Chief of Staff (AJP)

The American Journalism Project; United States; Remote; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

The American Journalism Project is seeking a Chief of Staff to partner with the CEO to strengthen organizational culture, internal communications, and cross‑functional planning. This leader will enable strategic focus by managing critical projects, coordinating with leaders and the board, and driving initiatives forward across the organization.

You will serve as a trusted advisor, oversee governance and board meetings, help design scalable processes, and support talent, culture, and external

Qualifications

• Demonstrated experience and leadership supporting a mission-driven organization and its leaders.
• A successful track record of work in advocacy, movement building, politics, and/or philanthropic ventures.
• Strong writing, editing and visual presentation skills.
• Excellent judgment and superior attention to detail.
• Ability to build trust-based relationships with colleagues in a virtual setting.
• Flexibility and comfort working in a fast-paced, multitasking environment.
• Proficient with G-Suite, including strong visual and presentation skills.
• 5-10 years of relevant work experience.

Responsibilities

• Serve as a key advisor to the CEO on cross-organizational planning and communication.
• Oversee planning and execution of board meetings and governance committees.
• Prepare CEO meetings with research, correspondence, action-item tracking.
• Design and steward organization-wide planning and streamline processes.
• Support hiring and lead ad hoc strategic projects.
• Oversee staff development and culture-building initiatives.
• Collaborate with the CEO to improve internal communications and culture.

Skills

Results-Focused

Problem Solving

Collaborative

Excellent communicator

Bold and Mission-oriented

Detail-oriented

Analytical

Trustworthy

Fun

Job description

The Chief of Staff will support the CEO in developing strong organizational culture, internal communications, and cross-organizational planning. The Chief of Staff will enable the CEO to focus on broad strategic initiatives both within and beyond the organization, and will follow up on critical projects, carrying initiatives forward with the CEO. This leader will bring the skill and experience to integrate quickly into the American Journalism Project and work effectively with the leadership and board, operating at maximum effectiveness.

WHO WE ARE

We’re an entrepreneurial team working to re-shape the future of local news in our country. We’re passionate about journalism, civic engagement and how local news plays a unique role in shaping our democracy.

We help build and grow sustainable local news organizations all over the country, through financial investment, venture support, and movement building.

We are a distributed team and strive to maintain a healthy, fun and productive workplace, working alongside smart, energetic colleagues who enjoy one another and enjoy the work.

Fast Facts

Employees: 12

Grantmaking

In 2019, the American Journalism Project announced its first $8.5M in grants to support 11 civic news organizations across the U.S.

The Chief of Staff will provide strategic counsel to key leaders of the organization while building and maintaining cross-departmental relationships to enable leadership success.

Your Job

Strategic Planning

• Serves as a key advisor to the CEO on all aspects of the American Journalism Project and works closely with team leads to facilitate fluid cross organizational planning and communication.
• Oversee planning and execution of all board meetings as well as governance and investment committee meetings. Oversee board development and onboarding of new board members.
• Own behind-the-scenes preparation to make CEO meetings, both internal and external, successful, including research and preparation, drafting correspondence and tracking, monitoring, and execution of action items that stem from these meetings, as well as attending many of them.
• Work with team leaders to design and steward planning and seek to streamline organization-wide systems and processes.

Talent and Culture

• Support in hiring of new roles and lead ad hoc strategic projects and research.
• Oversee key projects related to talent and staff development.
• Partner with the CEO to invest in staff and board’s cultural competence and foster a diverse, equitable, and inclusive organization.
• Oversee an internal communications and culture building strategy, including managing internal all-staff meetings and designing the systems and processes for fluid communication and culture building throughout the organization.

CEO Support and Management

• Manage part-time executive assistant and ensure CEOs time is maximized and prioritized effectively.
• Maintain a critical eye to ways the CEO's time can be best utilized by formally and informally, assessing systems in place and implementing new ways to make things work better.
• Support CEO to draft written communications and work with Marketing and Communications teams to prepare CEO for external communications opportunities.

Your Team

• You will work closely with our CEO, EA, team leaders as well as strategy and operations staff.

This is a full-time position with competitive salary and benefits.

WHO YOU ARE

This role is a fit if you are…

• Results-Focused: You set clear timelines and drive projects to completion. You move with a sense of urgency and know how to get things accomplished.
• Problem Solving: You're someone who thinks strategically. You love to brainstorm and come up with ideas. You look at the way things are and then imagine 20 ways they can be improved.
• Collaborative: You love people and you are the kind of person that brings energy to a meeting. You are friendly, kind, and professional. You are collaborative and believe the work is better when you get the input of diverse perspectives.
• Excellent communicator: You are direct and concise. You speak and write eloquently and with a situation-appropriate tone, whether over the phone, in person, e-mail, memos, PowerPoint, or social media channels.
• Bold and Mission-oriented: You wake up every day terrified about the future of local news in our country but boldly optimistic that we can reimagine our country’s local news infrastructure. You work with urgency to get us there faster.
• Detail-oriented: You cross your Ts and dot your Is and you get energy from doing behind-the- scenes work.
• Analytical: You love to research and analyze. You love taking complex projects with competing priorities and many dimensions and wrestling them to clear project plans.
• Trustworthy: You handle confidential and sensitive information with humility, professionalism, and discretion.
• Fun: We are working hard to reimagine the future of local news and our mission is vitally important to the future of our country. We also love the people we work with and like to have a good time.

What background and skills do you have? (We know not all strong candidates will have all the skills we list. That’s OK. What else do you bring to the table? Please tell us!):

• Demonstrated experience and leadership supporting a mission- driven organization and its leaders.
• A successful track record of work in advocacy, movement building, politics, and/or philanthropic ventures.
• Strong writing, editing and visual presentation skills.
• Excellent judgment and superior attention to detail.
• Ability to build trust-based relationships with colleagues in a virtual setting.
• Flexibility and comfort working in an environment where multitasking is the norm, the pace is fast, and priorities will evolve.
• Proficient with G-Suite, including strong visual and presentation (slides) skills.
• 5-10 years of relevant work experience

Your Impact

• Your voice will carry through every part of our growing organization and help us mobilize a movement with excellence, humility and greater impact.

The American Journalism Project is dedicated to equal employment opportunities for all applicants and employees. The American Journalism Project encourages people of all races, colors, national origins, ancestries, creeds, religions, genders, ages, disabilities, veteran status, sexual orientations, and marital statuses to apply.