Reports to: Caitlin Hannon, Partner
Start date: TBD
End date: TBD
About Building Impact Partners
Building Impact Partners (Building Impact) is a philanthropy advising firm that works with changemakers who want to solve big challenges — and move people, communities and society forward for good. With expertise spanning philanthropy advising, social innovation and advocacy, our team has the insights, imagination and determination to build effective solutions that endure. We believe philanthropy can be an engine for systems change. That’s why we work with and across the philanthropic community to build the knowledge, skills and mindsets needed to build a more just and equitable world.
About High Impact Grantmaking
High Impact Grantmaking (HIGM) helps donors and foundations get money off the sidelines and into the hands of organizations and individuals who need it most. We partner with donors to move big dollars quickly and efficiently by providing a suite of services including issue identification and research, program/campaign design, and full execution from grantee selection through evaluation and reporting. We help individuals and lean organizations have a big impact on the issues they care about, and we care deeply about building solutions in alignment with our values, the values of our clients, and the values and needs of the communities they aim to serve. The needs and requirements of each engagement vary, and team members are generally expected to join regular internal or client-facing check-ins in addition to independent and flexible work time.
Overview of Roles & Responsibilities
Building Impact relies on a cadre of steller independent contractors to support HIGM. Each role varies depending on the engagement, but common responsibilities include:
- Relationship and/or portfolio management with a large number of diverse stakeholders
- Creative and strategic problem solving
- Managing large-scale complex projects with competing priorities to a successful completion
- Communicating progress, questions, and challenges up, down, and across Building Impact, the client’s organization, and within the consultant team
- Acting as a subject-matter expert, when needed (i.e., school leadership, workforce development, health care, etc.)
Depending on the needs of the engagement, the organization seeks individuals for the following types of roles:
Engagement Manager
The Engagement Manager serves as the primary lead for the engagement. This person plays a critical project management role, is the point-person for both the client and other consultants, and is responsible for ensuring all deadlines are successfully met. The core responsibilities are as follows:
- Develop and execute against a week-over-week project plan and RACI chart, ensuring all deliverables and tasks are completed on the agreed upon timeline
- Manage the people and goals of the engagement, including know when to escalate challenges to the Partner
- Design the critical components of grantmaking, including selection criteria, the application, the evaluation process for a large number of proposals, communications and outreach plans, and collateral (with support and capacity from the Building Impact)
- Create agendas and lead all team meetings including (1) weekly meetings with the client and their partners, (2) weekly meetings with the internal Building Impact consultant team, and (3) bi-weekly status updates to the Partner
Program Manager
The Program Manager serves as a portfolio manager in many ways. The grantee pool is divided among several Program Managers so each person has a distinct set of grantees they work with for the entirety of the program. This person is critical to grantee support and reporting and is the point-person for their grantees and ensures all deadlines are successfully met. The core responsibilities are as follows:
- Manage outreach and communications to a portion of potential grantees (individual portfolio) to their participation in the program
- Support your portfolio of potential grantees during the application process by advising, answering questions, and being a thought partner
- Evaluate a portion grant applications and conduct additional due diligence to assist in selecting grant recipients
- Serve as the primary point of contact for a portfolio of grantees, ensuring all required tasks are completed including grant agreements and all grant reporting
- Conduct site visits and/or check-ins during the program to build relationships and support the program
The Person
You are an excellent organizer, planner, and prioritizer. You’re an organizer at heart and love organizing yourself and others via project plans, budgets, to-dos, etc. You love managing complex projects, especially the challenge of managing multiple stakeholders, workstreams, and deadlines. You’re a highly-skilled accountability partner and know when to slow down, change course, or push forward. You understand the larger picture and can therefore anticipate challenges. Clients are always satisfied with your work and impressed by your ability to set and exceed expectations.
You are committed to the team’s success. You understand your individual role AND what the broader team is trying to accomplish – it excites and motivates you and you are committed to ensuring the team succeeds. You are collaborative and enjoy working with others. You do not wait to be told what to do, you know what your role is and you get your stuff done. You think of the needs of the team and our client and how best to balance both of those to meet goals and advance priorities. You hold yourself personally responsible for results, both yours and the team’s, and are patiently persistent as you follow up and follow through. You find ways to get what’s needed to meet the goal.
You persistently and proactively problem solve. You are great at identifying potential issues before they even exist. You see challenges as opportunities to learn and collaborate and therefore don’t shy away from them. You have a variety of techniques at your disposal to resolve challenges on your own or as part of a team. You are able to analyze a situation and quickly (and accurately) decide what to do next. You can readily make sense of how complex circumstances interact and choose the path most likely to achieve the outcome you seek.
You are a strong communicator. You use clear and concise language. Others have said that your writing is concrete and actionable. You understand the context in which you are communicating and can respond to emails, calls, and requests with the appropriate nuance given the audience and message. You over communicate key messages multiple times and in various ways without judgment, allowing stakeholders to fully absorb what you’re communicating. You leverage questions to unearth assumptions, competing commitments, and advance the thinking of the team. You communicate with openness and transparency that allows stakeholders and team members to share candidly with you and push on your ideas.
Compensation
This is a contractor role requiring anywhere from 10-40 hours per week over the course of 4-12 months depending on the role and the engagement. Since we typically have several contractors working on these engagements, we pay a flat fee to each consultant on a predetermined schedule to ensure parity. Hourly time tracking is not required of this consultant role.
Commitment to Diversity
Building Impact does not and shall not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion (creed), gender, gender expression, age, national origin (ancestry), disability, marital status, sexual orientation, or military status, in any of its activities or operations. These activities include, but are not limited to, hiring and firing of staff and contractors, selection of volunteers and vendors, and provision of services. We are committed to providing an inclusive and welcoming environment for all members of our staff, clients, volunteers, contractors, and vendors.
