Director of Programs – Open Society Foundations

The Open Society Foundations is seeking to hire a Director of Programs to oversee individual opportunities for their duration and deliver on its outcomes, as well as for the management of their teams at the highest level of professionalism.

The expectation is that the Directors will be strong managers, as well as subject matter experts for this specific opportunity, able to build teams and work closely with the Program VPs, Managing/Senior Directors and their fellow Director colleagues in building a collaborative culture of both risk-taking and teamwork.

As Director of Programs, you may be designated by the Program VPs to serve as a Geographic Lead to coordinate OSF’s high-level approach to the geography and ensure a consistent and informed presence in a given area.

Responsibilities

• Accountable for articulating a creative and exciting opening to make impact in the world into a workable project plan for implementation according to established criteria.
• Extensive experience working on the intersection of Gender, Race, and power issues in multiple country contexts.
• Demonstrate experience of working with women political leaders and parties, including elected leaders particularly in the global south.
• Demonstrate substantive knowledge and experience in the provision of coordinated support and management of rights-based programs aiming to advance intersectional equality.
• Extensive experience working on the intersection of Gender, Race, and power issues in multiple country contexts.
• Experience of working with women political leaders and parties, including elected leaders, particularly in the global south.
• Substantive knowledge and experience in the provision of coordinated support and management of rights-based programs aiming to advance intersectional equity.
• Substantive experience and knowledge of working on racial justice issues.
• Evaluate an opportunity based on established metrics for MEL and ability to pivot to ensure the required outcomes are being achieved.
• Ensure appropriate financial, risk, and legal management and control are articulated during the planning and implementation phase, and work with all relevant stakeholders to develop mitigation plans.
• Oversee and manage the opportunity team, including external partners.
• Engage with embedded staff from other OSF teams in close cooperation with senior leaders.
• Articulate budgetary and workforce needs for opportunity leveraging internal and external resources, as required.
• Monitor and regularly report on the progress of an opportunity to the Managing Director of Programs and other senior OSF leaders.
• Leverage OSF’s work globally and employing the strategic capabilities of impact investment, strategic litigation, and advocacy to the opportunity.
• Represent the given opportunity issue externally at all levels, and grow a network accordingly that includes actors beyond the social sector into national and local governments, multilateral organisations, faith-based groups, grass-roots organisations, philanthropy, local experts, academia and think tanks, etc. to advance the opportunity. Depending on the opportunity this might include developing strong relationships with other funders and bringing them as partners into the opportunity.
• May be designated as a Geographic Lead representing OSF’s work in a critical geography (country or region) and leading a Geographic Policy Group, that defines OSF’s strategic approach to the priority geography and ensures a consistent and informed presence.

Experience

• Prior experience at both local and global level in leading social change and system-change work in civil society, government, multilateral institutions, and/or the private sector that has resulted in positive societal impact.
• Direct experience and knowledge of working in gender, race and power issues in the Africa, MENA, Latin America, Caribbean, Asia Pacific and Eurasia regions would be an advantage.
• Knowledge and understanding of global racial and reparative justice, global south Feminist, human rights and justice spaces.
• Experience and/ or familiarity with impact investment, economic empowerment and entrepreneurship programs to empower marginalised and/ or excluded gender, racial, indigenous or ethno-religious groups.
• Extensive expertise in the specific topic area as set out in the “Opportunity Description” above.
• Prior financial ($20m+), legal and risk accountability at large-scale programmatic level.
• Network across the social sector in national and local governments, multilateral organisations, faith-based groups, grass-roots organisations, philanthropy, local experts, academia, and think tanks.
• Proven people management experience (of individual contributors and external partners).
• Prior experience leading programmatic or organisational level change within organisations and/or systems that have gone through significant transformation
• Experience in multiple sectors and knowledge of philanthropic tools such as advocacy and communication, strategic litigation, and social impact approaches.

Languages 

• An excellent knowledge of English.
• Knowledge of other languages (appropriate to the location and/or opportunity focus) are preferred.

How to apply

The application deadline for this position is March 13, 2024. To learn more about this position and apply, please click here.