Director of Placement

Education First; Boston (MA); On-site; USD 75,000 - 80,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Four weeks paid vacation

Ten paid holidays

Two floating holidays

Business travel opportunities

401(k) matching

Medical, dental and vision coverage

Life and disability insurance

FSAs

Fertility care support

Wellness reimbursement

Employee resource groups

Employee assistance program

Sabbatical eligibility

EF discounts

Job summary

Education First is seeking a Director of Placement to lead Regional Placement Managers across the USA. This role drives placement performance, develops teams, and aligns priorities with program growth and quality.

You will partner with cross-functional teams to expand host family recruitment, student placement, school readiness, and operations while maintaining a strong focus on care and communication for students and host families.

Qualifications

• Experience leading people, coaching performance, and supporting professional growth.
• Experience in recruitment, business development, account management, operations, or another results-focused environment.
• Experience setting goals, tracking performance, using data to guide decisions, and translating organizational goals into clear priorities and measurable team actions.
• Ability to build accountability, support consistent follow-through, and develop others toward strong performance.
• Ability to build strong relationships across teams, including with staff, coordinators, schools, students, and host families.
• Strong organizational skills and the ability to manage competing priorities in a fast-moving environment.
• Clear communication skills and the ability to provide direction, solve problems, and make sound decisions in a collaborative way.
• Comfort working across teams and supporting shared goals in a distributed environment.
• Commitment to growth, service, quality, cultural exchange, and EF’s mission

Responsibilities

• Lead student placement progress, team performance, and priorities across your assigned area of the USA.
• Accountable for regional placement performance through leadership and development of your team.
• Drive progress toward placement goals using data and performance trends, forecast progress, and communicate priorities, risks, and next steps to leadership.
• Support host family recruitment, matching, and student placement, while ensuring program operations and school readiness across the region.

Skills

People leadership

Performance management

Recruitment

Operations

People development

Job description

EF High School Exchange Year sponsors international high school students who spend a semester or academic year living with volunteer host families and attending local high schools across the USA. We are seeking a Director of Placement with demonstrated success in people leadership, performance management, recruitment, operations, or a related field. This role is accountable for regional student placement performance and strategy while directly managing and developing a team of Regional Placement Managers. You will also provide direction and support to local coordinators as they work to expand capacity and strengthen the quality of the exchange program in local communities.

This position plays an important role on the HSEY leadership team, connecting program growth with strong execution and quality. You will lead through coaching, relationship building, data-informed planning, problem-solving, and cross-functional collaboration. Together with other Placement leaders, you will guide Regional Placement Managers in setting priorities, monitoring performance, developing their teams, and removing roadblocks across host family recruitment and matching, student placement, school readiness, and program operations. In this leadership role, you will help build a focused, accountable team while ensuring that students, host families, and schools receive the communication, care, and support they need throughout the placement process.

What you will do

As a Director of Placement, you will lead student placement progress, team performance, and priorities across your assigned area of the USA. You will be accountable for regional placement performance through the leadership and development of your team, setting clear expectations, coaching performance, and keeping the team focused on the work that matters most. You will drive progress toward established placement goals, use data and performance trends to identify opportunities and address gaps, and forecast progress while communicating priorities, risks, and next steps to leadership. You will hold your team accountable for strong follow-through while supporting their continued growth and development.

You will work closely with HSEY leaders and cross-functional teams to strengthen regional performance and remove roadblocks. You will help Regional Placement Managers and local coordinators strengthen host family lead generation, lead follow-up, host family matching, and student placement, while connecting qualified host family leads to placement activity and successful student matches in partnership with the Host Family Recruitment team. You will help ensure strong execution across host family recruitment and matching, student placement, school readiness, and program operations, while balancing regional growth with program quality, compliance requirements, and a positive experience for students, host families, and schools.

What we are looking for

We are looking for a strong people leader who is organized, accountable, and motivated by both results and purpose. The right candidate brings sound judgment, strong communication skills, and the ability to keep people, priorities, and performance moving forward in a fast-moving environment.

• Experience leading people, coaching performance, and supporting professional growth
• Experience in recruitment, business development, account management, operations, or another results-focused environment
• Experience setting goals, tracking performance, using data to guide decisions, and translating organizational goals into clear priorities and measurable team actions
• Ability to build accountability, support consistent follow-through, and develop others toward strong performance
• Ability to build strong relationships across teams, including with staff, coordinators, schools, students, and host families
• Strong organizational skills and the ability to manage competing priorities in a fast-moving environment
• Clear communication skills and the ability to provide direction, solve problems, and make sound decisions in a collaborative way
• Comfort working across teams and supporting shared goals in a distributed environment
• Commitment to growth, service, quality, cultural exchange, and EF’s mission

Why you’ll love working here: perks, benefits, and more!

This is the most fun, high caliber place you’ll ever work. Ask any employee why they love EF (whether they’ve been here 10 minutes or 10 years) and they’ll probably tell you the same thing: it’s the people. When you work at EF, you join a purpose-driven, international and energetic community that thrives on continuous learning, fearless innovation and mutual support.

In addition, you can expect:

• Commitment to professional growth: robust monthly calendar of trainings and workshops
• Four weeks paid vacation your first year, ten paid holidays, and two floating holidays
• Exciting business travel opportunities
• 25% company match on your 401(k) contributions
• Market-leading medical, dental and vision coverage, along with options for life and disability insurance, legal and pet insurance
• Dependent care, healthcare and commuter Flex Spending Accounts (FSAs)
• Access to fertility care and family-building support
• Wellness benefits including a yearly fitness reimbursement
• Frequent social and learning events, including access to our employee-run resource groups
• Robust Employee Assistance Program
• Tenure-based sabbatical eligibility
• EF Product Discounts (discounts on travel, international language schools, Au Pair program and more)
• Discounts at local venues and businesses
• Amazing offices designed to match the caliber of the people who work there, plus the flexibility of working from home one day a week.
• Compensation range for this role is $75,000 to $80,000, based on experience. Bonus potential is available based on individual and team performance.