Associate Director of Strategic Partnerships

Overview

The Watson Institute powers transformative Fellowships in partnership with leading corporations and foundations to support highly promising entrepreneurs and leaders from underserved backgrounds. The Fellowships provide proven entrepreneurship and leadership skills training, committed mentorship, community development stipends, long-term Alumni support, and access to a global community of peers, mentors, and opportunities.

Role

• Partnership Building: 80%

  • Build and grow a portfolio of partnerships with corporations and foundations to create Fellowships powered by Watson Institute.
  • Create compelling, persuasive, tailored, and well-designed/visual impact updates for Watson Institute's top prospects and partners.
  • Write and design decks, emails, Alumni and Fellow highlights, Fellow profiles, and more.
  • Prepare and lead prospect and partner meetings, including associated preparation, talking points, diligent notes, timely and comprehensive follow-ups, and coordination with appropriate team members on action items.

• Complex Stakeholder Mapping and Engagement: 20%

  • Coordinate and strategically engage a complex map of stakeholders across each corporate and foundation partner.
  • Develop compelling concept notes, decks, and grant applications for prospects and partners.
  • Create impactful points of 'business connectivity' that create connections across multiple teams and business goals within each corporate/foundation prospect and partner.
  • Work closely with Watson Institute's VP of Strategic Partnerships, CEO, and other members of the leadership team to ensure successful outcomes across all partnerships.
  • Collaborate with Watson Institute's Design Team on the monitoring, evaluation, and learning process and analysis to ensure impact metrics support partner expectations.

Special Projects

• New Responsibilities: Serve as the Strategic Partnerships Lead for special projects that are critical to Watson Institute's corporate partnership strategy and growth.

  • Examples include conducting a landscape analysis for partners who are looking to bring their Fellowship to new markets and developing thought pieces/reports on current trends in corporate impact and community impact.

Requirements

• Passion for Watson Institute's Mission: A deep-seated passion for Watson Institute's mission to develop innovators, leaders, and entrepreneurs to solve the toughest challenges facing the world.

• Enterprise Sales/Strategic Partnership Experience: Previous experience in enterprise sales/strategic partnership roles, specifically with corporations, corporate foundations, and corporate CSR teams.

  • Previous experience should include building and growing impactful corporate partnerships that deliver on business impact (for the corporate partner) and community impact (for the Fellows and their communities).

• Relationship-Building and Partnership Skills: A natural inclination to build and strengthen relationships and partnerships to grow Watson Institute's impact.

• Persuasive Writing and Communication: A love and talent for persuasive writing, complex enterprise sales, and communication designed to build and grow impactful corporate and foundation partnerships.

• Systems-Oriented Approach: A systems-oriented and highly organized approach to work.

• Technical Skills: Experience with Salesforce (or other CRM platforms) and Canva (or other graphic design platforms) are a strong plus.

Benefits

• Compensation: Competitive base salary according to experience: $80,000.00-$95,000.00

• Annual Happiness Fund: Increases with time and seniority

• Unlimited Vacations: 3 weeks required vacation time per year

• Healthcare Benefit: Via Thatch (ICHRA provider), where employees have the option to apply this amount towards their choice of medical plans, with the option to add vision and dental plans

• Automatic 3% Contribution to Retirement Account:

Vitals

• Full-Time Commitment: The Associate Director of Strategic Partnerships is a full-time commitment and reports to the VP of Strategic Partnerships.

• Remote Work: The position can work remotely, but should be based in CO, PA, GA, FL, ME, AZ, DC, OK, SC, IL, or MD.

• Travel: You will likely take short trips each year to spend immersive, hands-on time with our team, Fellows, and partners—whether at events, conferences, or other programming.