Grants Manager

Vanderbilt University Medical Center

Grants Manager managing funding applications and contracts for research at Vanderbilt University. Collaborating closely with faculty, staff, and external departments to ensure compliance and timely submissions.

Posted 6/2/2026full-timeNashville • Tennessee • 🇺🇸 United StatesMid-LevelSeniorWebsite

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Prepare and assemble grants proposals/contracts in compliance with sponsor, University, and federal guidelines in coordination with applicants including faculty, research fellows, and students.
Conduct extensive monitoring of requirements, deadlines and time management for responses to Program announcements/R.F.A.’s or general application submissions in a proactive manner.
Work and train in a collaborative manner with the Principal Investigator (P.I.), Other collaborative Research institutions; and in conjunction with the Sponsored Programs Administration grants and contracts office, throughout the application process.
Responsible for routing and obtaining appropriate signatures, both physical/paper and electronically routed as required from PI, Key Personnel and other department or outside institutions and agencies.
Assist P.I. and supervisor to assemble application prior to submission, and insure timely submission.
Prepare draft budgetary allocations through grant application year and periods for applications.
Estimate budgets based on spending historical spending trends and existing forecasting models from various shared databases.
Present, edit, and finalize recommended budget for next grant application year with P.I. and central offices.
Review budgeted direct cost items for federal compliance; and other agency, industry, or foreign government guidelines for accuracy, accountability, reasonableness, and consistency.
Interact with peers within other departments and agencies to facilitate the development, submission, and administration of grant proposals.
Work in a collaborative manner with the P.I. and the central offices throughout the application process to achieve a professional document for submission.
Responsible for the tracking and receiving back confirmation of submitted application and status.
Provide or facilitate to outside departments requests for biosketches, other support, budgets, inter- and intra-departmental contracts, and other ancillary data in a timely fashion.
Responsible for getting non-competing applications or reports to Grants, Sponsored Programs Administration and/or Research Finance for review and final submission.
Responsible for insuring accurate data flow from Pre-award team to Post-award and HR teams.
Assist with and manage budget responsibilities for grants.
Works in conjunction with supervisor on new, competing or revised grant applications in preparing initial and extended budgets, including Indirect cost calculation.
Reviews budget details with PI, ensuring consistency with agency regulations and Research Finance guidelines.
Coordinate with post-award team to insure awards and budget adjustments are recorded properly.
Monitor agency announcements for funding opportunities available to faculty, research fellows, and students specific to those groups.
Keeps abreast of new/updated agency policies, procedures, deadlines and timeframes of new initiatives and coordinates communication across the supported departments.
Attend all necessary training offered by the Sponsored Programs Administration and/or Research Finance in addition to monitoring online/published applicable materials (i.e.: NCURA newsletter, NIH online updates, DOD announcements, internal Vanderbilt guidelines).
Keep supervisor and PIs informed of any material changes in policies/procedures from agencies or central offices.
Assist overall administrative team as assigned to complete non-application aspects of Human Resource management relative to costing for personnel costing and effort management, annual fiscal budgeting, reporting, forecasting and general office/administrative aspects of operation as assigned.
Maintain existing plans to achieve defined departmental goals and objectives.
Maintain and edit existing databases, office functions and procedures, etc.
Compiling data, conducting research assignments and summarizing findings according to general instruction provided by supervisor.
Analyzing and reporting findings relating to operations.
Assist as assigned with completion of various periodic and annual departmental projects and functions, including fiscal-based start-up and close-out deadlines.

Requirements

What you’ll need

A minimum 2-year Associate degree or equivalent __is necessary__.
A 4-year Bachelor degree __is preferred__.
Proficient in Microsoft Word __is necessary__.
Able to create and update worksheets in Excel __is necessary__.
Have a working knowledge of Adobe including forms creation, editing and conversion of documents between these three programs __is necessary__.
A background in grant application preparation for agencies (NIH, DOD, AHA, etc.) __is preferred__.
Familiarity with reviewing and editing private industry and foreign agency contracts __is preferred__.

Benefits

Comp & perks

Health insurance
Professional development opportunities

ATS Keywords

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Applicant Tracking System Keywords

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Hard Skills & Tools

grant application preparationbudget estimationbudget managementdata analysisdocument editingtime managementcompliance reviewcontract reviewforecasting modelsresearch administration

Soft Skills

collaborationcommunicationorganizationproactive approachattention to detailinterpersonal skillsproblem-solvingtrainingfacilitationadaptability

Certifications

Associate degreeBachelor degree