Travel and Event Planning Associate Regular, Non-Exempt, Full-time, Market Range 04, biweekly The position will be responsible for financial travel reimbursements for departmental employees, students, friends, and visitors; planning and executing departmental and undergraduate program events; monthly time entry; biweekly time reconciliation; terminations of monthly paid employees; and annual parking allocations. Cross-trained with co-workers to improve service to internal and external customers so essential tasks are managed even if the responsible employee is out of the office. Establish and maintain effective working relationships within and outside of Chemistry. More Specific Responsibilities Include: * Travel Reimbursement o Assisting about 37 faculty, ~200 graduate students, ~30 undergraduate students, ~40 visitors, ~5 staff o Plan faculty, student, and staff travel by making travel and housing reservations, as well as coordinating entertainment and dining arrangements. o Maintain current knowledge of all department, college, and university travel policies and procedures. o Communicate with and train department travelers on policies prior to departure to ensure compliance and timely payments or reimbursements; including use of Travel Cards. Being the department expert on UT Travel policies and procedures. o In collaboration with the Business Office, oversee cost distributions and account charges to ensure travel expenses are billed correctly to the proper cost centers. o In collaboration with the Business Office verify travel charges are available per rules and policies of specific grants and/or contracts involved. o Apply graduate student travel awards by properly applying Graduate Student Senate guidelines and procedures. o Secure university vehicles and monitor use by department employees, students, friends, and visitors. o This excludes travel for Chem 501 course and Lind Lectures; except in cases where acting as back-up. o Liaison between Chemistry travelers and the Treasurer's Office. * Event Planning, Coordination or Assisting with Events
o Plan and organize departmental and undergraduate program events including onsite set-up, placing catering orders, securing supplies, assisting at the event, tear-down, and clean up. o Examples include Faculty Retreats, Annual Departmental Honors Day, Undergraduate Research Signup, Summer Undergraduate Research Program o Assists with Communications Professional with Graduate Program Events and Faculty Committees Events such as, but not limited to, Graduate Student Recruiting Event called Research Open House and annual Undergraduate Research Symposium o Gather and analyze feedback to recommend changes and improvements for annual recurring events. o Assist the Communication Professional with graduate program events. o Collaborate with department and college communications teams to create properly branded advertisement and recruiting materials aligning with department goals. o Manages the Big Orange Campaign in relation to the Chemistry Department along with the Development Office, including any employee incentive events to increase Chemistry employee participation in the fund-raising campaign. * Monthly Time Entry and Bi-weekly reconciliation process
o Distribute time sheets to department staff and collect and compile responses for supervisor approval. o Enter non-working hours into IRIS on behalf of employees, including sick leave, annual leave, FML, etc. o Reconcile errors and corrections in time by communicating both with employee and supervisors to ensure accurate pay and leave balances. o Maintains an understanding on policies and procedures regarding all paid leave categories. o Terminations of monthly paid employees. Keeps track of temporary employee end dates and guides employees through both the termination and online exit processes. * customer relations representative for the department, along with co-workers.
o In collaboration with co-workers, receive and route phone calls, direct visitors, and address issues in professional and friendly manner to represent department values. o Manage department parking needs, including distributing and monitoring use of special Orange Dot permits and creating parking requests for employees. o Order special parking for visitors during department events, ensuring accurate account billing. o Provide administrative support to the department, including proofreading and editing departmental documents, making facilities requests, reserving rooms and facility building access requests for event use, etc.
