After gaining broad experience in finance and administration in the Office of the Vice President for Finance (VPF), Nadie Trotman Brathwaite was ready to hone her skills and focus on research administration, an area of great interest to her. Today she is a fiscal officer at the MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI).
Nadie came to VPF in 2013 as a finance and operations administrator supporting the internal workings of VPF. She helped manage VPF’s finances, processed transactions, monitored spending, and each year, with her unit director, developed VPF’s annual budget.
“At VPF, I wore many hats,” says Nadie. “In addition to the finance piece, I handled space planning, emergency preparedness, and managed our service desk operations. One of the first assignments involved reorganizing our space—helping to relocate more than 100 staff members within our offices in NE49—and in that process, overseeing our efforts to recycle or shred a lot of paper records.”
As she thought about her next career move, Nadie knew she wanted to learn more about how MIT works as a whole. “I was drawn to this position at MITEI, for its overall mission and the opportunity to learn research administration,” she says.
At MITEI since 2018, Nadie provides financial oversight and guidance on a portfolio of industrial and federal research projects with sponsors including Shell, American Tower, Equinor, Iberdrola, and the Office of Naval Research (ONR). The scope of her work is connected to more than 60 principal investigators—spanning dozens of departments across MIT—and encompasses the entire research cycle, from pre-award planning, budget development, and managing a project’s account until the project is completed and closed out. She analyzes spending, provides forecasts, and supports decision-making on the allocation of research dollars. All of these activities roll up to helping a research team stay on track and in compliance with MIT policies and audit guidelines while supporting MIT’s efforts to research low- and no-carbon energy solutions.
Nadie says she has had a few informal mentors, and also has initiated conversations with senior leaders for career guidance. “When I made this change,” she says, “I didn’t see it as a risk, I saw it as a learning opportunity. I found my peers were very open, kind, and willing to share their knowledge with me.
“I think that if you are self-motivated and have a willingness to learn, you will find a lot of support for your career growth. I have no doubt that moving from one area to another creates a win-win for the employee and for MIT. To me, some keys to navigating a finance career at MIT are to ask questions, learn as much as you can, get involved in the broader MIT community, develop a great network, and keep asking questions.”