About Northern Trust:
Northern Trust, a Fortune 500 company, is a globally recognized, award-winning financial institution that has been in continuous operation since 1889.
Northern Trust is proud to provide innovative financial services and guidance to the world’s most successful individuals, families, and institutions by remaining true to our enduring principles of service, expertise, and integrity. With more than 130 years of financial experience and over 22,000 partners, we serve the world’s most sophisticated clients using leading technology and exceptional service.
Associate Consultant – Front Office Solutions
FRONT OFFICE SOLUTIONS PROFILE
Front Office Solutions is a new strategic business for Northern Trust, which provides a holistic digital+ service offering for some of the most sophisticated institutional investors across the globe, including foundations, endowments, pension funds, corporations, insurance companies, central banks, and sovereign wealth funds. As asset owners engage in more complex, data-driven investment approaches to asset allocation, their operational needs and demands for high-quality data have skyrocketed. Front Office Solutions provides a holistic, full-service, multi-asset solution that aims to empower in-house investment teams and support their important mission by providing a more comprehensive set of operational services and analytics including portfolio management, investment decision support, operational risk management, CRM/document management, and workflow tools.
DESCRIPTION
Under general supervision, the Associate Consultant will be responsible for investment data management that will provide clients with the holistic data sets they need to fulfill their various stakeholder requirements. The Associate Consultant will assist in researching solutions for data challenges for institutional clients.
PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITIES
- Acts as point of initial entry for all investment data, including entry of (but not limited to):
- Investment transactions (typically statement-based for alternative assets; file-based for public markets)
- Investment valuations (typically statement-based for alternative assets; file-based for public markets)
- Manager Estimates
- Plan Income / Expense Items
- Plan Contributions / Spending Withdrawals
- Underlying Manager Exposure Data
- Benchmark Data
- Responsible for preparing all investment reconciliations, including reconciliation of cash, positions, performance, transactions, alternative investment metrics (unfunded commitment, etc.).
- Import, normalize, and configure large amounts of historical data sets from multiple systems into FOS technology platform.
- Responsible for initial review of NAV, allocation, and underlying client performance for alternative investments.
- Serves as initial reviewer of investment and composite performance calculations, including time-weighted return and IRR calculations.
- Serves as initial reviewer of single, conventional, and blended benchmark calculations.
- Responsible for the input of all historic data entry and initial preparation of all reconciliations during client onboarding.
- Able to serve as a key subject matter expert and assist in training FOS partners in specific areas of expertise.
- Participates in ongoing process improvements based on specialized skills, knowledge, and experience.
REQUIRED KNOWLEDGE & SKILLS
- Knowledge of the investment industry, including markets and instruments.
- Basic investment concepts knowledge: IRR, time-weighted return, NAVs, accruals, etc.
- Investment operations knowledge: hedge fund accounting, private equity funds, performance reporting, etc.
- Alternative asset class knowledge: hedge funds, private equity, non-marketable securities, marketable securities, etc.
- Advanced understanding of Microsoft Suite (Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Visio), with particular emphasis on Excel Advanced Excel skills (Excel Pivot Tables, Charts, V-lookup, etc.).
- Analytical skills.
- Understanding of instances when performance issues need to be escalated to a supervisor.
- Ability to prioritize, multi-task, and perform effectively under deadlines.
- Ability to handle multiple concurrent projects and reconcile any conflicting priorities.
- Commitment to project success as it may require working unconventional hours during critical project phases.
PREFERRED KNOWLEDGE & SKILLS
- Functional /industry knowledge of and experience with complex asset allocators such as endowments, foundations, family offices, institutional asset managers, pension funds, or sovereign wealth funds.
- Understanding of alternative investment custodians, administrators, and service providers.
- Work experience in one of the following:
- Alternative Asset Operations
- Performance Measurement
- Investment Accounting (analytics, reporting, etc.)
- Technical skills / systems knowledge (Investment Administration & Portfolio Analytics Platforms).
- Experience using VBA, Python or other programming language to format large data sets.
- Orientation to operational process improvement.
- Client servicing experience with a high level of comfort communicating directly with clients and client advocacy.
- Ability to work closely and collaborate with internal stakeholders.
QUALIFICATIONS
- A College or University degree, preferably in Finance, Accounting, Mathematics, Economics or a related field.
- Minimum of 1 year of industry experience in one or more of the following fields:
- Alternative Asset Operations
- Performance Measurement
- Investment Accounting (analytics, reporting, etc.)
- Interest in pursuing: CFA, CAIA, CIPM, CPA, MBA.
- A genuine desire and capability to work in a fast-paced, professional, inclusive environment which requires teamwork, well-honed problem-solving skills, frequent re-prioritization, deadline management, ongoing and comprehensive communication, constant attention to detail, and a commitment to continuous improvement and best practices.