Global Process Owner – Project Portfolio Management

Job Summary

The Oracle Cloud ERP Global Process Owner (GPO) for Project Portfolio Management (PPM) serves as the primary subject-matter expert and solution architect for research in PPM. This senior role collaborates with IT and other functional teams to support the successful implementation, monitoring, and administration of key systems and processes. They drive the strategic vision of CGA and the department, ensuring operational, financial, and reporting needs are met through effective use of available tools and resources.

Engages as a strategic partner to communicate business requirements and priorities, ensuring all systems and processes align with organizational objectives. The ideal candidate brings deep experience in sponsored research, gifts, and faculty funding administration within a large, research-intensive (R1) university environment, and familiarity with enterprise-level systems from a business perspective.

About the Role

Responsible for driving the strategic vision of CGA and the department, this role ensures operational, financial, and reporting needs are met through effective use of available tools and resources. Engages as a strategic partner to communicate business requirements and priorities, ensuring all systems and processes align with organizational objectives.

Responsibilities

• Serves as the organization expert on a significant policy issue(s) or initiative. Collaborate with IT and other departments to identify, communicate, and prioritize business requirements for systems and processes, ensuring alignment with organizational goals.
• Serve as the business lead for project oversight to ensure departmental needs are met.
• Provides leadership, guidance, education, and policy development on the project. Responsible for driving the end-to-end business design for PPM workstreams. This includes award setup, budgeting, expenditure tracking, billing, and reporting for research projects, as well as understanding and coordinating with those handling departmental and faculty funds and gifts.
• Identifies policy issues of importance to the organization / initiative which frequently cross organizational lines and require research of state and national organizations; develops appropriate analytical and procedural framework for addressing the issues. Partners with stakeholders to monitor system performance and address any gaps or inefficiencies. Provides input on process enhancements and ensures alignment with operational goals. Drive a coordinated approach to ERP-related business process changes across PPM and related workstreams. Will be the business lead in driving the evaluation and adoption of quarterly releases from Oracle including ongoing system governance.
• Formulates new policies and procedures for implementation on the organization. Drive departmental planning, policy development, and management of strategic initiatives for Research within the ERP project. Provides consultative services to department administrators and stakeholders, ensuring processes are optimized for organizational objectives. Has advisory responsibility to leadership regarding enterprise business process strategy, governance, and operational impacts.
• Ensures compliance with legal and regulatory requirements in a complex changing environment. Coordinates with IT to ensure systems are effectively supporting departmental goals and aligns with UCSF’s policies, compliance needs, and reporting requirements. Define and standardize future-state business processes that support sponsored research administration and project accounting across UCSF. Monitors changes in the research and regulatory landscape and is instrumental in determining the required policy, process and system updates.
• Plans, develops and implements new programs and organizational structure changes required to implement new policy. Works with team members of all levels to develop documentation, training materials, and post-implementation support strategies. This includes change management, training, and stakeholder communications across the UCSF research enterprise.
• Proposes, leads and / or participates on policy and planning committees and working groups. Leads cross-functional collaboration, acting as the primary representative for the business unit in discussions related to systems, reporting, and data needs. Represent UCSF with UCOP and other external stakeholders on PPM-related matters as well as areas where UCOP policy intersects with UCSF system and business processes for research administration.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in related area and/or equivalent experience/training
• Minimum 3 years of hands-on experience with Oracle Cloud ERP (Fusion), including Grants Management, Projects, and Financials modules
• Minimum 5 years of progressive experience in sponsored research administration or related financial systems management within higher education or research institutions
• 10+ years of relevant progressive experience
• Demonstrated success representing the business owner for an Oracle Cloud ERP implementation or upgrade for the Sponsored Research or Grants workstream at an R1 or similarly complex university or academic medical center
• Ability to travel to UCSF locations as needed
• Expert knowledge of common organizational- or research-specific and other computer application programs
• Highly skilled communication and interpersonal skills to communicate with and influence others, both verbally and in writing
• Ability to use discretion and maintain all confidentiality
• Ability to multi-task with demanding timeframes
• Expert analytical / problem-solving skills