Finance Manager

This position has been deemed critical by the School of Engineering Dean’s Office and is exempt from the hiring freeze.

For Stanford University employees, please apply through the Opportunity Marketplace within Sequoia.

Note - Visa sponsorship is not available for this position. All candidates must be eligible to work and live in the U.S.

Work Arrangement: This position is eligible for a hybrid work arrangement with a minimum of 3 days/week working at the Stanford main campus, subject to operational needs.

Budgeted Salary:

The budgeted base salary range for this position is $120,322 to $135,922 per annum.

The School of Engineering

Stanford Engineering has been at the forefront of innovation for over a century, creating pivotal technologies that have transformed the worlds of information technology, communications, health care, energy, business and beyond. Our faculty and students are creative risk-takers who pursue excellence across a breadth of disciplines. Our alumni include some of the world's most successful leaders in technology and business. Our staff are critical to enabling Stanford Engineering to accomplish its mission: seeking solutions to some of the world's most urgent challenges and educating leaders who will make the world a better place through the power of engineering principles, techniques and systems.

About STVP

Stanford Technology Ventures Program, known as STVP, is Stanford University’s entrepreneurship center, housed within the School of Engineering’s Department of Management Science and Engineering. As one of the world’s leading entrepreneurship education programs, STVP is dedicated to accelerating high-technology entrepreneurship through research, innovative education, experiential learning, and thought leadership. Celebrating its 30th year of trailblazing impact in entrepreneurship and innovation at Stanford, STVP brings together students, faculty, researchers, and industry leaders to foster entrepreneurial mindsets, build community, and support breakthrough innovations that create positive global impact.

As a small and collaborative center, STVP offers a social, iterative, and mission-driven work environment where team members contribute to strong day-to-day execution and thoughtful experimentation. The center is exploring pilots for new concepts and entering a new chapter of growth, creating opportunities for team members to support continuous improvement, responsible scaling, and high-impact work across entrepreneurship education and innovation.

Position Overview

STVP seeks a Finance Manager to support the center’s financial operations, budget tracking, financial analysis, expenditure monitoring, and compliance activities. Reporting to the Executive Director and working closely with faculty leadership, including the Professor of Teaching and other program leaders, this role will help ensure that STVP’s financial activity is accurate, well documented, and aligned with Stanford policies and approved budgets.

STVP operates with a financial model that relies significantly on external funding, including donations, sponsorships, pledges, and other contributed support. The Finance Analyst will support the tracking and reporting of these funding sources, assist with financial planning and forecasting, and provide analysis to help leadership understand available resources, spending patterns, reserves, and projected funding runway.

This role is well suited for a detail-oriented finance professional who can manage recurring financial processes, prepare clear reports, support budget planning, and work collaboratively in a small, mission-driven academic environment with opportunities for growth and scale.

In this role you will:

Financial Operations and Compliance (50%)

• Monitor financial transactions to help ensure alignment with approved budgets, funding restrictions, and Stanford policies.
• Backup support for routine financial processes, including purchasing, reimbursements, vendor payments, honoraria, and other transactions if responsible staff are absent.
• Management of department software tools (as administrator and renewal management) and responsibility as CRM administrator.
• Review transaction documentation for completeness, accuracy, and appropriate approvals.
• Coordinate with Stanford finance and administrative partners to resolve routine financial questions or transaction issues.
• Track spending approvals and maintain organized financial records for center activities.
• Identify discrepancies, compliance concerns, or unusual spending patterns and escalate them to the Executive Director or appropriate Stanford office.
• Support monthly, quarterly, board reports and year-end financial activities, including reconciliations, reporting, and close-related tasks.

Budgeting, Forecasting, and Financial Analysis (25%)

• Support the annual budget planning process for STVP in partnership with the Executive Director, faculty leadership, and relevant administrative partners.
• Prepare and maintain budget tracking tools, financial reports, forecasts, and variance analyses.
• Monitor budget-to-actual activity across STVP programs, initiatives, and operating areas.
• Track planned and actual expenditures and identify variances, trends, or potential budget concerns for review by leadership.
• Assist with tracking reserve balances and projected funding runway based on current spending levels, known commitments, and anticipated funding.
• Prepare cost estimates and financial summaries for proposed projects, events, programs, and initiatives.
• Support basic scenario analysis and business case development by compiling financial data, projected expenses, and available funding information.
• Provide budget data and financial analysis to support leadership discussions regarding program priorities, resource allocation, and future planning.
• Support project costing, business case development, and basic financial scenario analysis by preparing cost estimates, compiling relevant financial data, tracking available funding, and identifying potential budget risks, funding gaps, or resource needs for leadership review.

External Funding, Donations, Sponsorships, and Pledges (10%)

• Track and monitor financial activity related to donations, sponsorships, pledges, and other external funding sources, including expected and received funds, available balances, restrictions, and related commitments.
• Coordinate with the Executive Director, faculty leadership, fundraising committee, and Stanford development or finance partners to support visibility into external funding activity and inform planning, stewardship, and income-generating initiatives. This includes as a key liaison for the board of advisor fundraising committee.
• Prepare reports and summaries on externally funded resources, including timing, allowable use, spending activity, and funding availability, to help ensure alignment with donor, sponsor, and institutional requirements.
• Exercise discretion and maintain confidentiality when handling donor, sponsor, pledge, gift, fundraising strategy, and financial information.

Student and Hourly Worker Expenditure Monitoring (10%)

• Monitor and track student worker, temporary staff, and hourly employee expenditures, including budgeted amounts, projected costs, actual spending, and labor allocations.
• Coordinate with administrative, HR, and payroll partners to help ensure labor-related expenses are accurately tracked and appropriately allocated, including managing HR paperwork for new hires.
• Prepare routine updates for leadership and identify projected overages, funding gaps, or allocation issues for review.

Center-Wide Financial and Operational Support (5%)

• As part of a small, collaborative team, provide occasional support for center-wide priorities, major events, fundraising activities, and special initiatives, particularly where financial tracking, purchasing, reconciliation, vendor coordination, or compliance support is needed.
• Assist with event and initiative-related financial administration, including budget tracking, expense monitoring, payment coordination, and post-event reconciliation.
• Contribute to time-sensitive STVP priorities during peak periods while maintaining focus on core Finance Analyst responsibilities.

Preferred Requirements:

• Experience supporting financial activity in an academic, nonprofit, externally funded, or program-based environment is helpful.
• Familiarity with Stanford financial systems, policies, and procedures.
• Experience tracking gifts, sponsorships, pledges, or restricted funds.

Core Duties:

• Independently implement, administer and evaluate day-to-day activities of the unit, function or program by identifying and executing tasks and objectives, making recommendations that impact policies and programs, and assigning resources to achieve the goals of the program.

• Collect and analyze data, create reports, review and explain trends; formulate and evaluate alternative solutions and/or recommendations to achieve the goals of the program or function.

• Analyze and interpret policies; develop, revise and implement procedures for program or function.

• Represent the program or function as the key contact and subject matter expert within the department, unit or school. Commit resources and provide information and/or training. May also represent the program or function to external/internal stakeholders and constituencies.

• Organize and/or participate in outreach activities that may include developing communications and training, planning/promoting events and/or conferences.

• May participate in development of budgets, monitor, and approve expenditures. May perform limited forecasting and provide recommendations that determine the budget.

• May direct staff to perform various tasks and assignments. May also supervise staff.

Minimum Education and Experience

Bachelor’s degree and three years of relevant experience, or combination of education and relevant experience.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• Demonstrated ability to prioritize own work and multi-task.

• Demonstrated excellent organizational skills.

• Demonstrated ability to take initiative and ownership of projects.

• Ability to communicate effectively both orally and in writing.

• Ability to routinely and independently exercise sound judgment in making decisions.

• Demonstrated experience working independently and as part of a team.

• Relevant subject matter knowledge.

• Ability to direct the work of others, for jobs requiring supervision.