication such as email, and using a variety of communication skills as appropriate including conflict resolution, active listening skills, etc.
Provide clear, courteous responses to customer inquiries
Communicate effectively with a broad customer base and develop high-quality responses for full issue resolution
Develop deep knowledge in order to consult and advise staff and faculty regarding the full spectrum of procure-to-pay options, policies, procedures and software functionality
Identify, research and resolve customer inquiries regarding procurement software, acting as first level technical response to items including, but not limited to, user access, expense account coding, purchase taxability, supplier availability and payment status
Develop proficiency in and utilize multiple software systems to describe and troubleshoot issues related to UW supplier status, payment enrollment processes, procurement software account status and university invoicing procedures
Demonstrate ability to recognize complex issues for escalation, identify proper escalation path and effectively communicate issue complexity and urgency
Lead design and implementation of processes to improve customer service response time, including intake, escalation and response mechanisms
Compliance and Analysis
Independently advise, interpret and inform departmental customers and suppliers regarding policies, procedures and activities ensuring compliance with University, state and federal policies, rules and regulations regarding proper procurement and payments
Conduct independent research, complete analysis and develop recommendations in collaboration with direct team members and Procurement Services process partners as needed to initiate corrective action and resolve issues
Analyze and resolve procurement discrepancies for reconciliation of supplier statements and University accounts
Make recommendations to campus administrators and fiscal staff to recognize and resolve budgetary commitments and supplier liabilities, as well as report and data utilization and interpretation to support departmental financial activities
Utilize a proficient understanding of financial organization and accounting principles to research and resolve complex financial interface issues, understanding budgetary impacts and making recommendations for correction based on deep understanding of university system integrations
Collaborate on Project Teams
Act as a key intermediary for select supplier relationships and actively collaborate with contract management personnel.
Collaborate with project managers, business analysts, software developers, campus user test groups and teammates in recommending new business process or system functionality, defining new business rules and participating in system implementation planning
Contribute input and recommendations based on feedback obtained from campus system users. Make recommendations for process and/or system improvements or corrections to supervisor, project management teams to resolve departmental challenges to adoption of new systems, policies or procedures
Plan, communicate and provide change management support for procedure, policy or system changes to include presenting demos, forum materials, website updates
Participate in follow-up outreach to assess change management effectiveness. Utilize customer inquiries and feedback data to assist with departmental outreach opportunities
Determine training needs for groups and/or individuals and work with Training Team to advertise, support and implement training plans to address campus needs
Documentation, Metrics Reporting & Process Improvement
Develop communication materials such as email template responses, FAQs, webforms and website content in response to campus feedback and needs
Design and implement processes to improve customer service response time, including intake, escalation and response mechanisms and team procedural documentation
Utilize departmental and team unit strategies to develop meaningful reporting metrics and report metrics on defined daily, weekly or monthly time frames
Maintain Customer Service procedure documentation on department intranet
Assist with departmental and team cross training as well as onboarding and training for new team members
Maintain departmental internal and external FAQ repository (currently utilizing Drupal)
Actively participate in strategic project teams
Actively participate in continuous process improvements using Lean methodology, reviewing and analyzing data from work processes, communicating ideas for improvement and reporting progress
Other duties as assigned
Train and cross train staff within Finance, Planning and Budgeting
We encourage applicants to apply even if they do not feel they satisfy all of the skills listed below; we understand that it will take some time for the successful applicant to strengthen specific position skills where needed, to learn about the university systems, campuses, and vendor collaborators, to develop a deep understanding of the FPB environment itself. You will join a supportive team that will partner with you in these efforts; we are an open, ethical, highly engaged, and collaborative community based on trust, transparency, and mutual respect. We believe in the importance of quality of life, embracing diversity, making a difference, and having fun.
Requirements:
Bachelor's degree and 3 years of experience working with financial and procurement systems which demonstrate success in:
Providing customer support for financial, procurement and/or supplier management systems
Communicating effectively through oral and written means
Participating on project teams using data-driven decision-making and reporting success metrics
Proficiency in the entire Microsoft Suite of programs (Outlook, Word, PowerPoint, OneDrive) and intermediate to advanced skills for Excel
Demonstrated experience in working on diverse groups and teams; respects, values, and contributes to FPB and UW's commitment to diversity, inclusion, and equity
Application Process:The application process may include completion of a variety of online assessments to obtain additional information that will be used in the evaluation process. These assessments may include Work Authorization, Cover Letter and/or others. Any assessments that you need to complete will appear on your screen as soon as you select Apply to this position . Once you begin an assessment, it must be completed at that time; if you do not complete the assessment, you will be prompted to do so the next time you access your My Jobs page. If you select to take it later, it will appear on your My Jobs page to take when you are ready. Please note that your application will not be reviewed, and you will not be considered for this position until all required assessments have been completed.