Senior Vice President of External Affairs

### Vice President of External Affairs Position

We are seeking a visionary Vice President of External Affairs to create a proactive, innovative, and comprehensive external relations strategy. This role involves building a unified approach for our communications, fundraising, and brand awareness to inspire deeper engagement from our key audiences, grow and activate our membership base, and generate the revenue necessary to meet our mission of defending and strengthening our democracy.

The Senior Vice President, External Affairs will direct the communications, digital, and fundraising strategy for Common Cause (501c4) and Common Cause Education Fund (501c3), national organizations with a presence in 30 states, and a membership base of 1.5 million. A strategic thinker and relationship builder with deep knowledge of many of our core issues, the Senior Vice President, External Affairs will act as a key representative for our organization, build and maintain close partnerships with donors, elected and government officials on both sides of the political aisle, external partners, coalition members, thought leaders, other decision-makers, and Common Cause staff across the country to direct the strategy and implementation of our communications and key messaging, and how to use that to drive deeper engagement from donors, members, and other audiences.

Within Common Cause, the Senior Vice President, External Affairs is a critical member of our senior management team, providing counsel and guidance on organizational strategic direction, and will oversee the Digital, Communications, and Development teams (a 20-person team). This is an ideal role for a seasoned communications, digital, and/or fundraising leader with a track record of managing effective teams, developing and implementing organization-wide strategy, and leading organization-wide change management efforts.

This role reports to our President & CEO and is based in Washington, DC with an expectation to come into our office at least 2 days per week. We hope our new Senior Vice President, External Affairs will start by November.

### Responsibilities

In close collaboration with members of the External Affairs team, develop and implement our strategic plan for external communications and audience engagement:
– Create, implement, and evaluate our short and long-term unified communications strategy to elevate the profile of Common Cause and our mission.
– Revise and refine our organizational brand and messaging to engage, activate, and broaden our member network, ensuring our organizational narratives and messaging are both consistent and differentiated for audiences.
– Develop and define key audience profiles to expand outreach and increase engagement of key stakeholders, including our member network, donors, partners, and other networks, with a particular focus on how we engage younger voters and activists in our work.
– Ensure effective implementation of our organizational brand and marketing strategy, including a consistent narrative and visual brand for the organization, as well as effective use of resources for materials we produce (written communications, video, paid advertising, etc.).
– Develop and oversee a process to evaluate the impact and effectiveness of external messaging, audience engagement, and advocacy campaigns.
– Engage internal teams and board members to ensure all external communication and marketing materials meet standards for brand, message, tone, and style.
– Ensure alignment of our communications and digital strategy with our fundraising goals and activities.
– Develop and manage a crisis management communication process.

Develop and implement our strategic plan fundraising for Common Cause and Common Cause Education Fund:
– Collaborate with the President, the Management Team, and our National Governing Board to set and achieve annual revenue goals of $25M+.
– Create, implement, and evaluate our multi-year strategic fundraising plan to expand and diversify our funding base.
– Align and strengthen our strategic approach to national and regional development.
– Develop and implement strategies for major gifts solicitation, and foundation and donor growth.
– Create strong systems for managing relationships with prospects, current supporters (including individuals and foundations), ensuring customized communication and cultivation.
– Cultivate, solicit, and steward a personal portfolio of supporters, and liaise with foundation officers and major donors.
– Assist with proposals, grant reports, and other products to maintain and grow the organization’s effectiveness and solvency.

### Position Common Cause as a Thought Leader and Represent Our National Agenda Publicly

– Collaborate with teams across the organization to identify opportunities to translate our work into digestible and powerful communications that will strengthen relationships, amplify our mission, and expand our reach.
– Advance our work through media outreach and public communications, including white papers, memos, policy reports, and other resources that position Common Cause as subject matter experts in democracy reform.
– Collaborate with teams to determine ways to promote our self-published materials to engage relevant and new audiences, and promote our agenda.
– Serve as the spokesperson for our organization as needed, and support the President and other senior staff on speeches and media appearances.
– Strategically cultivate meaningful relationships with members of the media, partners, and other key audiences to expand Common Cause’s reach and visibility.
– Actively seek opportunities for Common Cause to share our agenda and insights through media, conferences, and other public forums; ensure that the staff are prepared to represent Common Cause as needed.
– Strategically position appropriate staff members as influencers and thought leaders within the democracy reform space.

### Support and Develop the External Affairs Team

– Manage and support the development of the External Affairs team: directly manage four direct reports, and oversee the team of 20. Collaboratively set goals, coach and develop staff towards these goals, and support their career progression and retention at Common Cause.
– In partnership with other members of the management team, ensure efficient coordination between members of the External Affairs team and other internal teams.
– Oversee, monitor, and adhere to department’s budgetary objectives to support the organization’s fiscal health and sustainability.

### Qualifications

You will thrive in this role if you have:
– A strong commitment to Common Cause’s non-partisan mission and to advancing racial equity through our democracy agenda, with a passion to communicate our mission to a broader audience.
– A commitment to equity, both in the goals of our work and in how we work with staff and other stakeholders.
– Persuasive and inspiring communication skills in written, visual, and oral communications, with the ability to distill complex topics into accessible narratives.
– An understanding of and sensitivity to how different audiences receive information, with experience appealing to audiences that differ by generation, race, gender, geography, and political orientation.
– Innovative, critical, and strategic thinking skills, with a resourceful approach to problem-solving and the ability to navigate through urgency and ambiguity to achieve goals.
– Ability to manage multiple long-term priorities at once, with the ability to adjust priorities as needed to respond to urgent needs, with high attention to detail.
– Ability to quickly build rapport, trust, and credibility with multiple stakeholders with diverse interests.
– A track record of working collaboratively with others, navigating organizational dynamics, and leveraging relationships to meet common goals, and of respectfully navigating conflict.
– Openness to feedback and awareness of your own strengths and areas for growth.
– Deep familiarity with office productivity tools including Microsoft Office and Zoom, and the ability to quickly learn and adapt to new technology.

The following experience and qualifications are required:
– Experience leading organization-wide strategic communications (marketing, branding, digital, external relations), ideally within 501(c)3 and 501(c)4 organizations or campaigns, or experience in a senior media or communications role.
– Experience building a strategic approach to adapt messaging for different communities.
– Experience making public statements to the media, funders, and key stakeholders on behalf of an organization; ideally you have existing relationships with major media outlets.
– A track record of implementing innovative and successful organization-wide fundraising strategies that have met or exceeded revenue goals.
– Experience setting and driving strategy at an organization-level, and a track record of leading organization-wide change initiatives.
– Experience coaching and managing teams, managing through managers to achieve outcomes, and a track record of setting and reaching ambitious team-wide strategic plans and goals.
– Experience setting strategic direction for a team, and building a unified approach to achieve goals, ideally in an organization with a central team that supports teams across multiple states or other geographic spread.
– Understanding of our issues (voting rights, campaign finance, anti-disinformation, ethics, etc.).
– Deep familiarity with the broader community of decision-makers and pro-democracy organizations.
– Ability to work in-person in our DC office at least 2 days per week.
– Ability to work evenings and weekends if needed to respond to breaking news, and travel 1-2 times per year for team and/or all staff retreats.
– Per our non-partisan policy, Common Cause staff members may not currently be in elected office (or running for office); on the Steering Committee or Finance Committee for any political candidate; or affiliated with the leadership of a political party.

### Additional Information About This Role

– This position is classified as management and therefore not included in the union-represented collective bargaining unit.
– Common Cause is unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of an employment visa at this time; please note that if hired, you will be asked to produce documentation for authorization to work in the US.
– $175,000 – $225,000 a year. In order to ensure greater equity and transparency as an organization, Common Cause sets salary ranges consistently based on job responsibilities, and we determine salary for each staff member based on relevant years of experience (you can read more about our approach to compensation here, including where we offer geographical adjustments). For these reasons, we do not negotiate on our salary ranges or our specific salary offers.
– In addition to salary, we also offer a generous benefits package, including:
– A robust healthcare plan that covers 97% of employee’s medical care, 100% of employee’s vision and dental benefits, and 75% of family medical care and 100% of family vision and dental benefits.
– A 401k retirement savings plan, with Employer Match after 1 year of service.
– Generous Paid Time Off including 20 Days of Vacation and 10 observed Holidays per year, and additional days off for Thanksgiving and Winter break.
– Flexible spending accounts.
– Dependent Care and Pet Care Support when you travel for work.
– Funds for professional development.
– And more!

See more details here: [Common Cause Benefits](https://www.commoncause.org/our-benefits/).

Common Cause is an equal opportunity employer and welcomes applicants of any race, creed, color, religion, ethnicity, national origin, income class, political affiliation, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, disability, veteran status, or marital status, as well as applicants who have been previously incarcerated.

Common Cause (501(c)(4)) and Common Cause Education Fund (501(c)(3)) are nonpartisan, nonprofit grassroots affiliate organizations dedicated to upholding the core values of American democracy. We work to create open, honest, and accountable government that serves the public interest; promote equal rights, opportunity, and representation for all; and empower all people to make their voices heard in the political process.

Founded in 1970 and headquartered in Washington, DC, Common Cause has more than 1.5 million members and supporters living in every Congressional district in the United States, and offices in 25 states around the country.

Apply to this role via Lever: https://jobs.lever.co/commoncause/0efe4f56-edbb-4e0b-9d6b-405e05fab556?lever-origin=applied&lever-source%5B%5D=PAC