Careers

Campus Dining, which is predominately an insourced operation, is a dynamic and progressive culinary organization responsible for the food program management in residential dining halls, retail venues, and catering across campus. The residential dining program consists of six colleges, the graduate school, and a kosher facility. Catering offers the campus community a broad range of services including high profile receptions, full-service dinners, catering delivery service, and a Food Truck, which currently offers two separate menus. The retail dining program consists of seven cafes, a food gallery located in the Frist Campus Center, a convenience store, Prospect House—the University’s faculty and staff club, Palmer House—a nine-bedroom guest house, and athletic concessions.

Nutrition and sustainability are important initiatives of Campus Dining. Menus provide options for a healthy diet and promote well-balanced meals. Campus Dining also operates an Allergy Awareness Program to assist guests with special dietary needs. In addition, through Campus Dining’s Sustainability Initiative, thoughtful consideration is given to the broader context of social and environmental issues surrounding food production, distribution, and preparation.

The Campus Dining food program is culinary-driven based on culinary principles of healthy and sustainable menus. The food program focuses on scientific research, innovative menu concepts, and food and ingredients.

Menus are globally inspired and plant-centric which celebrate cultural diversity and discovery. Campus Dining’s Culinary Council and a team of Food and Beverage professionals develop unique memorable experiences for our students, faculty, and staff. Campus Dining’s vision for the future engages our campus community in activity-based learning.

Our guiding principles are:

• Team and People: to inspire our team of hospitality professionals.
• Service Excellence: to deliver excellence in food and beverage service and food and beverage production.
• Efficiency and Effectiveness: to continually develop innovative solutions that are fiscally responsible while being sustainable for our community, health, well-being, and the environment.

The scale of the programs offered by Campus Dining is large and complex. In addition to the large number of venues operated by the department, portions of the portfolio are outsourced to third party providers. Campus Dining’s annual revenue and expense budgets exceed $30 million each and the department has meal contracts with approximately 3300 undergraduate and 400 graduate students.

Many of the staff (approximately 275-300 FT employees) in the department are paid on an hourly basis and are represented by a union (S.E.I.U. – Service Employees International Union). The number of staff, along with the need to ensure adherence to the union agreement and the complex technology make payroll processing additionally complex.

The department is also expected to grow over the next several years. In Fall, 2022 Princeton began the process of a four-year expansion of its student body. This expansion is expected to increase the undergraduate student body by 500 over the next few years. To support this increase, a new residential dining facility opened in Fall, 2022. In addition, the University is implementing a ten-year campus plan that will significantly change the landscape of campus. It is expected that the building resulting from the Campus Plan will result in additional Campus Dining venues opening in new or renovated facilities.

SUMMARY OF POSITION

Princeton University’s Campus Dining seeks an accomplished and collaborative leader for the position of Senior Associate Director of Finance. The Senior Associate Director of Finance is a member of Campus Dining’s senior management team providing leadership, expertise, and oversight of the finances, and payroll processing within Campus Dining. He/she will provide data and strategic direction to senior administration related to financial reporting and budget projections, capital investment and resource allocations, return on investment, procurement and request for proposal (RFP) information. In addition, the position is responsible for the day to day financial operations of the department and for developing and finalizing the complex annual departmental budgets and various projections related to changes in operation, capital investment, etc.

Reporting jointly to the Executive Director of University Services and the AVP for Campus Dining, the Senior Associate Director will work collaboratively with the residential, retail and catering senior management, and staff in various offices throughout the University, including Finance and Treasury, the Provost Office, University Services IT, and the Office of Information Technology.

The position will oversee Campus Dining’s finance and payroll staff. These teams are responsible for optimizing Campus Dining’s resource allocation and for accurate budgeting, financial transacting, reporting, monitoring and payroll processing.

PRINCIPLE DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

Financial Transacting, Budgeting, Reporting and Monitoring:

• Provide leadership and oversight for Campus Dining’s financial management. Ensure direction is strategic in nature and aligns with University, University Services and Campus Dining’s goals, core values and guiding principles.
• Develop and manage the annual operating budget, all budgets for capital investments, and all proforma analysis. Integrate diverse business operating models, including third party service providers into the budget planning and reporting process.
• Lead unit managers to develop annual budgets based on KPI (zero-budget formulation)
• With Campus Dining leadership, identify and budget expenses and revenues for department initiatives
• Develop a strategic plan to meet and exceed the budget requirements
• Work with the Budget Office to ensure that the departmental budgets are accurately included in the University’s accounting system.
• Develop and implement processes to ensure that senior management is informed on a regular basis of the units’ budget performance (both operating and capital budget), make recommendations, and propose solutions to related issues.
• Oversee the creation, distribution and unit level review of monthly financial reports and KPIs to operating unit management and directors.
• Oversight of outsourced vendors (i.e. - Restaurant Associates, Canteen) on all financial issues, including preparation and completion of annual budgets, payment of fees, equipment funding needs, monthly financial reporting, etc.
• In coordination with the Director of Retail and Catering approve annual budgets received from outsourced vendors (i.e. - Restaurant Associates).
• Oversee the monitoring and reconciliation of the Prospect House Association bank account.
• Collaborate with Executive Director for University Services to provide content for periodic submittals to the Priorities Committee and budget memos to the Provost Office, etc.
• Ensure accurate and current accounting for revenue, expenses and capital investments, including creating and processing journals.
• Monitor and reconcile financial information, including but not limited to balance sheet accounts and non- operating funds, to detect improper or inaccurate charges.
• Ensure that Campus Dining operates in an environment with adequate internal controls.
• Approve credit card transactions and reports to assure monthly expense reports are substantiated and completed by authorized staff.
• Responsible for board plan administration. Liase with The Service Point to ensure all board plan options and selections are accurately reflected in University’s technological system(s).
• Oversee the Campus Dining POS system; including functional administration, access, permissions, financial integrations, reporting, and reconciliation
• Ensure departmental compliance with University and industry standards and requirement for cash handling and Credit Cards (PCI)
• Oversee departmental assets including the University Asset Management System, department inventories. Coordinate budgeting and scheduling for replacement and repair of equipment assets with the Directors of Residential, Retail and Operations and the Assistant Director of Procurement.
• Provide functional oversight of Campus Dining meal programs including Late Meal, Lunch To Go and Meal Exchange. Represent department needs for reporting and functionality with University Services IT.

Procurement:

• Collaborate with Campus Dining’s procurement department in alignment with University, University Services and Campus Dining goals, objectives, and strategies.
• Oversee compliance with vendor management, contract management, and risk mitigation related to contracts. Ensure compliance with University procurement policies.
• Provides support/direction on RFP processes.
• Assist in negotiations for significant Campus Dining contracts.

Payroll:

• Provide leadership and oversight for Campus Dining’s payroll processing department in alignment with University, University Services and Campus Dining goals, objectives, and strategies.
• Using technology, ensure that payroll is efficiently, effectively and correctly processed and all systems reflect required and accurate information
• Strategically plan systems and integrations for payroll, scheduling and time and attendance system and reporting to align with departmental needs
• Represent Campus Dining interests in strategic development of tools for time keeping, scheduling and managing attendance, distribution of labor costs across business units and reporting for both operational needs and strategic planning.

Business Processes and Procedures:

• Review current procedures to ensure efficiency and effectiveness. Streamline processes when possible, to improve accuracy and reduce processing time using the latest technology available including but not limited to Tableau, Prime Analytics, and Cognos. Make recommendations as deemed appropriate. Oversee implementation of new procedures.
• Develop standard operating procedure, where applicable, ensuring adequate internal controls are in place. Prepare written documentation of procedures and communicate information.
• Ensures compliance with all University policies and procedures.
• Actively participate in the University Services data analytics initiative, providing information and insight into data, its location and the visualizations.
• Develop and maintain dining financial dashboard for accuracy and decision making
• Function as the department’s lead user of University financial systems; ensure the integration of departmental systems and PRIME.Offer assistance and training for staff’s access to Information Warehouse, PeopleSoft, Labor Accounting, Concur, Prime and other related on-line financial resources.
• Ensure that access to systems is given to staff, as deemed appropriate.
• Collect information needed to develop the annual recommendations for the Priorities Committee. Make recommendations on what additional data is needed to support the department’s recommendation to the Priorities Committee.

Supervision:

• Supervise finance and payroll staff, providing support, direction, and training opportunities. Counsel and mentor employee as required.
• Administer annual performance appraisals; Recommend annual merit increase.

Other Duties:

• Participate in department initiatives and projects that are aligned with the departments and division’s priorities
• Member of Campus Dining’s Technology Committee
• Other duties, as assigned.

Contacts

The Senior Associate Director will have continuous contact and collaboration with:

• AVP University Services - Campus Dining
• Director University Services
• Directors of Residential and Retail Dining
• Director of operations and culinary director
• Staff in Campus Dining
• The Executive Team of University Services
• University Services Finance Staff
• University Services Information Technology Staff (USIT)
• Staff in The Point
• Finance and Treasury Staff, including the Budget Office, Student Accounts, Purchasing and Payroll
• Provost Office
• Third Party Management and Service Provider Companies
• Office of Audit and Compliance