When the pandemic arrived less than a year after he took on a new position at MIT, financial analyst Joseph Siniscalchi used the lockdown to accelerate his educational goals and earned an MBA, with the same deliberate and measured approach he has taken in his career.
Joseph joined VPF Sponsored Accounting in 2011 soon after graduating from UMass Amherst with a degree in accounting. His main responsibility was closing out industrial grants to the Institute. He enjoyed working directly with departments and labs on their research grants and learned how to juggle projects and effective time management. He later moved to VPF’s Financial Accounting and Reporting (FAR) team where he supported general ledger accounting functions. There he had an Institute-wide view and learned how everything in the general ledger rolled up to the year-end close and into the Report of the Treasurer.
“After four years, I was ready for a new challenge and joined the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART) team in 2019 as a financial analyst, after a former VPF colleague who had moved to SMART encouraged me to apply for this position,” says Joseph. “In this role, I help the SMART team close out books on two financial cycles (the Singapore year-end in March and MIT’s year-end in June), stay in compliance with MIT and Singapore travel policies, and create financial reports in Singapore dollars.
“The work I did at VPF really prepared me for this complicated finance role. I was able to apply a great deal of my VPF experience—a deep understanding of MIT’s accounting structure, familiarity with using the Data Warehouse to build Brio reports, and knowing the activities related to closing out the year—to my position on the SMART Headquarters team.”
Soon after the start of the pandemic, Joseph enrolled in an MBA program at Fitchburg State University, completing a management degree in 14 months with more than 80 percent of the tuition paid by MIT’s Tuition Assistance Plan.
Reflecting on his eleven years at MIT, Joseph puts a lot of stock in relationships and mentoring. “My managers and mentors have played a big role in my career, as they encouraged me to take on new challenges and grow. My advice to anyone starting out in a finance role at MIT—either at VPF or in a DLC—is don’t get too comfortable, stay open to new challenges, and understand how building relationships is essential to your work and your career advancement. There’s no one right way to pursue a finance career at MIT. It’s amazing how many different paths are out there.”