Managing Director of Programs

Overview & Benefits

***We are currently in the interview process for this role. New application submissions may not be reviewed.***

Students are at the core of Bottom Line. Every day, we are energized by their drive, potential, and passion. We know that the success of our students will create a ripple effect in our communities.

Bottom Line is bridging the divide of educational inequity by providing a trusted advisor and the social capital necessary for our students to earn their bachelor’s degree, build financial stability, and successfully launch thriving careers. We primarily focus on students of color who will be in the first generation of their family to earn a college degree, are from low-income backgrounds, and are academically prepared for college.

For more than two decades, Bottom Line has been fighting for educational equity by ensuring that the right to a quality college education is accessible to those whose potential and drive exceed their opportunity. For first-generation degree-aspiring students from low-income backgrounds who face systemic barriers, Bottom Line’s advisors are a relentless ally who partner with them to find the right college, persist to a degree, and successfully launch a career.

As one of the first college support organizations to focus on college completion, Bottom Line now produces best-in-class college graduation rates that reduce the significant gap between first-generation students from low-income backgrounds and their wealthier peers. We operate regional programs in Massachusetts, New York City, and Chicago that collectively serve over 7,000 students.

When you join Bottom Line, you will find an organization that lives into its core values. We are committed to building strong, impactful relationships with our students, co-workers, schools, community partners, donors, and other supporters. We are engaging, responsive, caring, direct, honest, solutions-oriented, and we always follow through on our promises. We act with empathy and extend grace to ourselves and each other. We pursue ambitious goals, hold ourselves to high standards, make data-informed decisions, and orient to long-term success for our students and our organization. We operate with curiosity, evolve thoughtfully, take informed risks, and learn from successes, setbacks, and each other. Experts in our field, we are driven by our mission and motivated by the impact we’re achieving.

At Bottom Line, we have a strong commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. We aim to attract diverse candidate pools who hold these same values, and are ready to help us along our journey toward greater equity and inclusion. 

For more information about who we are, please review our Core Values and Careers Page. 

Overview:

The Managing Director of Programs (MDP) plays a crucial leadership role to ensure Bottom Line’s New York Region continues to provide its students with impactful programming in college access, college completion, and career readiness in alignment with our vision – to create a far-reaching ripple effect, launched by the transformative power of a college degree and a mobilizing first career, that will uplift individuals, families, and entire communities..   

With the support of a deeply committed program team, the MDP is ultimately responsible for program outcomes in the NY region. The ideal candidate is student-centric while being data savvy. In other words, they are able to see trends and use data to pinpoint places for program enhancement but ultimately understand that our data and key performance indicators translate to actual students and every student’s experience matters. They derive fulfillment from coaching staff to achieve beyond what they think is possible.  This role is all about developing others in support of their growth, specifically related to Bottom Line’s Core Competencies as well as key job functions. They view feedback as a gift and love to give and receive that gift. Their personal values align with the organization’s values. They understand that effort should lead to results\ and if it doesn’t, we need to re-examine how we are doing things.  

The ideal candidate is self-aware about the intersection of their personal identity, power, and privilege. Although Bottom Line is at the beginning of its journey towards becoming an anti-racist organization, the candidate is committed to providing leadership through the process (even if they have not worked in an anti-racist organization before). 

Reporting to the Executive Director, the Managing Director of Programs will work closely with the regional leadership team, regional program directors, and program leadership from the National team.   

This role has five key areas of focus: 

Coaching & Supporting Program Leaders – 25% 

Ensuring High-Quality, Student-Centered Program Delivery– 25%

Deepening Relationships with Target Colleges and other Partners – 20% 

Build Strong Culture across NY Region – 20% 

Collaborating across the Organization for On-going Program Evolution – 10% 

Responsibilities

 Primary Responsibilities: 

Coaching & Supporting Program Leaders – 25% 

• Support program leadership in implementing Bottom Line’s program model in pursuit of strong student experience and outcomes 

• Build a program team culture around data accountability that is grounded in anti-racist principles and inclusive of both qualitative and quantitative measures  
• Use Bottom Line’s tools and processes to model effective performance management with intentional, data-driven goal-setting; strong and consistent developmental feedback and coaching; and timely and fair evaluations/reviews  
• Coach Managers and Directors through performance and employee relations issues as they arise, in line with legal guidelines, best practices, and Bottom Line policies  
• Build/maintain program team diversity that represents the student population Bottom Line serves (predominantly Black and Brown students, from low-income communities, and/or first in their family to graduate from college) at every level 
• Ensure meaningful student perspective/input in all aspects of program delivery  

• Model agility; specifically, the ability to adapt to new information or changing context while remaining laser-focused on program and organizational outcomes 
• Ensure direct service program staff receive a thoughtful and frequent schedule of training and professional development to enhance and deepen technical advising skills, Bottom Line competencies, and self and social awareness around intersectionality and in alignment with the organization’s foundations 
• In collaboration with all regional leaders ensure performance is calibrated annually for equity across title bands 
• Build a culture of observation, increasing the frequency by which all staff spend time observing and providing feedback in team meetings, 1:1 meetings, student meetings, etc.  
• Support the selection, training, development, and retention of new managers and be responsible for the selection, training, development, and retention of Program Directors 

• Build a leadership pipeline for the future - for the MDP, regional program director and team manager positions 

Ensuring High-Quality, Student-Centered Program Delivery– 25% 

• Drive high-priority, strategic programmatic initiatives and special projects including the direct management of program pilots or model adaptations 
• Serve as a critical thought partner in the region’s initial career connections efforts and ensure buy-in across all program areas, especially Success  

• Collaborate with the development team to increase the number of student touch points with volunteer professionals 
• Build strategies to ensure an equity-based incoming class that recognizes student populations with most historical barriers to degree attainment (i.e. young men of color).  Further, ensure that critical recruitment and student service goals are achieved in a timely and efficient manner there is a particular focus on recruiting young men of color  
• Ensure data transparency, build data fluency, and strengthen accountability toward data as a means of meeting Bottom Line’s mission and vision 
• Build processes and protocols to ensure regular, honest feedback loops on programmatic outcomes; particularly when targets and goals are not met so that learning can be incorporated for future endeavors 
• Enhance program knowledge and information sharing across program teams to build understanding and opportunities for cross-collaboration. Support program teams in understanding each program’s goals and current trends to ensure successful student progression through our program 

• Bring a learning lens to program challenges – encourage teams to try new strategies to increase impact firstly and then efficiency.  Bring a bull horn to successes elevating strategies that prove effective for the entire organization and sector to learn from 

Deepening Relationships with Target Colleges and other Partners – 20% 

• Establish a Target College relationship strategy to explore collaborations that could lead to improved student experience and increased campus-specific outcomes  
• Play a critical role in developing/maintaining relationships with external stakeholders, including target colleges and universities, public school leadership, revenue-based partnership, and community based organizations.  
• Meet the revenue goal for the fee-for-service partnerships pipeline (FY23 = $150,000) 

• Fuel sustainability of the fee-for-service partnerships pipeline for future years by creating a strong partner experience for current paying partners and identifying and cultivating prospective future relationships 
• Oversee all programmatic relationships including those tied to student recruitment and those tied to ongoing student support 
• Serve as a spokesperson with external stakeholders, donors, and partners, in both one-on-one and public speaking formats
• Work in concert with the NYC DOE to deepen and expand access of Bottom Line services to all eligible HS students; support the Access Program Director in building and overseeing the effectiveness of placed-based services at select high schools  

Build Strong Culture across NY Region – 20% 

• As part of the Bottom Line management team, advise the regional leadership team, help to shape critical organizational decisions, and work to support organization wide communications and investment in decisions 
• Actively contribute to building/maintaining an organizational culture in line with our foundations, specifically our Core Values and Commitments to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion  
• Model and actively support the building of a strong inclusive culture that ensures all team members feel a sense of belonging 
• Champion and firmly establish among program staff an understanding of the vital importance of philanthropy to our mission  
• Serve as an organizational role model in delivering direct and actionable feedback 

Collaborating across the Organization for On-going Program Evolution – 10% 

• Act as the primary point of contact with the National Program Team in order to maintain regional site’s adherence to national standards and programmatic baselines 
• Collaborate with the national program and HR teams to plan the training and onboarding for new advisors, managers, and directors 
• As much as possible, ensure staff (especially advisors) and student voices are included in key program decision making  
• Serve as a program leader across the organization.  Consistently contribute to the community of MDP peers 

• Participate in organizational leadership convenings, retreats and working committees as determined in discussion with the executive director. Duties, responsibilities and activities may change at any time with or without advanced notice. 

Qualifications

Education, Experience & Qualifications: 

Required: 

• Bachelor’s degree and work authorization 
• Demonstrated commitment to Bottom Line’s mission, vision, and core values 
• 8 – 10 years of program and/or staff management experience  
• Proven ability to use metrics to drive decisions and achieve strategic objectives 

• Participated in anti-racist training/workshops (i.e. People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond) and/or conducted meaningful self-study and is comfortable engaging in conversations around the intersections of power, privilege and identity 
• Experience providing adult learning experiences 
• Have hands-on program management experience, and a track record of effectively leading a performance-based and outcomes-based program and staff 
• Experience in building continuous improvement feedback loops  
• At ease with ambiguity, viewing it as an opportunity to learn and seek new solutions 

• Unwavering commitment to the students Bottom Line serves 
• Approaching mastery in Bottom Line's seven core competencies: Relationships, Results, Communication, Inclusiveness, Talent Development, Agility, and Planning, including, but not limited to: 

• Experience building and leading effective teams 
• Excellent interpersonal skills  
• Demonstrated ability to set and meet strategic objectives 

• Excellence in organizational skills and project management 
• Ability to work effectively in collaboration with diverse groups of people 
• Integrity, positive attitude, and solid judgment  
• Self-directed 
• A team player, who can interrelate and operate effectively with peers and other associates within a collegial, yet demanding, work environment 

Preferred: 

• Master’s degree in a relevant field  
• Expertise in youth engagement and leadership 
• Experience in college access, college completion and/or workforce readiness 

Competencies: 

All employees are expected to demonstrate continued growth within our seven core competencies. 

Competencies provide Bottom Line with a way to define, in behavioral terms, what it is that people need to do to produce the results that the organization desires, in a way that is in keeping with its culture.  Bottom Line defines a competency as a cluster of related knowledge, skills and attitudes that affects a major part of one’s job that correlates with performance on the job, that can be measured against well-accepted standards, and that can be improved via training and development.  

• Relationships  

• Fosters an environment where direct and indirect reports are able to voice their concerns or ideas without fear of criticism, ridicule, or retaliation 

• Results  

• Uses data to measure outcomes and inform future plans and goals 

• Communication  

• Recognizes and resolves controversy/conflict before it creates an adverse effect on the team 

• Inclusiveness  

• Creates and maintains an environment that respects and values the identities and cultures of all colleagues and students we serve 

• Talent Development  

• Actively contributes to the hiring, development, retention, and promotion of a highly effective team 

• Agility  

• Demonstrates adaptability and openness to shifting priorities, needs of stakeholders, and organizational changes 

• Planning  

• Effectively and efficiently uses resources (people, time, materials) in order to create, meet, and assess both strategic and task-oriented goals 

Salary : $150,000 - $0