Punch Up Lead Organizer

Position Title: Punch Up Lead Organizer

Tier / Category: Tier 4 / Organizer IV

Reports to: Clay Smith, Grassroots Organizing Director

Employment Status: Permanent, Full-Time

FLSA: Exempt

Location: Remote

NLRA: Bargaining Unit Member

About SURJ: Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ) is a national organization that brings white people into fights for racial and economic justice. We work to build a white flank of multiracial majorities fighting for the things all communities need. We organize white people by engaging their shared interest - what they stand to gain by joining alongside people of color. We do this through 150+ local chapters across the US and Canada, a National Membership base, and local base building projects in the South.

About the Punch Up project: Punch Up launched in October 2024 with the mission of building a home for poor and working white men from across the country to join in the work of freedom and justice for all. Project members and supporters pledge not to blame ourselves or other everyday people for the challenges we face and to instead direct our anger at the billionaires and multimillionaires who use their wealth, power, and influence to keep the rest of us down. The Project is building a positive masculine culture, broadcasting a new story of poor and working white men’s dignity and grit, and fighting for justice alongside everyone else getting ripped off by those at the top.

Role Description: This position is the staff anchor and lead organizer for Punch Up, an organizing project recently integrated into SURJ that has an existing core of 16 member-leaders. The Punch Up Lead Organizer will build out the Punch Up organizing project by guiding and supporting the Punch Up member-leaders in identifying issues that resonate with their target base of poor and working white men, designing organizing and narrative campaigns, and building a powerful membership base through strong recruitment, absorption, and leadership development tactics. The Punch Up Lead Organizer will work collaboratively across the SURJ team (including Communications, National Organizing, Grassroots Organizing, Development, and others) to ensure the work of Punch Up is in alignment with SURJ’s organizing of other bases.

PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITIES — Essential duties and responsibilities may change with the development of this new project. Initial responsibilities may include, but are not limited to the following:

Priority 1: Clarify & implement a clear Grassroots/ Distributed Organizing Strategy (20%)

• Develop and practice a model for recruitment and base building, leadership development, campaigns and power building using community organizing and distributed organizing approaches.

Priority 2: Develop and implement a clear Narrative Change Strategy (20%)

• Develop and practice a model for recruitment and base building, leadership development, and campaigns and power building through narrative strategy.

Priority 3: Combine and implement these in an Integrated Organizing Framework (45%)

• Articulate, with members, a theory of change and long-range and mid-range goals.
• In coordination with the Grassroots Organizing Director, make proposals, set goals, and drive decisions about issues, campaigns, and tactics.
• Ensure Punch Up is making steady and measurable progress on these goals, and use advanced organizing and leadership knowledge to troubleshoot issues and adapt strategies and tactics.
• Act as a bridge between SURJ staff and Punch Up member-leaders by bringing Punch Up member perspectives and interests into staff spaces and connecting Punch Up members with SURJ’s strategy and larger campaigns.
• Work to ensure the member-leaders, members, supporters, and volunteers are effectively managed and supported.
• Create a blueprint for Punch Up to scale.
• Manage Punch Up project budget.
• This position holds Peer Leader designation, meaning if additional staff are hired within the program, this position could guide them as a non-supervisory Peer Leader, including assigning work, supporting, mentoring, and cultivating the person’s leadership, and giving consistent feedback.

Priority 4: Support movement building (15%)

• With the Grassroots Organizing Director, maintain and deepen relationships with movement partners who are working to build the base of white men engaged in economic and racial justice work.
• Attend and represent SURJ at national movement gatherings, including bringing and supporting members to attend when it’s strategic.

POSITION REQUIREMENTS

QUALIFICATIONS:

• Minimum of 5 years as an organizer.
• Significant experience in base building, campaign planning, leadership and political development, and movement work.
• Some experience supervising or overseeing the work of others.
• Experience successfully managing members.
• Experience holding the big picture of an organizing campaign with very little external guidance.
• Experience working with and organizing white poor and working class men.
• SURJ policy requires all employees to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19, subject to reasonable accommodation under federal, state, and local law. Accommodations may be not possible for positions that require in-person contact with other staff or members of the public.

KNOWLEDGE:

• Experience running an integrated program that balances leadership development, campaign strategy, and winning change.
• Demonstrated ability to integrate political analysis in program’s strategies and tactics.
• Experience with data management and tools for campaigns including EveryAction or similar database preferred, VAN, and virtual phone bank systems and dialers.
• Experience organizing volunteers and members on issues of racial and economic justice.
• Understanding of SURJ’s work and theory of change.
• Commitment to racial, gender and economic justice and their intersections, both inside and outside organizations.

SKILLS:

• Solid time management skills, attention to detail, and ability to manage multiple projects at the same time.
• Planning effective meetings and strong facilitation skills.
• Proven skills in leadership development, especially integrating political analysis and concrete organizing skills.
• Skilled in utilizing advanced knowledge to anticipate issues and respond to critical issues in a way that aligns with the organization’s values and furthers the goals and objectives of the organization with minimal supervision.
• Excellent relational and verbal communication skills.
• Flexible: open to new ways of doing things and experimentation.
• Reliable: follows through on what they said they are going to do.
• Commitment to SURJ’s strategy and approach to anti-racist work.

ABILITIES:

• Demonstrated track record of organizing and leading in successful multiracial coalitions.
• Ability to develop leaders and programs remotely.
• Ability to direct the work of volunteers and members.
• Ability to manage multiple projects.
• Ability to adapt, plan, troubleshoot, and use organizing and professional concepts to resolve issues with minimal supervision.
• Demonstrates ability to be self reflective, prioritize work, and delegate tasks.
• Demonstrated ability to work both independently and as part of a team.
• Ability to build trust and work with a wide range of individuals and personalities, and to establish and maintain effective working relationships.
• Ability to work in a cross-class environment while also holding a strong class politics that centers poor and working people.
• Ability to give and receive direct constructive feedback.