Director of Financial Planning and Budget Operations (Immediate Opening)

IDEA Public Schools•Weslaco, TX

2d•$108,100 - $128,600•Remote

About The Position

The Finance Team strives to support leadership at IDEA as we work together to meet and exceed our ambitious financial and student achievement goals. As the Director of Financial Planning & Budget Operations, you will serve as a key financial partner, providing actionable insights, financial discipline, and performance visibility to help leaders effectively manage resources and achieve strategic priorities supporting long-term sustainability. This role is focused on analysis and performance management, working closely with the Financial Planning team to ensure strong coordination and alignment across budgets, forecasts, and actual results. Support budget development and ongoing financial management by providing analysis, validation, and quality control on key assumptions and outputs. Lead forecasting, variance analysis, and financial reviews, ensuring clear visibility into performance, drivers, and required actions. Apply strong technical skills to analyze financial data, evaluate assumptions, and build targeted models/analyses as needed to support decision-making. Partner with Accounting to maintain alignment between reported financials and budget structures, ensuring accurate and transparent reporting. Establish and uphold standards for financial discipline, reporting quality, and performance management across the organization. Monitor key drivers including staffing, compensation, and spending trends, and provide actionable insights. Train and support stakeholders in understanding financial performance and effectively managing their budgets. Establish and reinforce standard approaches for financial analysis, forecasting assumptions, and decision support to ensure consistency and quality across the organization.

Requirements

Bachelor’s Degree in business administration, public/non-profit administration, accounting, finance, economics or related field
Advanced financial modeling and forecasting skills.
Strong proficiency in Excel, financial planning tools, and data analysis platforms.
Experience developing driver-based forecasting models, scenario analyses, and multi-year financial projections.
Ability to synthesize complex financial data into actionable recommendations for executive and operational leaders.
Strong understanding of budgeting, forecasting, variance analysis, financial reporting, and performance management practices.
Experience working with large datasets and translating financial results into meaningful business insights.

Nice To Haves

Master's degree or higher in business administration, public/non-profit administration, accounting, finance, economics or related field preferred

Responsibilities

Lead monthly and annual forecasting processes, ensuring accuracy, timeliness, and clear communication of changes
Perform and deliver variance analysis tools with actionable insights and support
Support and facilitate financial performance updates to supervisor, highlighting risks, opportunities, and recommended actions
Partner with the Financial Planning team during the annual budgeting process, providing analytical support, assumptions validation, and quality control
Monitor financial performance across departments, including spending trends, cost drivers, and staffing impacts
Provide visibility into financial risks and opportunities, recommending proactive adjustments
Recommend and support financial decisions and tradeoffs, ensuring alignment with budget constraints, organizational priorities, and long-term sustainability
Evaluate existing forecasting and planning methodologies and recommend enhancements to improve accuracy, efficiency, and decision support
Ensure consistent and accurate linkage between budgets, forecasts, and actual financial results
Translate financial data into clear, actionable insights for non-financial leaders
Serve as a trusted advisor to leaders, helping them understand performance and manage tradeoffs
Develop and maintain standard reporting packages, dashboards, and KPIs to track financial performance
Improve variance analysis and forecasting methodologies to increase reliability and usability
Identify and implement process improvements across FP&A workflows to enhance consistency, efficiency, and quality of financial planning and analysis outputs
Strengthen organizational capability in financial literacy and performance management
Support cross-functional initiatives requiring financial analysis and evaluation
Ensure consistency and quality across financial reporting outputs
Additional Duties as assigned.