Youth Climate Organizing Program Manager

Who we are: We’re a multidisciplinary team working together to research and fund strategic leverage points in the fight against climate change. On paper, ours is a medium-sized family foundation that employs a wide range of tools in this work, including philanthropic grants, impact investments, progressive political contributions, angel investments, and gifts. We have developed a shared theory of change on how to drive the clean energy transition at speed and scale; each portfolio plays a key role. Our theory is this: The profit motive cannot solve for the best outcomes for the public. Therefore, democratic public ownership of climate assets is required to compel the transition to a climate-safe world. An economy that prioritizes climate safety and human well-being over private profit can only be achieved through herculean working-class organizing, including through the labor movement, the youth movement, and international solidarity.

While we’re a distributed team, we come together online to debate the best approaches to our work, at all levels. Whether we are analyzing the latest developments and their implications, unpacking capitalism, interrogating our proposals, or discussing ways to incorporate more diverse insights into decision making, we often find ourselves far more critical of philanthropy than perhaps would seem the norm. But we like it that way, and we’re looking for someone who will join us in thinking broadly and critically about how the world works.

What we’re reading: These articles have been particularly stimulating in our discussions as we crafted our approach:

• Mapping the Global Youth Climate Movement
• Young Workers Are Bridging the Climate and Labor Movements
• Funding a Green New Deal for Public Schools
• What is the Rank-and-File Strategy, and Why Does It Matter?
• New York Socialists Won Big On Climate. How Did It Happen?
• Blended Finance

If you apply, please include in the second paragraph of your cover letter a short explanation of what you found interesting in one of the above selections and why.

Some other things to know: We support progressive politics and movement building, at both the domestic and international levels. Our office is in San Francisco, but you are welcome to work from anywhere within the US, as long as you can attend our meetings and those with our partners. We do meet in person approximately 4 times per year, including an annual summit. We highly encourage candidates from diverse backgrounds to apply. We will deeply value your insight and expertise to help us build a great place to work. This may be a fulltime or parttime position depending on the needs of the successful candidate.

Compensation: We hope you will love this job because you know that every day your contributions will be felt by our team and pushed out into the world. You will have decision-making power, as opposed to being stuck somewhere deep inside an org chart. We also recognize that more traditional forms of compensation matter as well. To that end, we offer a competitive starting salary range of $80K-$100K annually commensurate with experience and with significant growth potential subject to annual reviews. We also offer excellent health coverage, generous PTO, fully remote work opportunities, technology and home office benefits, and all of the lively debate about how the world works and the best way to make change that you can handle.

We will be accepting applications until December 15th, 2023.

Who we’re looking for: We’re looking for someone dedicated to equipping youth with the tools that they need to effectively confront fossil capitalism, drive the clean energy transition at speed and scale, and build the just transition. This position will entail collaborating with other team members to integrate this portfolio’s grantmaking within our shared theory of change.

The Program Manager will lead our outreach and partnerships with youth-led or centered organizations that build progressive power for lasting change, as well as other organizations that create foundational conditions needed for youth to build and exercise their power. This includes climate organizing, labor organizing, youth voter organizing, and intersectional organizing among other approaches. The position involves developing and maintaining a strong sense of the ecosystem, including organizations and funders, staying informed on current events, news, and trends, and identifying leverageable funding opportunities based on that knowledge.

Please apply if: If you find the work described above compelling and you have the experience and capacity to excel in this role. The ideal candidate will have experience leading effective initiatives in several of the following areas, but we encourage applications from exceptional people with non-traditional backgrounds:

• Youth-led climate organizing

• Labor organizing, especially involving youth

• Youth campaigns or intersectional organizing

• Climate change education

• Political education

• Public Education

Additional skills and experience that would be assets:

• Spanish fluency

• International organizing

• Solid understanding of climate science

We would be willing to support the right candidate in the following, if needed:

• Grant-making practices

• Our communication and record-keeping tools: Slack, Notion, AirTable, Zoom, Google drive