Director, The Children’s Movement (TCM)

Children Now is a nonpartisan, whole-child research, policy development, and advocacy organization dedicated to promoting children’s health, education, and well‐being in California. Children Now employs a game changing, anti-racist connector strategy to mirror and ultimately exceed the power of other established interest groups. A critical component of our strategy is The Children’s Movement of California, a unique network of more than 5,300 parent, student, civil rights, direct-service, business, labor and faith, and community‐based organizations working together to make children a top priority in public policy. Learn more at www.childrennow.org including about Children Now’s core organizational values.

About the Role

Children Now is seeking a Director of The Children’s Movement (TCM) to lead the Movement into a significant new phase of growth and impact. TCM, the largest and most diverse kids focused advocacy network in the country, has already had a major impact, benefitting millions of kids and enhancing our connector strategy. The size and breadth of the network reflected in the Pro-Kid list in and of itself demonstrates the demand for kids to be prioritized in policy making. In addition, the sharing of research, advocacy tools, and other information has helped connect the too-often fragmented kids’ space, and has provided critical support to local advocates, including parent and student led groups. The Movement has also served a critical outreach function, including increasing participation in the census, and ensuring undocumented kids and former foster youth are enrolled in health insurance. And TCM’s opt-in advocacy campaigns have led to ground-breaking wins for kids, including but not limited to:

Expanding funding by billions of dollars in state budgets for a range of kids’ programs, including child care and mental health services, and rescinding proposed cuts.
Eliminating Medi-Cal premiums, to ensure more than 500,000 kids and families could access health care.
Establishing the Family Urgent Response System (FURS), a 24/7 statewide hotline and county mobile response system to access trauma-informed supports.
Creating the CalWORKs Home Visiting Initiative, the first-ever state investment in home visiting programs.
Adopting The Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) –historic school equity funding that provided additional supports to English Learners, kids in poverty and foster youth.
Pressuring California’s congressional delegation to rescind anti-immigrant proposals and regulations at the federal level.
Urging passage of the Alameda County ballot measure to increase early childhood supports.

The Movement currently has over 5,300 organizations representing the diverse array of potential members, but with over 90,000 kids-related non-profits, thousands of local governments, and millions of businesses in California, we have just scratched the surface in terms of growth. As TCM looks towards this next phase of membership growth and policy wins, we are searching for a Director to dramatically increase membership, the sharing of resources and supports, and mobilization of organizations in opt-in advocacy campaigns (some of which have already topped 1,000 organizational sign-ons).

The TCM Director, working with other organizational leaders and leading our TCM team, will work to connect all those in California who care about kids.

Ideal Candidates

The ideal candidate is positive, flexible, solution-oriented and has a strong work ethic. The candidate must have extensive experience leading and managing a large membership or customer base (ideally at an organization focused on federal or state level advocacy). The candidate should also be an effective project and people manager. While we are seeking a candidate who already has experience at a large membership-based organization or business, the expectation is that they will be proactive and open and willing to learn and develop skills to address any gaps. This full-time position is based in our Oakland office, with occasional travel to our Sacramento and Los Angeles offices and other areas of the state. This position will have an opportunity for a hybrid work environment, and will report to the Vice President, Operations and Engagement.

Primary Responsibilities

Create a roadmap for expansive individual and organizational membership growth, including the development of systems and the implementation of a data-driven, equity-focused member recruitment, and retention strategy, including member segmentation.
Develop strong relationships with organizations, businesses, government agencies and networks throughout the state to strengthen the visibility of TCM within communities and increase engagement of current members and recruitment of new members, particularly among communities that are underrepresented in the Movement.
Plan calendar of TCM events that includes webinars, advocacy campaigns, and other engagement activities, and manage implementation of these events.
Manage The Children Movement’s advocacy, communications, and information sharing campaigns, working with Children Now’s Communications, Government Relations, Policy, and Research teams.
Create extensive communications content sent through the Movement, including but not limited to, regular updates, social media and web posts and advocacy and information sharing campaigns, ensuring all communications align with brand and voice and translating complex policy concepts into easy-to-understand messaging.
Generate excitement and buy-in from internal and external stakeholders around Movement activities, especially opt-in advocacy campaigns.
Set performance outcomes and evaluation metrics and analyze and utilize data to measure success and progress towards recruitment and engagement goals.
Supervise, manage and support small TCM team staff through the annual performance management cycle (e.g., goal development and progress monitoring, weekly check-ins, coaching).
Manage and support TCM team staff around all activities, including the TCM Equity Fellowship Program.
Recruit, hire and build TCM team as needed.

Qualifications and Experience

At least 7 years of nonprofit or for-profit experience in membership or customer management and recruitment.
Highly skilled and competent in using technology platforms and systems, including but not limited to B2B marketing, member and customer engagement platforms, Salesforce, Excel, Pardot, and WordPress. An understanding of laws around data collection, B2B marketing preferred.
Excellent planning, project management, analytic, and problem-solving skills, with the ability to align Children Now’s mission and strategy with TCM’s day-to-day tasks.
Proven success managing multiple projects/tasks simultaneously and thriving in a complex and fast-paced environment with multiple priorities.
Outstanding verbal and written communication skills.

Ability to troubleshoot technological challenges, and work with external consultants to resolve as needed.

Strong relationship-building skills with the ability to manage effective working relationships with colleagues, external groups, and others.
Demonstrated leadership, supervision experience and commitment to racial equity, including building inclusive, diverse, and equitable messaging, and overall communications.
Agility and nimbleness, given the audacious mission and strategy of Children Now.

Deep commitment to Children Now’s mission and understanding the context of our strategy, including some level of familiarity with California politics and the prenatal to age 26 children’s landscape, as well as an understanding of the institutional racism and other systemic barriers that adversely impact children’s well-being in California.
Experience with marketing, sales, or advertising a plus.

Bachelor’s degree required; advanced degree preferred.

Compensation

This position offers a competitive salary range of $110,000-$135,000 as well as generous benefits.

Application Process

Please complete the online application form located here. Interested applicants must attach the following as part of their online application: 1) cover letter, 2) resume, and 3) writing sample. Please submit attachments in PDF format only.

Children Now COVID-19 Vaccination Policy

The health and safety of our employees is our number one priority. Thus, Children Now has implemented a COVID-19 vaccination policy covering all employees. To be compliant with this policy, all new staff members shall be required to provide proof of their vaccine status at the start of their employment, unless a reasonable accommodation is requested and approved.

Children Now is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to staff diversity, equity and inclusion. Children Now values diversity as an asset essential to accomplishing our work and views diversity as including differences in race, national origin, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, disability, veteran status, job skills, education, and geographic location and any other category protected by law. We encourage all qualified candidates to apply.