Cierra Hubbard
Experienced Finance & Operations Professional
Parkville,MD
Summary
Attentive, dynamic operations and finance professional with a background in higher education, SaaS, and customer-centric roles. Adept at fostering inclusive work environments, enhancing organizational efficiency, and supporting employee development. Proven success in budget planning, team leadership, and relationship building. Good interpersonal, communication, and critical thinking skills. Committed to leveraging a global mindset, and strategic planning, to drive exceptional results.
Overview
17
17
years of professional experience
Work History
BUDGET ANALYST
Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health
Baltimore, MD
11.2023 - Current
- Support and management of accounts, grants and contracts for key faculty members and department Chair
- Led monthly strategy meetings with faculty to ensure budget alignment and identify efficiency opportunities.
- Support diverse stakeholders by tailoring communication and support approaches, fostering a more inclusive work environment.
- Drive improvements in faculty/student experience through efficient and effective operations and customer communications processes.
- Serve as departmental Accounts Payable and Accounts Receivable- process invoices, reimbursements and monitor site and vendor accounts
- Regularly review contracts to establish and maintain billing schedules and ensure financial compliance
- Prepare and submit new award documentation for completion (Coeus/Fibi)
- Evaluate, determine and perform best accounting practices for Health Policy & Management (Grants & Contracts)
- Reconcile back-up documentation to monthly revenue and expense statements
- Prepare monthly variance reports comparing actual results against planned targets.
- Use SAP to create shopping carts, process vendor and independent contractor payments, reimbursements, travel reimbursements, purchase orders etc
- Perform trend analyses on historical spending data to anticipate future needs.
- Identify and resolve vendor, student, staff, and faculty payment issues
- Monthly budget consultation meetings with Principal Investigators to review expenditures
- Provide a high level of customer service to vendors and internal customers (students, staff, and faculty)
- Communicate and ensure compliance with University policies for travel, purchasing, Procurement Card usage, etc by faculty and staff
- Regularly familiarize with government research policies, procedures and compliance protocol
- Establish & maintain a comprehensive electronic document filing system
- Facilitate year-end close out process; post accruals
- Collaborate across teams for compliance and process improvements on a regular basis
- Manage departmental HR functions alongside Finance Manager
- Coordinate with University-wide HR to update databases with employee changes in position and compensation
PROGRAM SUCCESS SPECIALIST & TRAINER (Part-Time)
Dream To SOAR
Washington, D.C.
07.2020 - 01.2024
- Designed and implemented onboarding and training frameworks that increased student success outcomes by focusing on individualized needs and growth.
- Mentored staff and students, creating a supportive learning culture rooted in empowerment and feedback.
- Build strong relationships with students to identify learning needs and objectives and carefully measured learning outcomes to make the necessary modifications to enhance client support
- Conduct specialized consulting sessions, to provide students with strategic, individualized support and feedback, that aims to enhance personal, professional and career goals
- Create programmatic Standard Operating Protocols and train existing and new staff on procedures
- Develop new and enhance existing student intake, reassessment and discharge processes and forms to impact and assess student outcomes better effectively, using CRM tools
- Collaborate with team for student recruitment and retention efforts
- Carefully assessed medical records to enroll students in related mental health programs
- Manage feedback from students to gain insights into program success and recommendations for future cohorts
- Collaborate with Executive Administrator & Program Executive to ensure appropriate recordkeeping and data collection for monthly submission to the Department of Behavioral Health
- Process bi-monthly payroll and other financial transactions
- Establish, manage and reconcile student funds accounts including student expense reports for reimbursement
- Identify gaps and areas for improvement in HR processes, establishing and optimizing workflows to better support business needs.
- Create and facilitate weekly training classes for each cohort's coursework.
- Drive improvements in student experience through efficient and effective operations and customer communications processes.
LEAVE SPECIALIST
Sparrow
Remote US
01.2023 - 11.2023
- Customer and company onboarding support for 10-15 companies and hundreds of employees to introduce them to the SAAS product and enroll in LOA plans
- Drive success through initial customer kickoff and provide a supportive, personalized end-to-end leave of absence (life cycle) experience for customers using a combination of tools to manage, communicate and update all stages of a leave
- Delivered empathetic, clear, and compliant support to diverse employees across various industries during sensitive life events.
- Maintained high satisfaction rates through relationship-based communication and attention to cultural context.
- Stay abreast of state and individual company leave policies to ensure plan enrollment and payment compliance
- Act responsively, accurately, and with attention to detail in a considerate and timely manner with my assigned customers/companies through Zendesk, to exceed KPIs
- Assess medical records to properly enroll employees in necessary leave of absence plans
- Review, compile and handle confidential client medical information appropriately
- Financial Analysis- Create and process payroll plans and partner with our internal payroll teams to ensure employees are paid accurately and on time
- Interface, collaborate and serve as a liaison with a variety of key parties: individuals on leave, HR/payroll teams, state representatives, doctor’s offices, etc through various methods of communication (phone call, email, video chat)
- Provide weekly benefits related research and information to HR representatives and employees regarding their leave of absence plans
- Technical support and troubleshooting for individual clients and companies’ dashboard/website usage
- Implement process improvements to resolve inefficiencies and address customer pain points
- Provide multi-channel support to clients/employees (email, phone, chat)
ACADEMIC SERVICES/BUDGET SPECIALIST
John Hopkins Carey Business School
Baltimore, MD
02.2013 - 01.2016
- Work within the educational success team to coach incoming MBA students for program success
- Managed the Admissions department budget, independently, including procurement, travel/expense processing & vendor contracts & payments & monthly reconciliation
- Financial reporting & analysis, monthly & quarterly
- Spearheaded Admissions website upgrades and management including creation and maintenance of student communications plans, collaboration with recruiters to schedule recruitment and informational events through web & customer service/troubleshooting for students in staff on website functionality
- Oversight of departmental calendars, creation and maintenance of pertinent logs and reports and training for administrative staff on use
- Direct student and staff support including the Associate Dean of the Carey Business School (travel booking, event management)
- Establish and maintain processes for audit protocol
- Lead departmental budget and financial processes; collaborate with Accounts Payable and Procurement teams on budget management
- Conducted budget development and assisted in maintaining financial compliance.
- Performed budget formulation work involving review and preparation of budget estimates and financial plans.
- Create and implement training modules for incoming students
ASSISTANT BRANCH MANAGER/TELLER TEAM LEAD
SECU Credit Union
Fullerton, MD
01.2008 - 02.2013
- Directed & managed all teller and vault cash management including ATM settlement, records management and member transactions requiring manager approval
- Ensured branch-wide compliance with all legal regulations/codes including BSA, Foreign Assets Control, financial recordkeeping and reporting of Currency & Foreign Transactions & USA Patriot Act through training and audits
- Supervised daily branch operations and a ten of 12, exceeding sales and service KPIs
- Led all daily activity of the teller team (Member transactions, employee development, serve as subject matter expert, enforce sales and service model, prepare/conduct performance reviews, coach employees to successful performance in customer service and sales)
- Manage personnel activities including talent management (hiring/recruiting), onboarding, development, disciplinary action, timekeeping & payroll management & processing
- Investigate member transaction issues and/or fraud complaints
- Vendor invoice management & payment
- Trained and mentored highly effective teams to meet corporate service standards.
- Built strong rapport with new and existing clients to better serve financial needs and promote branch loyalty.
- Worked with cross-functional teams to perform regular financial audits
Education
Bachelor of Arts - Psychology
University of Baltimore
Baltimore, MDSkills
- Project Management
- Financial Reporting
- Strategic Planning
- Communication
- Team Leadership
- Team Development
- Training
- Process Improvement
- Budget Management
- Performance Management
- Customer Service
- Program Development
- Business Administration
- HR Operations
- Diversity
- Inclusion
- Invoice processing
- Monthly reporting
- Budget planning
- Report preparation
- Cost monitoring
- Funds distribution
- Monitoring expenditures
- Variance reporting
- Expense monitoring
- Budget compliance
- Stakeholder engagement
References
References available upon request.
Systems & Technical Skills
- MS Office Suite Proficiency (Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, Teams)
- Google Office Suite
- SAP
- Peoplesoft
- TCCUS
- ADP
- Fibi
- Zendesk
- Salesforce
Timeline
BUDGET ANALYST
Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health
11.2023 - Current
LEAVE SPECIALIST
Sparrow
01.2023 - 11.2023
PROGRAM SUCCESS SPECIALIST & TRAINER (Part-Time)
Dream To SOAR
07.2020 - 01.2024
ACADEMIC SERVICES/BUDGET SPECIALIST
John Hopkins Carey Business School
02.2013 - 01.2016
ASSISTANT BRANCH MANAGER/TELLER TEAM LEAD
SECU Credit Union
01.2008 - 02.2013
Bachelor of Arts - Psychology
University of Baltimore
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