Policy Portfolio Director
R Street Institute
Washington, DC
The R Street Institute—a free-market think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C., and with regional offices across the country—seeks an organized, energetic, experienced Portfolio Director to oversee our technology and innovation, cybersecurity and national security policy efforts. The core aspects of this role focus on development, fundraising and project management. If you want to join an organization and do something extraordinary, this may be just the opportunity you need.
Your typical day at R Street may include helping divide responsibilities for a new project between experts on our various teams, helping outline a potential organizational response to a recent cyber attack and meeting with a foundation program officer to discuss R Street’s potential role in a new effort. This role is part of our management team and will report to and work closely with the Associate Vice President of Policy.
Other Aspects of Your Role
- Establish a clear policy strategy for the Technology and Innovation, Cyber and National Security portfolio, demonstrating broad familiarity with programming and serving as a brand ambassador.
- Oversee portfolio budget and facilitate cross-functional processes for fundraising, proposal development, and financial analyses.
- Lead fundraising efforts, including: ideation, proposal development, pitching and closing deals.
- Apply uniform standards for business assessment to analyze viability of policy programming and develop growth strategies where appropriate.
- Supervise portfolio staff and ensure project deliverables are high quality, highly credible and timely.
- Oversee hiring and managing staff with competency-based learning and assessment methods.
- Leverage contextual decision-making to manage conflict.
- Serve as a catalyst for activities which create high morale by demonstrating organizational norms and leading with integrity, humility, and resilience.
- Prioritize the organization’s needs while concurrently demonstrating empathy to build strong internal and external relationships.
Skills and Qualifications
- Demonstrated ability to oversee and deliver sophisticated, multi-part projects and budgets. Familiarity with Salesforce and project management software preferred.
- A record of success in development/fundraising, with an emphasis on articulating and realizing strategic business goals, particularly in a nonprofit environment.
- At least five years of management experience involving oversight of multiple full-time W-2 employees.
- Demonstrated ability to make difficult management choices, often without full information.
- No particular educational background is required; proven ability to achieve results is far more important than credentials.
- Aligned with our mission for free markets and limited, effective government.
- A sense of humor and a desire to grow with a dynamic organization.
Demonstrated understanding and achievement in one or more of the particular policy areas is highly desirable but not absolutely required. This is a job for someone who has a firm grasp of fundraising, nonprofit business strategy and management. In other words, while familiarity with our policy content is a plus this job is not primarily about doing our policy work.
This is a full-time job based in Washington, D.C. However, for the duration of COVID-19 related closures, this position will be required to work remotely until our office reopens. The job will require some travel, almost all of it within the United States.
R Street strives to provide a compensation package superior to those at other think tanks and nonprofits. In addition to a competitive salary, we provide a health insurance option entirely paid by the employer (even for families); wellness benefit; employer-subsidized mobile phones benefit; 401(k) contributions with up to a four percent match; and an exceptionally generous vacation policy. We were named to Washingtonian Magazine’s “Great Places to Work” List and take pride in providing an exceptional environment for our employees.
R Street does not discriminate on the basis of age, sex, race, creed, color, national origin, sexual orientation, era of military service, gender identity, relationship structure or anything else that's illegal, immoral or nonsensical to use as a basis for hiring.
We currently plan to accept applications for this job until filled. We will contact ideal individuals for video interviews and plan to conduct them on a rolling basis. Due to COVID-19, we will hold interviews virtually via Zoom until our DC office reopens. To apply, please upload a cover letter and resume in Microsoft Word or PDF format.