Director of Collaborative Change
The Collaborative Change Cluster is responsible for the development and implementation of a diverse portfolio of Living Cities’ activities. This includes leading all efforts that land in places and are focused on transforming systems to achieve population level results; namely, supporting the establishment of local, cross sector/cross discipline leadership infrastructures and managing networks/channels that enable faster adoption of innovation and the intentional cross-fertilization of ideas nationwide.
ABOUT THE POSITION:
This is an ideal opportunity for an entrepreneurial, innovative leader who seeks to drive broad-based, systems-level change throughout the country. The Director will have the opportunity to trail blaze in the emerging collaborative change/collective impact field, with regular access to leaders at the highest levels of philanthropy, policy, and business. Reporting to the Living Cities CEO and serving on the organization’s senior leadership team, the Director of Collaborative Change will ensure that the work of the cluster is cross-cutting, innovative and impactful.
Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:
Strategic Planning
- Identify and communicate commonalities and patterns across cluster programs, geographies and/or organizations to evolve Living Cities’ thinking and approaches and to build more successful programs in the future
- Conceptualize and articulate cluster goals, creating plans of action to attain those goals, and identifying metrics to measure success
- Develop new opportunities for cross-fertilization and knowledge sharing across sectors and geographies to facilitate cross-site adoption and adaptation
Organizational Leadership
- Provide strategic guidance on organizational strategy, serving as a thought leader and senior executive for Living Cities as a whole
- Oversee organization-wide governance committees chaired by Living Cities’ members
- Communicate cluster goals, commonalities, and patterns throughout the organization in order to find opportunities for cross-cutting strategy and learning
- Serve as a subject matter expert on complex collaborative change, representing Living Cities externally by speaking at conferences, writing op-eds, blogs, articles and white papers, and facilitating convenings
Cluster Management
- Manage and develop the Collaborative Change team, coaching staff and creating staff development plans, modeling effective management and sharing feedback to nurture professional growth
- Oversee implementation of cluster’s plan of action
- Keep cluster and organization abreast of trends and developments in the field of collaborative change and ensure that they inform Living Cities’ work
- Serve as a conduit for information gathering and dissemination, ensuring that work of the cluster is communicated across Living Cities and that the initiatives happening in other areas of Living Cities are leveraged by the Collaborative Change team
CANDIDATE REQUIREMENTS:
The ideal candidate will possess the following qualifications:
- Minimum of twelve years of relevant work experience, including program direction, public sector leadership, policy development, advocacy and/or grantmaking
- Experience running an organization or government agency and/or serving as Chief of Staff to an elected official or senior government official strongly preferred
- Demonstrated leadership in changing complex systems and policies; a proven ability to lead a complex, cross-sector, multi-dimensional initiative that seeks population-level results preferred
- Deep knowledge of urban policy and the issues affecting low-income urban residents from multiple perspectives
- Experience designing and facilitating trainings and meetings; managing large work groups
- Ability to work across multiple constituent groups, providing technical assistance, thought leadership and/or other services, enabling local leaders and practitioners to advance their work
- Demonstrated success managing teams, including the hiring, supervision and evaluation of staff, interns, and consultants
- Exceptional interpersonal, writing and verbal communication skills, with the ability to serve as an external voice for the work of Living Cities and the Collaborative Change cluster
- Strong problem-solving skills, with the capacity to conduct and communicate strategic, systems-level analysis
- Ability to navigate complex environments and conversations, with the cultural competency to work across sectors, populations and settings, building deep and lasting relationships with Living Cities members, local policy-makers and practitioners, and other invested stakeholders
- Resourcefulness and resiliency, with the creativity and adaptability to find multiple paths and solutions to overcome challenges
- Proven ability to manage multiple priorities and deadlines in a demanding environment
- Good sense of humor and teamwork
- Master’s degree or equivalent training
COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS:
Salary and benefits will be competitive and commensurate with experience.
To Apply Click Here
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Associate Director, The Integration Initiative
In 2010, Living Cities launched The Integration Initiative (TII) to support cities that are harnessing existing momentum and leadership for change, overhauling long obsolete systems and fundamentally reshaping their communities and policies to increase opportunity for low-income residents. Five initial TII sites were selected: Baltimore, MD; Cleveland, OH; Detroit, MI; Newark, NJ and the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, MN. In aggregate, the sites received an investment of more than $80 million in grants, flexible debt, and commercial debt by Living Cities and its members. They also participate in an array of formal and informal partnership and knowledge exchange opportunities including one-on-one meetings, site visits, and cross-site convenings known as “Learning Communities.” In addition to direct work with and across the sites, Living Cities captures and documents the lessons from the on-the-ground efforts in TII sites to share with key stakeholders in the nonprofit, philanthropic, private, and public sectors.
ABOUT THE POSITION:
This is an exciting opportunity for an entrepreneurial individual who is passionate about driving large-scale change across multiple cities and working with a wide range of stakeholders from private industry, the public sector and the philanthropic community. Reporting to the Director, Collaborative Change and partnering with an outstanding team of colleagues, associates, consultants and external partners, the Associate Director will provide thought leadership and drive progress on this signature Living Cities initiative, ensuring that The Integration Initiative’s work and learning is fully integrated into the broader organizational portfolio at all levels.
Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:
- Setting strategic direction and providing ongoing leadership for this multi-site, multi-year, complex initiative
- Leading a cross-functional team of members from different Living Cities units; ensuring that the breadth of expertise from different parts of the organization are fully harnessed and brought to bear on this signature initiative and that the knowledge gleaned from TII informs the rest of Living Cities’ work.
- Designing and implementing the next round of TII, adding new sites and deepening impact within existing sites, identifying common needs and supervising the development of training curricula, tools and resources to address those needs
- Stewarding bi-annual Learning Communities, conducting site visits and developing other convenings to accelerate work in each city and across the portfolio
- Preparing and monitoring the overall TII work plan and budget, supervising Living Cities staff and consultants as appropriate
- Aligning and coordinating the work of TII with the work of other Living Cities teams and other investments, identifying potential opportunities for additional exploration and/or influence that emerge out of the initiative’s work
- Building and maintaining relationships with external partners to extend the influence and impact of the initiative and accelerate adoption of the initiative’s principles and activities beyond selected sites
- Actively engaging Living Cities members in the work of TII through formal and informal mechanisms, including co-staffing a governance body responsible for TII
- Ensure fidelity to the process established for collecting common data across sites in order to assess the collective impact of the Network
- Documenting and publishing some of the key learnings coming out of TII and representing Living Cities’ perspectives at national meetings and conferences with key public officials and other audiences
- CANDIDATE REQUIREMENTS:
The ideal candidate will possess the following qualifications:
- Minimum of 8 years of relevant work experience, including program direction, public sector leadership, policy development, advocacy and/or grantmaking; demonstrated participation in changing complex systems and policies and/or a proven ability to lead a complex, cross-sector, multi-dimensional initiative preferred
- Deep knowledge of urban policy and the issues affecting low-income urban residents from multiple perspectives
- Expertise in results-based accountability measurements
- Experience designing and facilitating trainings and meetings; managing large work groups
- Ability to work across multiple constituent groups, providing technical assistance, thought leadership and/or other services, enabling local leaders and practitioners to advance their work
- Exceptional interpersonal, writing and verbal communication skills, with the ability to serve as an external voice for the work of The Integration Initiative
- Strong problem-solving skills, with the capacity conduct and communicate strategic, systems-level analysis
- Ability to navigate complex environments and conversations, with the cultural competency to work across sectors, populations and settings, building deep and lasting relationships with Living Cities members, local policy-makers and practitioners, and other invested stakeholders
- Resourcefulness and resiliency; with the creativity and adaptability to find multiple paths and solutions to overcome challenges
- Proven ability to manage multiple priorities and deadlines with attention to detail in a demanding environment
- Good sense of humor and teamwork
- Master’s degree or equivalent training
- Ability to travel roughly 40%
- COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS:
Salary and benefits will be competitive and commensurate with experience.
To Apply Click Here