Deputy Director

The Black Organizing Project is reviving the spirit of Oakland’s Black community through relationship building, leadership development, political education, and policy-change.

Deputy Director Job Description

About the Black Organizing Project

The Black Organizing Project (BOP) is a Black member-led community organization working for racial, social, and economic justice through grassroots organizing and community-building in Oakland, California and across the Bay Area. In addition to caring for our community, BOP has adopted a more sustainable philosophy for our staff. BOP takes pride in caring for its staff by providing competitive salaries, 4-day work weeks, three paid company-wide seasonal rest periods each year, as well as other perks that promote a healthy work-life balance. While BOP currently observes a hybrid work model, we require all program staff to live within a one-hour driving distance from Oakland, CA.

Our vision is to build a strong bottom-up organization of Black people that will:

• Craft alternative models and institutions that will advance our vision of racial and economic justice
• Rebuild the spirit and foundation of our community
• Exercise political and economic power
• Act to win real systematic change
• Transform the lives of Black people
• Embody the spirit that has sustained the Black community

Organizational Culture

BOP is building toward a free and just world for Black people. Some of the expectations for staff conduct include active participation in building and sustaining a culture of radical care, equity for all members of the BOP team, joyful connection to Black Liberation, and thoughtful understanding of our political and historical experiences.

In service of this goal, staff are expected to:

• Participate in an organizational culture of resolving conflict through transformative justice strategies, as appropriate.
• Engage in generative and compassionate communication.
• Demonstrate a commitment to maintaining a joyful, healthy, and positive work environment.

About Our Ideal Candidate

Our ideal candidate is a mission- and values-aligned leader who brings deep expertise in organizing in Black communities, resource development, and providing effective organizational leadership. They are a creative, accountable, and relationship-oriented leader who can hold a sharp view of BOP’s priorities and progress. They possess the critical ability to identify strategic opportunities, craft elegant solutions, and motivate and support individual staff and teams to execute with joy, a learning-orientation, and rigor. Additionally, our ideal candidate needs to be able to passionately and persuasively communicate the vision and rally diverse internal and external stakeholders around the urgency of the work including staff, members, community partners, and funders.

Position Description and Functions

The Deputy Director is responsible for overseeing day-to-day internal operations, including: coordinating the activities of the Executive Leadership Team, ensuring strong alignment, communication, and cohesion across the organization towards effective and timely implementation of BOP’s goals. The Deputy Director will be part advisor, part gatekeeper, part problem solver, and part all-round strategic partner to develop strategy to meet organization goals and advance our mission. The role will have both internal and external facing responsibilities. The Deputy Director handles complex situations and multiple responsibilities simultaneously, while ensuring the completion of long-term projects. Deputy Director will be responsible for designing and implementing a range of organizational strategies to ensure that BOP is working to fulfill its mission. This is a leadership position in the organization that serves on the Executive Leadership Team and reports directly to the Executive Director.

Management & Operations

• Partner with the Executive Leadership Team, facilitating meetings and providing strategic counsel on programmatic, administrative, human resources, and budgetary matters
• Collaborate with the Executive Director on board relations, and support the ED with key external partnerships as needed
• Lead organizational development initiatives, including internal planning, assessment, and evaluation (e.g., 360 reviews) to enhance organizational effectiveness and strategic impact, and oversee organizational strengthening projects
• Design and oversee implementation of organizational systems and protocols to facilitate optimal organizational development, performance, and sustainability
• Supervise Lead Staff and organizing staff, as needed
• Manage organizational consultants
• Develop and provide standardized training, coaching, and oversight to ensure: timely execution of key org-wide related deliverables, such as departmental work plans and budgets; a shared understanding of and accountability to organizational standards and expectations; and fidelity to policies and protocols
• Provide budget support to program leads and Executive Director
• Support with Development work as needed

Organizational Culture, Learning, & Talent Management

• Lead staff recruitment and retention via strategies and initiatives that build ladders for advancement, sustain high staff morale, and foster a healthy, political and value centered organizational culture
• Lead staff development and leadership learning by designing effective staff-wide training, building coaching and/or mentoring programs, support staff with all professional development opportunities
• Support supervisors to ensure strong individual staff development plans for their direct reports
• Support healthy conflict resolution and communication skills
• Mediate and support resolution of conflicts between staff members using a holistic, transformative justice model
• Cultivate a joyful and connected work environment, via creative virtual and in-person discussions and activities
• Strengthen team collaboration, cohesion, and performance through optimizing systems and organizational practices that fully engage staff members in learning, innovation, and cross-team collaboration – includes but not limited to coordination of staff meetings & retreats
• Support effective cross-departmental communication by designing systems and schedules that foster effective connection, facilitate key joint departmental meetings, and support strong alignment and integration of departmental work plans, calendars, and strategies
• Support Organizing Team strategy and direction by attending team meetings

Special Projects

• Oversee special projects, such as organizational events, retreats, etc.
• Additional responsibilities may be assigned by Executive Director

Preferred Skills and Qualifications

• A minimum of 7 years of organizational development and/or management experience in the nonprofit sector
• At least 2 years of experience in grassroots community organizing
• Certification in leadership coaching and a variety of emotional intelligence, team building, and leadership assessments is preferred
• Excellence in organizational management and facilitative leadership with the ability to coach senior-level staff to manage and develop high-performance teams and develop and implement programmatic strategies
• An analytic and decisive decision maker with the ability to prioritize and communicate key objectives and tactics necessary to achieve organizational goals
• Experience being an executive or other higher-level organizational leader or being on a team with Executive leaders
• Experience leading organizational transformation and culture change projects
• Ability to build and use metrics to gain buy-in for critical initiatives; can also create relevant dashboards, frameworks and tools to be shared with senior leaders to aid in decision-making
• Strong analytics and business acumen required
• Can think creatively and engage others to think outside the box on leadership development and organization-wide innovation
• Ability to build relationships at all levels, particularly at the senior leadership level
• Strong ability to read and understand financials and to provide insights on fiscal strategies
• Unwavering commitment to excellence and data-driven organizational and programmatic evaluation
• Strong written and verbal communication skills
• Action-oriented, entrepreneurial, highly adaptive and innovative and able to hold and effectively manage organizational complexity
• A systems thinker operating with the highest integrity, emotional intelligence, and positive mindset, and who is mission-driven and self-directed
• Impeccable judgment and discretion in dealing with sensitive information
• Experience with community organizing required
• Proficiency in Microsoft Office Suite, Google Workspace, and PowerBase are a plus
• Having deep roots in Oakland, graduating from an Oakland Unified School District or having a child enrolled in Oakland Unified Schools District is a PLUS
• Valid driver's license, insurance, and reliable transportation required
• All positions at BOP are expected to contribute to our campaign work as needed and as directed by staff supervisors and/or Executive Director

Conditions and Compensation

This is a full-time, exempt, at-will position with a 90-day probationary period. Background check is required for all positions at BOP. For positions working directly with children fingerprinting will be required as well upon job offer.

Salary: $132,000-$152,000 (depending on experience), plus a 32 hour FTE work week, incredible co-workers, inspiring work and more.

BOP offers a generous benefits package to all regular full-time employees that includes:

• 100% organization paid medical, dental, vision coverage for the employee and family
• 401(k) with employer matching
• Accrue 14 vacation days in the first year with incremental increases thereafter, 7 sick days annually, 16 paid holidays, 2 unrestricted floating holidays
• 3 paid seasonal closures: 1 week long break in spring, 1 week long break in summer, and 1 in winter between Christmas, and New Year’s Day
• Eligibility for fully paid 3-week sabbatical program after five years of full time service with the organization
• Professional development funds