Director of Strategy & Partnerships

Key Responsibilities

• Working with the LASP Director and senior leadership, oversee the development of short- and long-term strategic priorities and future plans that span LASP’s science and technology teams, including in coordination with CU, government, private, and international space partners
• Identify new opportunities across academic, government, commercial, and international sectors, including awareness of emerging domains, products, and sectors eligible for expansion, such as large mission concepts, instrument line development, and strategic faculty and staff hiring
• Cultivate partnerships with NASA, NOAA, local and state government, federal agency, industry, foundation, and philanthropic entities, supported by a robust partner relationship management system
• Interact with prospective principal investigators (PIs) to maintain a continual awareness of future ambitions
• Evaluate proposal opportunities and assess resource and capacity requirements for responding to calls, working closely with LASP leadership
• Publicize upcoming proposal opportunities within LASP
• Lead a team of proposal and capture managers to grow the quality and number of proposals submitted by LASP principal investigators and by external principal investigators partnered with LASP scientists and technologists
• Oversee the submission of large mission, instrument, and research proposals, including conducting internal reviews to ensure proposal excellence
• Oversee the LASP Strategy and Partnerships Committee, a rotating group of scientists and technologists to support the Director of Strategy & Partnerships in shared responsibility for lab-wide dissemination of opportunities, internal proposal support and review, and fostering the skills growth of new PIs and PMs
• Ensure initiatives for strategy and partnerships are resourced, sequenced, and tracked to completion

Qualifications

• Advanced degree or equivalent experience in a relevant discipline of engineering or science
• Ability to lead and define new directions in science, engineering, and mission opportunities
• Program/project management experience in a research or science mission capacity
• Demonstrated ability to manage complex organizational relationships and drive alignment across diverse teams without direct authority
• Deep familiarity with federal proposal and procurement processes, including experience with NASA, NOAA, NSF, DoD, or comparable agencies
• Ability to identify academic, financial, and political factors that impact research and mission opportunities
• Excellent collaborative and adaptive thinking perspectives, along with high emotional intelligence
• Excellent cross-cultural and multi-discipline communication skills
• Resilience and composure under pressure, with the ability to manage competing priorities in a fast-moving environment
• Creativity, accountability, and resilience

Preferred

• Ph.D. degree in a relevant discipline of engineering or science
• Experience with industry, federal, and/or international space agencies
• Commercial business development and marketing experience

Due to requirements governing access to export-controlled data and information, only U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents (green card holders), or other protected individuals (i.e., persons designated as an asylee, refugee, or temporary resident under amnesty provisions) are eligible for hire.