Director of Marketing and Communications

Location: Remote

Preferred application deadline: January 9, 2023

ABOUT PROPEL

Our country's education and workforce systems are inequitable, failing to meet the needs of our country's most marginalized citizens. Historically, workforce education has led to low-wage jobs disconnected from ongoing higher education, which has created significant barriers for career advancement. At the same time, traditional higher education has increasingly become unaffordable for Americans from lower-income backgrounds while also lacking direct connection to the labor market. The consequences of these systemic failures are dire.

At Propel America, we believe a better system should and can exist. We believe high school graduates shouldn't have to choose between forestalling income and accruing significant debt while pursuing a traditional college degree or forestalling education and mobility for low-wage, entry-level work with few opportunities for advancement. Propel is building that better system – a Jobs-First Higher Education – that allows young adults from low-income backgrounds to access an affordable and efficient educational pathway to a good job that serves as a springboard to a choice-filled life.

By working backwards from the needs of established employer partners, Propel America:

• Supports young adults (18 to 24 years old), particularly those from low-income backgrounds, to prepare for living wage jobs
• Partners with training and higher education organizations to offer in-demand credentials that allow students (or “fellows,” as we call them) to earn college credits
• Provides wraparound coaching and professional skill development to ensure fellows have what they need to be successful in their job interview, on the first day of work, and a plan for ongoing education and career advancement.

To learn more about Propel America, please visit https://www.propelamerica.org.

THE OPPORTUNITY

Propel America's Director of Marketing and Communications is responsible for building strategy to enhance the organization's communications impact and executing communications, marketing, and branding efforts across all functional teams, as we aspire to better reach all our stakeholder audiences in 2023. Through drafting content for audiences, ensuring our website is relevant and up-to-date, leading design work, and capturing and sharing the voices of Propel, this role will help Propel build credibility with our existing audiences and reach new stakeholders. This role ensures Propel's public-facing voice and materials center our mission and fellows, are polished and brand-aligned, and help us build trust and community investment around jobs-first higher education.

Responsibilities include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Strengthen consistent, external communications through creating content for all audiences to spread jobs-first higher education.
  • Write/publish audience-specific content for social media platforms; design and post on social media feeds through highlighting various voices/experiences of Propel
  • Maintain a consistent blog to support Propel as a thought leader, initiating and responding to relevant conversations and current events
  • Write and distribute quarterly national newsletter and regional newsletters
  • Set goals for impact; track communications and marketing impact through quantifiable metrics
  • Pursue earned media/PR opportunities for the organization and its leadership to build greater community awareness

• Ensure Propel's website is inspiring, informative, up-to-date, and relevant.
  • Conduct a thorough audit of the current website, and websites of peers in our space, from the perspective of each stakeholder to build a more relevant and up-to-date site
  • Build additional content and pages based on each functional team's needs
  • Ensure the entire website is brand-aligned, aesthetic, and user-centered

• Lead internal design work and brand alignment.
  • Support program design, delivery, and recruitment teams by creating tools and/or executing design work to enhance fellow-facing content (decks, one pagers, program experience visuals) into brand-aligned and polished materials
  • Support external affairs and talent teams by executing design work to enhance employer-, community-, and potential employee-facing content (decks, newsletters, one pagers) into brand-aligned and polished materials
  • Create system to organize and maintain communication materials to be accessible and up-to-date for Propel team members

• Capture and share the diverse voices of Propel.
  • Create systems for capturing fellow, coach, employer, and Propel staff testimonials to integrate into communications and marketing efforts
  • Create a culture of content creation so staff share their work and highlight our impact
  • Coordinate content calendars across teams to ensure alignment of messaging, timing, and consistency of brand and hold teams accountable to timelines
  • Create systems for consistency across videography and photography content creation

• Manage marketing and communications systems for the organization.
  • Collaboratively engage with each functional team; consider the rest of the team as “clients”
  • Plan and engage with consistent check-ins with all functional teams to project manage their design, marketing, and communications needs
  • Working cross-functionally to define design standards and own alignment to the standards
  • Create and update/monitor a centralized home for marketing materials and templates

SKILLS/EXPERIENCE

• 4-7 years of comparable experience
• 3+ years experience with and confidence in using Google Suite
• 3+ years graphic and website design experience and confidence using Canva and/or Adobe design suite
• Experience with social media platforms, including managing google ads and Facebook/Instagram ads, and earned media outlets
• Excellent written communication skills (5+ years of professional writing experience)
• Attention to aesthetic and brand details
• Eagerness to internalize content and messages to produce well-crafted communications and graphics
• Experience working within a project management software and ability to balance multiple projects and timelines
• Commitment to Propel's mission
• Commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion

COMPENSATION

The salary for this position is between $70,000-$88,000 annually. Propel America offers a competitive total rewards package including coverage of 90% of health insurance premiums, unlimited PTO, and a flexible work environment.

INTERESTED IN APPLYING?

Please submit your application here. The application deadline to apply for this position is January 9, 2023. After this date we do not guarantee review of submissions.

Propel America is an equal-opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws.

We encourage candidates from historically underrepresented backgrounds and those with non-traditional educational backgrounds to apply.