Principal Grants Management Implementation Consultant, Higher Education

Workday•Atlanta, GA

20d•$133,300 - $236,900•Hybrid

About The Position

The Higher Ed Functional Consulting team partners with colleges and universities to design and deliver Workday Grants Management solutions. The team leads implementations end-to-end, managing scope, milestones, and quality across multiple projects while taking account of higher education environments, including shared governance and academic calendars. The consultant partners with mission-driven organizations to design, configure, and deploy Workday Grants Management solutions. They bring product and implementation expertise to customer engagements, translate business requirements into practical solutions, and work closely with clients, project teammates, and Engagement Managers. The role has meaningful ownership of the Grants workstream and the autonomy to recommend designs that support customers’ long-term success. The position supports data conversion, integrations, testing, implementation milestones, and customer knowledge transfer. It also contributes to the Higher Education consulting practice through mentoring, training and knowledge sharing, and internal improvement initiatives. Workday is open to hiring at Senior Consultant or Principal Consultant level depending on experience and scope of expertise.

Requirements

For the Principal level: 6+ years of Grants and Financial consulting experience or 6+ years of Grants operational experience in Higher Education institutions.
For the Principal level: 6+ years of experience in a consulting, software, or internal Workday environment with hands-on responsibility for payroll configuration, testing, and partnering with stakeholders.
For the Principal level: 6+ years of experience with Workday Grants.
Experience working with Higher Education and/or Nonprofit organizations.
At least 2 full-cycle software implementations in the Higher Education industry.
Understand reporting and compliance requirements for government-funded grants.
Proven ability to build trusted, long-term relationships with payroll, HR, and/or finance stakeholders in Higher Education and/or Nonprofit environments, including navigating complex governance structures.
Ability to manage multiple customers in parallel, estimate effort accurately, surface risks early, and coordinate with Engagement Managers and project teams to keep scope, schedule, and quality on track.
Ability to travel up to 50% based on client and project needs, particularly for key implementation milestones.
Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience, preferably in Finance or Accounting.

Nice To Haves

Working knowledge of research or clinical trial solutions.

Responsibilities

Design and configure Workday Grants Management solutions for customer needs and operational realities.
Apply deep Workday Grants Management product expertise across customer engagements.
Elicit, clarify, and document customer business requirements.
Document solution decisions so customers can support and sustain their environment after go-live.
Partner with clients and data conversion teams to support conversion of legacy grants and financial data into Workday.
Partner with integration teams to support configuration and testing of integrations between Workday and third-party or custom solutions, as applicable.
Support customers through testing cycles, including issue triage and resolution.
Transfer system knowledge to customer teams to support adoption, confidence, and long-term success in production.
Communicate with the Engagement Manager about project status, hours forecasting, time reporting, risks, and mitigation plans.
Help customers prepare for and navigate implementation milestones from design through testing and deployment.
Mentor consultants who are newer to Grants Management.
Participate in updating training and knowledge-sharing opportunities.
Identify opportunities to improve the Higher Education consulting practice and lead or participate in internal initiatives.