Tracee Foster

• Manage a branch/team of 25 members, inclusive of setting portfolio, set expectations and completion of performance evaluations (PMAP's), and assess specific training needs for individual growth as needed.
• Develop and create Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Timely (SMART) goals for employee evaluation and performance metrics.
• Regularly conduct Branch/Team meetings to discuss workload, policies, and staff engagement.
• Oversee, analyze, review, and manage grant workflow for the Blood Division (DBDR) and Lung Division (DLD).
• Develop and implement grants policies and procedures to assist in managing and facilitating grant awards.
• Provide technical training and oversight to team members, program officials, review panels, applicants, and staff on grants management practices and procedures.
• Write and negotiate award terms and conditions of grants and cooperative agreements, inclusive of costs, milestones, and oversight responsibilities.
• Analyze and evaluate portfolios along with complexities to ensure appropriate management amongst staff members.
• Perform final review of completed awards for staff members, ensure appropriate funding levels, allowable and unallowable cost have been reviewed correctly, and all regulatory and legal requirements are met.
• Compile, review, and analyze funding plans which allows staff to authorize and issue competing and non-competing awards within GM workload.
• Manage and assist staff with oversight of large clinical trials, collaborative studies, and networks.
• Create and develop budgetary guidelines, within NIH policies and procedures, for Funding Opportunity Announcements (FOA's), Program Announcements (PA's), and Requests for Applications (RFA's).
• Review NHLBI's policies and procedures and at times provide assistance to our Office of Policy and Extramural Research (OPERA) on NHLBI's management of grant awards.
• Partnered with program officials and external awardee recipients to present at various venues, best practices of managing large clinical trials over a project period.
• Coordinate and manage all co-funding agreements from the Office of the Director (OD) and Common Fund initiatives throughout the institute.
• Evaluate and collect data of all incoming prior approval actions within the portfolio to assist in the construction and conversion to the electronic submission process within NHLBI.

Review and evaluate administrative and financial aspects of competing and non-competing grant applications.

Ensure allowable costs, reasonableness, and consistency of applications as it applies to the appropriate cost principles and within the NIH Grants Policies Statement.

• Negotiate the budget, award periods, and terms and conditions that are issued within the Notice of Grant Award.
• Review and respond to prior approval actions requiring award changes, ensure they are consistent with policies and in compliance.
• Effectively communicate with staff members, program officers, university representatives, and principal investigators to ensure clear understanding of grants managements practices.
• Independently manage the Epidemiology and Women's Health Initiative Branch grant portfolio which consist of over 350 awards, and serves as the sole point of contact for Grants Management.
• Manage various multi-million dollar clinical trials and network programs within the Division of Cardiovascular Sciences.
• Create Standard Operating Procedures (SOP's) to assist staff within grants management on daily tasks during both pre-award and post awarding period.
• Provide presentations and guidance for program officers and university representatives on NIH grant policies, allowable costs, managing un-obligated balances, and administrative requirements.
• Mentor and train staff members new to Grants Management, review and release awards within signature authority of $1.5 million.
• Provide guidance to the NIH grant community internally and externally on procedures for corrective action plans to award recipients, and phasing out of clinical trial studies.
• Assist in review and writing of Program Announcements, (PA's), and Requests for Applications (RFA's), provide budgetary and administrative guidance for development initiatives within NHLBI.
• Completed NHLBI Audit of Non-Profit Organizations, which required detailed review, cost analysis, and detailed write up of findings specific to the A-122 cost principles.
• Serve and assist as the Team Leader and Branch Chief for the Division of Cardiovascular Sciences as needed.