Staff Accountant at WITNESS

Location:  International, Anywhere; 100% Remote

ABOUT WITNESS 

We are a global human rights organization, comprised of a team of passionate human rights activists with remote staff based across 5 continents. WITNESS’ mission is to help people use video and technology to protect and defend human rights. While we’re legally a non-profit that is registered as a 501(c)3 in the U.S, our multi-disciplinary team of 55 staff members (as well as consultants, interns, fellows and a vast community of partners and collaborators) are based around the world and reflect a group of activists with diverse skills and backgrounds.

WHAT WE DO

WITNESS pairs grassroots community support with advocacy at a systems level. Our team works holistically on a global scale to understand how communities are using and want to use video and technology for human rights.  With a cellphone camera, anyone can become a human rights defender and expose injustice, making it harder for perpetrators to hide or for systems of oppression to remain invisible.  But using video for community organizing, justice and accountability can be dangerous – videos can put defenders (or those they film) at risk, can be used against communities in court or deceitfully discredited by tired old power narratives.  Filming is almost never enough – for videos to make a difference they need to work alongside strong advocacy or legal strategies; they also need to be created, preserved and shared in ways that avoid creating more harm or trauma.
New threats to human rights are emerging at the intersection of artificial intelligence, misinformation and disinformation and a global wave of rising authoritarianism.

When it comes to systemic challenges we are on the watch for both existing problems – like how large amounts of critical human rights footage are lost because of the arbitrary decisions of platforms – but also emerging threats and opportunities, such as those posed by ‘deepfakes’, new ways to manipulate media to make it look like someone said or did something they never did.

THE TEAM

Committed to the organization’s mission and vision, you will be part of a dynamic, global team of activists who work across the world and in different time zones. You’ll be closely partnering  with the Finance team (Accounting and Finance Manager, Associate Director of Finance and Finance Associate), Operations Team and the various programmatic teams.  In this role,  you will function as a key connector of the  global team, ensuring that organizational Finance and Accounting policies are adhered to and teams and employees are supported accordingly.

THE ROLE

As a member of the Finance Team, the Staff Accountant will perform a wide range of integral fiscal and departmental duties under the direction of the Accounting and Finance Manager. The staff accountant will also be responsible for managing the work of the Finance Associate in their work supporting finance and administration tasks relating to revenue management such as accounts receivable, recording incoming grants, monthly cash flows, vendor payments and serving as liaison between the Finance Team and WITNESS staff.

THE RESPONSIBILITIES

• Create, process, and import General Journal entries
• Reconcile accounts, sub-ledgers, and databases to the General Ledger
• Process Accounts Payable, including the generation and tracking of invoices
• Process payments in the Accounting system, including check payments, ACH, and wire transfer payments
• Process and reconcile expense reports (Advance Reconciliations, Credit Card Reconciliations, Reimbursement Requests)
• Prepare and transfer batches from the Expensify system to Blackbaud’s Financial Edge General Ledger. Make adjustments as needed.
• Retrieve monthly bills and statements online and process them as needed
• With the Accounting &  Finance Manager, conduct new and ongoing training for finance onboarding for new staff and support local and regionally based staff on updates in financial policies
• Update Chart of Accounts
• Work on completion of all monthly, quarterly, and annual reports, including departmental, program, project, and grant reports.
• Assist in the completion of annual Form 990/1099
• Assist in the preparation for annual audits and funder-specific audits
• Work on Fixed Asset Register – addition, removing fixed asset from the register

THE IDEAL CANDIDATE

Education: 

• Bachelor’s Degree in Accounting or Finance, or a related field
• Knowledge of GAAP

Work Experience: 

• 3-5 years experience in accounting, financial management, or business, preferably at a non-profit organization
• Experience with Blackbaud Financial Edge and/or Expensify
• Experience with financial accounting software

Functional Experience, Knowledge and Skills: 

• High level of proficiency with the entire MS Office suite, especially Excel
• Excellent organizational skills and attention to detail
• Exceptional collaboration skills and flexibility
• High level of emotional intelligence, empathy and curiosity
• Strong interest, background, and/or work experience in human rights advocacy or media/technology for social change; demonstrated commitment to social justice and WITNESS’ values and mission

Other Important Skills and requirements: 

• Characteristics:Strong interpersonal skills and aptitude for cross-cultural communication. Team-minded. A doer. Is organized and follows through. Demonstrates good humor under pressure; inspires others.
• Language: We are a global team that uses English as our shared language, as such this role requires a high proficiency in written and spoken English.
• Location: We are a globally distributed remote workforce and this key role will involve working with staff across our whole team, to help facilitate this, a candidate based around the Eastern Atlantic regions of the Americas, Europe, or the Western Africa will have the most crossover and collaborative time with the majority of staff and with this role’s key collaborators;
  • Ideally this means candidates will be between the timezones UTC/GMT-7 and UTC/GMT+1;

• The successful candidate must have the legal right-to-work in the location in which they will be based.

COMPENSATION 

WITNESS operates a salary localization policy using a combination of regularly reviewed foreign exchange rates and location adjustment multipliers.

Based on current rates, gross salaries for some of our current locations are given as an example:

• Brazil – BRL 225,200
• Mexico – MXN 874, 050
• Nigeria – USD 47,950
• UK – GBP 51,600
• USA  – USD 70,700

BENEFITS

• Health: WITNESS offers competitive and robust medical benefits that cover an individual’s and their dependants’ medical, dental and vision at 100%.

• Life Insurance & AD & D: WITNESS provides life insurance and AD&D payable at one time (1x) the employee’s salary, to the beneficiary, in the event an employee were to expire while employed by the organization.

• Remote Work Stipend: WITNESS recognizes that flexible working arrangements are key to equity and inclusion in the workplace and we provide a monthly remote work allowance, we are happy to talk about the type of flexible arrangements that might work best for you. This remote work stipend is provided to all staff members to pay for extra equipment, electricity, stationery, internet, wellness,  or whatever an employee deems necessary in order to work remotely. Please note that a computer and basic accessories are provided to all employees at the time of hire.

• Pension Contributions: After 1 year of service at the organization, WITNESS will contribute 3% of an individual’s gross baseline salary towards a global retirement fund.

• Paid Time Off: WITNESS has a range of paid time off types that support our staff.
  • Vacation leave: that meets local statutory levels or 15 days whichever is higher, in addition to staff’s local public holidays.
    • The vacation allowance increases by 5 after 3 years of service.
  • Personal / Wellness leave: 5 days staff can use at any time to recharge in recognition of the importance of supporting positive mental well being.
  • End of Year closure: this usually is equivalent to a minimum of 5 days leave in addition to any public holidays across the last week of December and early January.
  • Sick Leave: follows local statutory guidance however;
    • WITNESS ensures a minimum of 10 days paid time off for occasional sickness and health related absences.
    • A minimum of 6 weeks of full pay in instances of longer-term absence.
  • Sabbatical Leave: At the 10 year mark we offer staff 10 weeks of paid time off in order to take a break, gain new insights and expand their horizons.
• Work/ Life Balance: WITNESS believes in creating a healthy work environment in which  flexible schedules are available, we also understand that sometimes an employee may just require a few hours to take care of personal issues in which case they can adjust their hours to make up for the time instead of taking a full day of leave. Both are allowable once agreed upon with the departmental supervisors.
• Mental Health Policy: WITNESS feels that all employees should feel supported both physically as well as mentally while they are at work and realizes that many times the issues that we deal with, the materials that we watch and the events surrounding some of the work that we do, can lead to feeling “unwell” and not in a “good space”.
  Should a situation arise in which an Employee requests support on mental health, WITNESS will award  (10) days of “WITNESS” paid leave.
• Professional Development: In support of the growth and development of our staff, WITNESS regularly seeks opportunities for professional development, exposure to new skills and supports a culture of learning.
  • As part of this we offer staff Reading Days (1 day per month) where staff can take a day to read, study and connect more deeply with peers, partners and colleagues to further functional knowledge relevant to their role or deepen their general understanding and ability to support human rights work.

HOW TO APPLY

If you are interested in joining the WITNESS team, please apply through BambooHR: https://witness.bamboohr.com/careers. You will need to attach your resume.

Please note that if you are seeing this post in a 3rd party system (Indeed, Glassdoor, LinkedIn, Zip Recruiter etc), be sure that you are submitting an application via WITNESS’ application link in BambooHR.

APPLICATION DEADLINE: Applications must be submitted by end of day August 23rd, 2024 to be considered in the first round of application screening. Depending on the outcome of this first round of applications, later applications may be considered. Please note that due to the volume of anticipated applications, we will not be able to respond individually to each applicant. We kindly ask that you do not send duplicate applications via mail or email, and no phone calls. No recruiters please.

WITNESS is a global human rights organization and aims to build an inclusive workforce that is reflective of the communities we work with. We are interested in building a talented team that brings their true selves with diverse backgrounds, cultures and perspectives. We are interested in receiving applications from those who are marginalized and underrepresented.

WITNESS is an equal opportunity employer. People of all ages, races, ethnicities, national origins, religions, genders, gender identities and expressions, sexual orientations, and individuals protected by any other statuses under international federal, state or local laws, including but not limited to, disability, marital, domestic partnership, familial, caregiver, transgender, military or veteran statuses, are encouraged to apply.

http://www.witness.org