The Senior Director, Insights and Impact is a senior leader of the DIAL team. S/he will lead the team that works across DIAL programs to shape DIAL’s strategic thought leadership, contribute and manage knowledge production efforts, and lead our dissemination strategy with partners. S/he will be a thought leader in ICT4D and will have a strong strategic and implementation skills, capable of leading the design and implementation of digital research and tools production across multiple sectors. S/he will have a strong grounding in customer needs of at least two eco-system actors, and have a strong understanding of their perspective on business issues preventing digital technologies going to scale. S/he will identify opportunities and trends relevant for DIAL and its key audiences and stakeholders, developing a strong point of view as to which matter most, working with colleagues to shape DIAL’s strategy. S/he will then lead the team that translate these technical trends into written and visual materials that can be quickly understood and used by both public and private sector audiences, delivering immediate impact and establishing a strong and distinctive voice for DIAL.
All applicants must have a proven track record of leading digital development teams and have the ability to work collegially and efficiently with internal and external colleagues to design, write, and deliver cutting edge and memorable analysis quickly.
DIAL is a donor-funded program hosted within the UN Foundation, and is based in the UN Foundation’s Washington, D.C. office. The incumbent will be an employee of the UN Foundation and will be based in Washington, D.C. All candidates must have prior US work authorization.
The Senior Director, Insights and Impact, DIAL will report to the CEO and lead several teams including Insights team which focuses on providing strategic advice and developing actionable research and tools for our internal teams and the Impact team which focuses on training and dissemination across DIAL. The latter team includes DIAL’s stewardship of the Principles for Digital Development community.
The role will play a cross-functional “coaching” role at DIAL as the facilitator of DIAL’s work in establishing new distribution channels. The role will work closely with teams leading our strategic efforts in shaping demand aggregation and pooled procurement, helping them think through their strategy and suggesting options to move these efforts forward.
This role requires a highly collaborative individual, effective of supporting technical research requested by our Platforms & Services and Data for Development teams, and translating that research into strategic communications for DIAL partnering closely with our Investment Evaluation team and Communications colleagues.
Responsibilities
- Collaborate with leaders across DIAL’s teams to define annual research and publication needs to support DIAL programming and the communication calendar
- From this input, define DIAL’s research and dissemination strategy setting clear guidelines for what is in/out of scope for his/her team.
- Translate the strategy into an actionable, annual research agenda that contains 1) key themes and messages, 2) publications calendars 3) measurement criteria. S/he will coordinate with communications team closely on 4) production and, 5) social media plans and other activities to realize DIAL’s strategic objectives
- Establish a strong and positive Insights and Impact team culture that encourages collaboration and cross-pollination of learnings across the whole DIAL team.
- Facilitate DIAL’s cross-programmatic work in developing new business models and procurement strategies
- Produce select strategic communications for the organization working with colleagues
- Represent I&I’s interest as a senior leader of DIAL.
- Represent DIAL at global conferences and with the media.
- Perform periodic team strategy reviews and propose strategic course corrections, in partnership with the CEO.
- Ensure the Insights and Impact strategy adheres to its implementation plan and budget.
- Provide periodic reporting as required.
- Dynamic ICT4D leader with a passion for creating and delivering materials that can catalyze behavior change by actors within the digital ecosystem
- Demonstrated track record of leading global digital strategy, research or analytics teams, at a leading non-profit or global institution (e.g., consulting firm, research firm)
- Record of accomplishment of driving the production of world-class communications assets, including publications, infographics, presentations.
- Strong point of view on challenges in digital technology pricing and global procurement practices preventing digital technology from being incorporated effectively into development services.
- Demonstrated client service orientation, with the ability to internalize internal and external audience needs and to translate these needs quickly into high-quality research and assets.
- Recognized for growing and building strong teams across geographies and cultures.
- Outstanding written communications skills, with a proven ability to translate dense messages into relatable content shaped around audience needs.
- Strong program manager with an ability to execute across multiple efforts simultaneously.
- Substantive professional experience in emerging markets.
- Entrepreneurial, with a talent for creative problem solving, perseverance, flexibility, and resilience.
- Ascribe to DIAL’s values of Commitment, Collaboration, Empowerment, Courage and Thoughtful Action
- Sense of humor
- Ability to meet regular attendance/tardiness policy.
- Ability to work under pressure and handle stress.
For full-time, benefit eligible employees, UNF offers an excellent range of benefits, including:
- A choice of two health plans through CareFirst (PPO or HDHP with HSA),
dental insurance, - vision discounts,
- flexible spending accounts,
- 403b retirement savings plan with a generous matching contribution,
- group term and supplemental life insurance,
- short-term disability,
- long-term disability,
- health club discounts,
- commuter benefits, and
- employee assistance program.
Additionally, all benefit eligible employees have 12 paid holidays, 20 vacation days, 10 sick days, 3 personal days, and 8 weeks of parental leave.