Community Power Network seeks Membership and Marketing Director

Update: This position has been filled

Community Power Network started as a small group of neighbors working together to get solar at a discount. Over the past nine years we have grown and developed a unique grassroots model that helps people go solar, join together, and fight for their energy rights. We use solar co-ops (group purchasing) to jump-start and grow local solar markets while building a vibrant new constituency for clean energy at the state and local level.

Having built an effective organization around this theory of change, we are now preparing to scale this work and add a paid solar membership component to allow our organization to expand to represent the interests of all solar homeowners. Members will receive a suite of benefits and will become part of a functional organizing model with a broad and diverse membership with real grassroots power to influence energy policy across the country. We are seeking a Membership and Marketing Director who will lead this initiative and integrate membership offerings into our existing programmatic work. Please find a description for the position below. If you would like to apply, send a resume and cover letter to https://www.solarunitedneighbors.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/nancy-HOA-1.jpg, Chief of Staff, at jobs@solarunitedneighbors.org.

Vision and Values

Our theory of change is to use going solar as a tool to attract and engage a new and different breed of clean energy activists. We have found that solar is wildly popular with rural, urban, conservative, and progressive people and polls with over 92% support nationally. Solar attracts people for a variety of reasons, from climate change to self-sufficiency, energy independence to the simple fact that most Americans have little affection for their utility company. People get involved via tangible solar projects as a practical entry point into the clean energy movement. We then bring them along to become clean energy advocates, strengthening the clean energy movement with a broad base of solar supporters.

The Role of the Membership and Marketing Director

CPN seeks to bring on an experienced Director of Membership and Marketing to help us develop and deploy a compelling membership offering that builds on our existing programs. The Director will have extensive (5-10 years) serving as a Membership Director for an existing large-scale membership organization and will bring the necessary expertise to help us set up and test membership offerings quickly and effectively. They will be responsible for overseeing the development of a new branding exercise, and the development of our membership acquisition strategy. They will oversee the development and testing of our membership offerings, collateral, and web infrastructure, and will provide key strategic guidance to CPN as we develop organizational expertise in these areas. Over time they will direct and manage a dedicated Membership staff, including overseeing integration with on-the-ground grassroots co-op work and policy advocacy.

This is a huge opportunity for someone with experience leading a membership organization. You will have the chance to take your expertise and experience and help us establish a brand new membership department. You’ll then work to scale up the department, eventually helping CPN become a self-funding organization with profound influence over clean energy politics. You will help find, recruit, organize and mobilize a vast new constituency of solar homeowners.

The Marketing and Membership Director, in concert with and under the direct supervision of the Executive Director, will oversee the Membership and Marketing departments of the organization. They will quickly build the department over the next five years.

Key Challenges and Expectations of the Position

• The Director will be responsible for quickly learning about the existing organizational offerings and how to integrate membership offerings to support and amplify the existing work of our programs. The Director will then, at an early stage in their tenure, begin leading the process of establishing, testing, refining and deploying membership offerings. We have already laid the groundwork for identifying these offerings and are now in need of someone who can lead a process of deploying, testing, refining, and scaling.

• The Director will spearhead the process of crafting a strong membership brand and marketing platform. They will guide us in developing strong, compelling branding for the membership program and the marketing platform and relationships to roll out this brand. They will also support a culture of continuous growth in market share, membership growth, and deepening member relationships.

• The Director will be expected to be a full partner in establishing organizational vision and programmatic implementation strategies. They will also be expected to represent the organization in a variety of venues at the request of the ED. This will require experience in planning and executing major programmatic strategies, the ability to articulate the mission and vision of the organization in a compelling manner and strong, persuasive presentation skills.

• A close and effective working partnership with the Executive Director and Executive Leadership Team is key to the success of this position. Regular meetings, consultation, substantive information-sharing, as well as the ability to reach consensus on roles, direction, desired outcomes, benchmarks, and timing are essential. This will require outstanding communication skills – oral and written, active and accurate listening skills, demonstrated experience in effective collaboration and teamwork, and the ability to develop and agree upon meaningful measures of success.

• The Director will share in a critical focus on efficient resource utilization, budget monitoring, ensuring appropriate financial and budget controls, reviewing resource allocation in light of strategic goals, and outcomes and identifying opportunities to attract or leverage resources.

• As requested and appropriate the Director will be responsible for providing accurate, timely reports to the Board, funders, investors, and other key audiences.

Ideal Candidate

The ideal candidate will possess the following professional experiences and personal attributes:

• Experience with Membership Organizations: Experience working at a previous membership organization is essential. We will rely on the Membership and Marketing Director to provide guidance and expertise based on their previous work with membership organizations. That includes bringing knowledge on the types of technological infrastructure to implement, experience developing and implementing effective membership recruitment campaigns, and knowledge of the challenges inherent in launching a membership initiative. Ideally, the experience is based across multiple industries coupled with deep market, consumer and competitive insights. Experience with business models relying on annual subscribing and renewal cycles is preferred.

• Staff Management: Extensive, successful experience managing and motivating diverse, entrepreneurial staff is critical to the success of this position. The Director must have the ability to balance competing demands and demonstrated skill in establishing measurable goals and holding staff accountable. A non-autocratic, inclusive manager who is able to elicit the best efforts of staff supervised is ideal. The successful candidate will be described as an effective, motivational listener and communicator who can inspire and energize staff, foster internal learning and collaboration, hold people accountable and employ exceptional judgment to make timely, sensible decisions. The Director will be responsible for successfully leading people through change, both as direct reports and across the organization

• Experience Scaling the Organization: The Membership and Marketing Director will need to be able to implement systems that will quickly scale over the next five years. Our goal is to become a 1 million-member organization by 2022, which will require strategic planning in order to ensure our infrastructure and organizational systems can scale to meet this need. Experience taking an organization through the growth process will be highly valued, as will a systems thinking approach to problem solving (i.e. we need to be planning not only for the next challenges, but heading off issues down the road).

• Comfort With an Evolving Process: The next few years will be a huge undertaking as an organization. It will also be extremely exciting and innovative. The Director will need to be really comfortable with growth and managing uncertainty as we establish the membership infrastructure. This will not the type of organization where the Director arrives to an already established membership department where they are expected to continue implementing an existing process. We’re looking for someone who will come and work with us to establish the department, and then lead it. That means being really comfortable with “building the airplane while flying it”.

• Organizational Skills: The Director must have demonstrated, successful management experience in a growth dynamic, including the ability to understand and effectively manage organizational dynamics, diverse disciplines, and complexity. We will look to the Director to be able define and allocate tasks and resources for maximum impact, as well as use their problem-solving skills and ability to adapt quickly to new contexts and activities.

• Flexibility and Willingness to Experiment: Developing a paid membership offering is a new area of work for CPN. As an organization we operate via a “Design/Do” process, where we are constantly developing new initiatives, testing their efficacy, refining, and then deploying again. The Director will be in the thick of this process as we launch our membership offerings and must be extremely comfortable with guiding the evolution of the process in a way that allows us to learn and quickly refine our offerings.

• Communication: We are seeking a candidate with exceptionally effective and persuasive interpersonal communication and presentation skills (both written and verbal), a strong bias toward the use of technology, and someone who is a consensus builder with the ability to articulate strategic goals and vision as well as practical detail.

The entire organization will welcome a candidate with energy and stamina and a warm, friendly and responsive demeanor who is able to address the challenges of an increasingly complex organization.

TO APPLY

Please send a cover letter and resume to https://www.solarunitedneighbors.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/nancy-HOA-1.jpg, Chief of Staff, at jobs@solarunitedneighbors.org. Submissions will be accepted until April 10, 2017, but applicants are encouraged to apply sooner. We are actively looking to fill the position.