Utah Organizer
Full-Time / Contract-to-hire / Statewide
Location: Utah (Rural Utah preferred)
Pay Range: $30-40/hour, 40 hours/week
United Today, Stronger Tomorrow, a regional, state, and local organizing project, is seeking to hire a local full-time (contract to begin) Utah organizer to build and run a statewide base of grassroots individuals and community leaders working on campaigns at the state and local level. UTST has been working in Utah over the past 6 years, helping to deliver millions of dollars in federal funds to the state, developing local leaders to run campaigns, and strengthening the organizing infrastructure in the state. We work with labor, community, local elected, and leaders from tribal and rural communities across the state.
We are looking for an energetic and self-motivated person to help us strengthen and expand our work in the state, by leading on building and expanding our base across the state. While we are looking for someone with experience in organizing, we are open to applicants with volunteer and or community experience, but have the drive, passion and the interest to build out this work in partnership with local leaders and a high performing team in Utah, as well as the region. Currently our core campaigns in Utah focus on healthcare, good jobs, clean energy, and affordability.
Description
The organizer will work under the direction and with support from the Organizing Director with support from the Strategic Campaign Director, and in collaboration with other Utah staff to build and manage member-run, local organizing committee(s) in 5-6 regions/communities across the state. The staff person will work with members and local grass top leaders, including local elected officials, workers, and small business owners, to lead campaigns on issues that are widely and deeply felt across the diverse constituency. In addition to base building, the organizer will build relationships with existing organizations who are potential coalition partners in these campaigns. The issues, demands, targets, and strategies will be developed by the local organizing committee.
Responsibilities
- Build a base of people and organizations to activate in local and state campaigns focused on delivering concrete benefits to Utahns.
- Build member-run organizing committees in 4-5 regions of the state, through on-line to offline organizing.
- Identify new pipelines of leaders and activists for campaigns.
- Conduct one-on-ones with potential leaders and build leadership development programs.
- Convene issue committees to be co-facilitated by member leaders.
- Manage the texting program - use phone, text, one-on-ones, and more, to build the organizing committee.
- Moderate Facebook groups and other social channels specific to the project.
- Identify leadership roles and support leaders in doing community organizing work (training, check-ins, and management, for example).
- Organize and work with leaders to lead meetings and briefings, for example.
- Implement an earned media strategy to garner local press and media attention.
- Organize research teams that can identify policy solutions and communicate them to a general audience.
- Learn and teach local political dynamics to organizing committee leaders.
Qualifications
The ideal candidate is someone who is interested in building statewide campaigns and has strong experience in base-building, leadership development and managing multiple organizing committees and local campaigns, especially with diverse communities and people across the political spectrum; experience on an issue, policy, corporate, union, or administrative campaign; and interest in leading a campaign. Prior experience in distributive on-line to off-line organizing is extremely helpful, but not required.
- One to two years experience base-building and building community leaders.
- Experience working on a campaign—preferably an issue, administrative, corporate, or unionization campaign.
- Experience managing projects, programs, or an organizing committee.
- Willing to travel around the state and spend multiple days in rural communities working on local campaigns and building local leaders.
- An ability to build and manage relationships with a wide array of stakeholders and to multitask different pieces of work.
- Experience building diverse teams and staffing workgroups and/or committees.
- A track record of recruiting, developing, and managing leaders and volunteers.
- The ability to implement digital organizing tools, tactics, and strategies.
- Strong writing skills.
- Experience working with media (writing press releases, pitching, and organizing press events) is preferred, but not required.
Prefered
- Working knowledge of EveryAction, Scale to Win/Spoke texting, New Mode, and digital advertising is a plus but not required.
Other details
- Local or regional residency in Utah is a must, with preference given to candidates with working knowledge of Utah government institutions.
- Having a car, working laptop, and the ability to travel overnight to communities across Utah. Travel to regional and team-wide meetings is occasionally required.
- Hours vary and will include weeknights 1-2 a week and weekends on occasion, minimum once a month. During the week, the expectation is to be reachable and responding to team requests from 10am CT to 3pm CT, with some flexibility outside of that.
- UTST is an equal-opportunity employer. Women, people of color, Native/indigenous people, and LGBTQ+ people are strongly encouraged to apply.
Compensation
Pay range is $30-40/hour, 40 hours/week. Travel expenses are covered.
UTST Organizer positions start as contracts. After completion of the probationary period of 4 months, you may be offered a salaried position with benefits based on your skill level, experience, and performance.
How to apply
To apply, please send a resume and cover letter to [email protected] that includes why you are interested in this position and how your experience can help build the project. Please put “Utah Organizer” in the subject line.