Data Analyst & Reporting Specialist

Guidacent is seeking a Data Analyst & Reporting Specialist who will support our public sector client’s Cost of Service Study by leading data collection, validation, reconciliation, workbook development, and reporting activities across financial, operational, staffing, vendor, licensing, infrastructure, and overhead cost data. This role will work closely with the Principal Consultant, Cost of Service & Financial Analysis to organize source data, support cost model development, identify data gaps, document assumptions, and ensure all analysis is traceable to agency-provided records.

The Data Analyst will play a critical role in developing structured workbooks, supporting cost allocation analysis, and preparing reporting outputs needed to determine fully loaded service costs, compare costs to existing rates, and support executive-level findings and recommendations.

• Support the development and maintenance of the Cost Data Collection Workbook required to capture source data by program, service, cost category, data source, and assumptions.
• Gather, organize, and structure financial, HR/payroll, contract, licensing, procurement, infrastructure, and operational data provided by our client’s stakeholders.
• Work with program contacts and business owners to collect data required for labor, vendor, consulting, licensing, maintenance, software, hardware, cloud infrastructure, miscellaneous, and overhead cost categories.
• Maintain clear documentation of data sources, assumptions, definitions, and limitations.

• Validate completeness, accuracy, and consistency of source data received from agency systems and stakeholders.
• Identify data gaps, inconsistencies, and limitations that may affect the accuracy of cost determinations.
• Support reconciliation of cost data to agency financial records and document unreconciled variances for review by the Principal Consultant.
• Assist in validating allocation assumptions, cost drivers, units of measure, and service-level data inputs.

• Support development of service-level cost models used to determine total and per-unit costs for each program or service.
• Assist with analysis of direct, indirect, shared, and overhead costs across agreed-upon cost categories.
• Support rate comparison analysis by organizing current rate, revenue, cost, surplus, shortfalls, and variance data.
• Help prepare supporting analysis for cost drivers, variance explanations, cost recovery gaps, and rate adequacy findings.

• Develop and maintain Excel-based analytical workbooks with formulas, documentation, and traceability to source data.
• Prepare tables, charts, summaries, and supporting exhibits for the Full Cost of Service Report, Rate Adequacy Analysis, Forecast Analysis, and Executive Summary.
• Support creation of reporting materials for agency leadership presentations and oversight briefings.
• Ensure work products are organized, editable, agency-accessible, and suitable for review, comment, and final delivery.

• Work directly with the Principal Consultant to support day-to-day analysis, data requests, model updates, and reporting needs.
• Coordinate with the Government Cost Allocation SME to ensure data inputs support approved allocation methodologies.
• Support the Project Manager by providing status updates on data collection progress, data gaps, and analytical workstream risks.
• Maintain organized files, version control, assumption logs, and supporting documentation throughout the engagement.

• Bachelor's degree in Finance, Accounting, Business Analytics, Economics, Data Analytics, Information Systems, Public Administration, or a related field.
• Three to seven years of experience in financial analysis, data analysis, reporting, business intelligence, accounting support, or consulting analytics.
• Strong experience working with financial, operational, staffing, vendor, contract, or budget data.
• Advanced Microsoft Excel skills, including formulas, pivot tables, structured workbooks, lookups, data validation, and model support.
• Experience collecting, cleaning,…