Sr. Manager Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A)
Unitek Learning · Irvine
Company Description
As a leading healthcare education organization, Unitek Learning’s family of schools helps thousands of students launch and accelerate their careers every year. As a rapidly growing and highly successful company, Unitek is also a great place to pursue a rewarding and challenging career. We offer a competitive salary, generous benefits, unlimited growth potential, and a collegiate work environment.
Job Description
About the Role
We are seeking a detail-oriented, strategic finance leader to serve as the primary FP&A partner to Unitek’s Academic department across all divisions. This role provides financial insight, decision support, and strategic direction to help Academic leaders plan effectively, allocate resources, and advance academic quality, student success, and sustainable growth.
You will lead budgeting, forecasting, long-range planning, and performance analysis for academic operations, partnering closely with Academic, divisional, and campus leadership. A central focus will be developing a consistent understanding of faculty utilization, instructional costs, and academic capacity across Unitek while accounting for the needs of individual programs and campuses.
The ideal candidate combines exceptional analytical rigor with the ability to build productive relationships with Academic leaders and translate financial insights into practical recommendations. Experience supporting academic organizations with physical, ground-based campuses is a major plus.
Key Responsibilities
- Serve as the strategic finance partner to Academic leadership across all Unitek divisions, providing guidance on resource allocation, operating plans, and investment priorities.
- Lead budgeting, forecasting, and long-range financial planning for academic operations, aligning faculty and instructional resources with enrollment projections, program needs, and strategic objectives.
- Become the resident subject matter expert on faculty utilization and instructional workforce planning, partnering with Academic leaders to assess teaching loads, staffing models, full-time and adjunct faculty mix, and hiring needs.
- Develop models that connect enrollment, cohort size, course schedules, and program progression to faculty requirements, instructional costs, and classroom, lab, and clinical capacity, where applicable.
- Partner with Academic leadership to identify opportunities to improve efficiency while supporting educational quality, student outcomes, and accreditation and regulatory requirements.
- Produce precise monthly variance analysis and academic performance reporting, explaining key drivers, identifying risks and opportunities, and recommending actions.
- Establish consistent academic operating KPIs and cost benchmarks across divisions, with appropriate adjustments for differences in program structure, delivery format, and campus requirements.
- Support monthly Private Equity reporting, monthly Operations reviews and quarterly Board presentations with clear analysis and commentary on academic performance, resource needs, and strategic initiatives.
- Partner with Finance, Operations, Human Resources, and enrollment teams to align assumptions, improve data quality, and strengthen accountability for academic financial performance.
- Continuously improve financial models, reporting processes, and planning tools, including Adaptive Planning or comparable systems.
Who You Are
- A strategic finance partner who builds credibility with Academic leaders and connects financial decisions to educational priorities.
- A meticulous analytical leader who values accuracy, consistency, and clear explanations of business performance.
- Skilled at translating complex operational and financial data into actionable recommendations for both financial and nonfinancial audiences.
- Comfortable challenging assumptions constructively and influencing decisions across divisions and campuses.
- Able to balance enterprise consistency with the practical needs of individual academic programs and locations.
- Effective in a fast-paced, results-driven environment, with the judgment to navigate ambiguity and competing priorities.
Qualifications
Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in Finance, Accounting, Economics, or related field (MBA, CPA or CFA a plus).
- 7–12 years of experience in financial planning and analysis or corporate finance roles.
- Advanced proficiency in Microsoft Excel (modeling, nested logic, scenario planning).
- Experience with Anaplan, Adaptive Planning, Prophix or similar planning/reporting systems strongly preferred.
- Private Equity-backed or multi-site services experience a plus.
- Strong communicator with the ability to present complex information with clarity and brevity.
- Demonstrated career growth, with at least one internal promotion in a prior role.
Additional Information
We Offer:
- Medical, Dental and Vision starting the 1st of the month following 30 days of employment
- 2 Weeks’ starting Vacation per year. Increasing based on years of service with company
- 12 paid Holidays and 2 Floating Holiday
- 401k with company match
- Company Paid Life Insurance at 1x’s your annual salary
- Leadership development and training for career advancement
- Tuition assistance and Forgiveness for you and your family up to 100% depending on the program
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