Back to top

Communications Manager

This job is no longer available

Oakland, California, USA
Full-time

The Opportunity

Essie Justice Group (Essie) is building grassroots power to dismantle the US incarceration system, the most egregious creator of racial and gender injustice of our time. We are a loving and powerful community of women with incarcerated loved ones and include cisgender women, transgender women, formerly incarcerated women, gender nonconforming people, elders, and young people. We communicate in innovative ways to reach our people, share our research and analysis, and persuade decision-makers. For five years, the powerful storytellers in our membership, a strong brand, and influential partnerships have helped us reach the 1 in 4 women who have loved ones behind bars and bring them into our sisterhood for social justice. As we prepare to launch a statewide campaign rooted in the demands of our groundbreaking report, Because She’s Powerful: The Political Isolation and Resistance of Women with Incarcerated Loved Ones, we now seek the experience and creativity of a Communications Manager to join our team. 

The Communications Manager is a strategic storyteller who recognizes opportunities that others might miss to shift narrative and advance a political perspective to multiple audiences. A creative and savvy communicator, the Communications Manager is as confident and detail oriented in flexing their language skills in message development as they are creating inspiring graphic collateral. With a pulse on mainstream trends and movement moments, the Communications Manager is adept at identifying and leveraging timely cultural opportunities to advance the social change agenda of our loving and powerful membership. This role benefits from having compelling content at their fingertips; their task is to experiment with creative ways to share our Black feminist perspective, vital personal testimonies, and precise political messaging to serve our organizational and movement goals.  

Areas of Responsibility: 

Core Responsibilities

Organizational Branding & Messaging

  • Develop messaging that elevate Essie’s brand and abolitionist, race- and gender-justice perspective.
  • Develop communications materials including templates and an organizational style guide; train new staff on employing branded communications. 
  • Develop and implement a strategy that distributes relevant and engaging content on Essie’s social media platforms. 
  • Manage the development and distribution of all print and electronic publications including emails to listserv of 40K+ people, programmatic marketing collateral, and donor outreach materials.
  • Manage all media contacts and cultivate relationships with local and national journalists and media personalities.
  • Create and implement new ideas for partnerships and public awareness campaigns that expand Essie’s audience. 
  • Oversee Essie’s visual assets including photography, films, graphics, and logos. 
  • Manage creative contractors including graphic designers, photographers, and filmmakers for ongoing communications needs and special projects. 
  • Design branded organizational swag including for special events and organizational programs.  

Thought Leadership & Campaign Communications 

  • Regularly write op-eds, blog posts, articles, and other organizational responses to current political and pop cultural events that uplifts Essie’s political analysis and the constituency of women with incarcerated loved ones. 
  • Conduct media trainings, provide individualized coaching, and secure media opportunities for Essie member spokespeople.  
  • Draft keynote speeches and develop talking points on behalf of and in collaboration with Essie’s Founder & Executive Director.
  • Develop and lead the implementation of strategic communication plans for campaigns in collaboration with the Director of Campaigns and Advocacy; create press kits and releases, campaign collateral, draft messaging, and graphic content. 
  • Manage media relations and communications consulting firms to advance specific campaign aims or thought leadership projects. 
Skills/Experience: 

Ideal Qualifications:

  • 5+ years relevant professional experience in communications.
  • Proficient in listserv email platforms (eg. MailChimp), multiple social media channels, WordPress and Adobe Photoshop.
  • Impeccable and beautiful writing, editing, and verbal communication skills.
  • Experience writing reports and publications, organizational emails, Op-Eds, and speeches. 
  • Experience creating and implementing strategic communication plans.
  • Ability to lead communications discussions at both the strategic and tactical levels.
  • Track record as a collaborative leader who excels in managing multiple projects. 
  • Experience managing relationships with multiple stakeholders including partners, Board members, community members, and donors. 
  • Experience creating and implementing new communications campaigns and initiatives.
  • Experience supervising creative professionals, either in-house or outside vendors.
  • Demonstrated skill in creative problem solving and embracing change.

Qualities:

  • Delights in language’s power and possibility. You are intentional with words, thinking carefully about what will land with efficiency and accuracy. Beautiful writing, slogans carrying a punch, and viral messages have long been your thing. You may have a rep among friends for being pun-y or getting super hyped over an amazing bar or lyric. You craft and create prolifically with words.  
  • “Sees the matrix” of narrative-shifting. You scan social media, the news, and public debates with a sharp eye – seeing what others don’t. You constantly discern opportunities to create a narrative, rather than simply be on the receiving end. As an experienced social change storyteller, you have a well-developed perspective on what will resonate and work, and what won’t. 
  • Sees #Woke as a verb. You are committed to continuously deepening and evolving your own understanding of systems of oppression through study, openness, and humility. And you easily recognize your own relationship to privilege and power, examining and shifting your behaviors as appropriate.
  • Values people, process, and results. You are an exceptionally hard worker. You have an uncanny ability to create an inspiring environment in which stuff gets done with speed, great impact, and focus.
  • Discernment we can trust. You are a thoughtful communicator who acts in alignment with your integrity. You are a confident and collaborative decision-maker and unfailingly trustworthy.
  • Uplifting and additive. You see mistakes as opportunities for growth; problems as catalysts for solutions, and inspire others along the journey. You carry a positive approach, can-do attitude, a sense of humor, and authentic kindness wherever you go.
Compensation/Benefits: 

The Position

The Communications Manager is a full-time exempt position. This position is supervised by the Director of Strategy. The salary for this position is between $72,000 – $76,000 depending on experience with full medical, dental, and vision benefits, optional 401(k), a substantial vacation package, and a monthly personal wellness stipend. The position is note remote, and can be based in Oakland or Los Angeles. 

How to Apply: 

To Apply

Please address a thoughtful cover letter to the “Essie Hiring Committee” and submit along with a resume through our hiring portal (https://essiejusticegroup.bamboohr.com/jobs/view.php?id=11).

Essie values and specifically seeks applicants who are people with incarcerated loved ones, formerly incarcerated people, people of color, women, queer, transgender, gender non-conforming, and gender fluid people. We welcome applicants who thrive in the pursuit of social justice.

Essie Justice Group provides equal employment and advancement opportunities to all staff members. Employment decisions are based on merit, qualifications, and skills. Essie does not discriminate in employment opportunities or practices on the basis of race, color, creed, religion, national origin, ancestry, age, size, sex, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, familial status, veteran status, disability, AIDS/HIV status, medical condition, prior conviction, arrest history or any other characteristic protected by law.

Additional Information: 

About Essie Justice Group

Essie Justice Group is a non profit organization of women with incarcerated loved ones taking on the rampant injustices created by mass incarceration. Our award-winning Healing to Advocacy Model brings women together to heal, build collective power, and drive social change. Learn more at www.essiejusticegroup.org.

Organization Info

Essie Justice Group

Overview
Headquarters: 
Oakland, CA, USA
About Us
Mission: 

Essie Justice Group is a nonprofit organization of women with incarcerated loved ones taking on the rampant injustices created by mass incarceration.

Programs: 

To transform the criminal legal system women impacted by incarceration must organize. Our Healing to Advocacy Model brings women who are enduring a loved one’s incarceration alone into a loving and powerful membership body. From there, women lead: taking on campaigns, providing peer-to-peer support, participating in actions, and partnering with a national community of activists and advocates to build a more compassionate and just society.

From individual engagement, to group participation, to a network of women leaders, our model will bring together hundreds of thousands of women to break isolation, increase resources to families, and confront mass incarceration’s harm as a unified, loving, and powerful group.

Connect With Us

Listing Stats

Post Date: 
Sep 21 2019
Active Until: 
Oct 21 2019
Hiring Organization: 
Essie Justice Group
industry: 
Nonprofit