Assistant Director of Research & Writing

Position description

The mission of the Harvard Kennedy School Government Performance Lab is to accelerate progress on difficult social problems by improving how state and local governments across the country function. Our team collaborates closely with government innovators in developing and testing ways to create more just and effective service systems in areas including child and family wellbeing, public safety and justice, and homelessness and housing. To date, the GPL has engaged with 100 jurisdictions across 38 states and has conducted more than 278 projects shifting more than $6.2B in government spending towards results.

Duties

Summary: 

This Assistant Director’s primary portfolio will be leading the Government Performance Lab’s (GPL) Research & Writing team. The Assistant Director will report directly to the GPL’s Executive Director, lead the organization’s research and writing strategy, and work closely with the GPL’s senior leadership to develop and distribute products capturing key insights, evidence, and lessons learned from GPL projects in the field, spread them to state and local government leaders across the country, and elevate the role of the GPL as a thought leader. Research and communications are critical to the GPL’s ability to identify promising practices and insights generated through intensive projects in the field and to clearly and persuasively communicate them to state and local government policymakers and practitioners. 

The Assistant Director will manage Research & Writing staff and oversee the content creation process. This includes collaborating with GPL staff to identify and write about lessons learned from our on-the-ground projects and producing written materials (including policy briefs, case studies, technical training materials, website content, and blog posts), and serving as the GPL’s managing editor. They will also assist with the distribution of GPL content via press releases, media pitches, and social media, working to increase the visibility and usefulness of our written materials to the public. Examples of recent Research & Writing-supported projects include publication and tools on translating kin-first commitments into practice; a report on developing community-informed public safety indicators; and a brief detailing promising practices for supporting the homelessness response workforce through coaching and training. 

Key responsibilities of this role include: 

Manage the Research & Writing Team – Lead a team of Research & Writing staff by driving and adapting team strategy, setting annual goals, and measuring impact. Create management relationships in which team members produce high impact work and feel supported, included, and valued, including by responding to mistakes, risk-taking, and creativity in ways that build psychological safety and enhance learning. Create clear and insightful content – Manage a team and collaborate with GPL staff across the country to produce content that captures key insights, evidence, and lessons learned from the GPL’s projects. This may include both original content (long-form pieces, case studies, technical guides, policy briefs, interviews with government leaders) and derivative content (syntheses of insights across projects, blog posts, and guides to existing resources). 

The Assistant Director may directly craft the content, manage the GPL Research & Writing staff to produce it, and/or may manage a collaborative production process involving other GPL staff. Identify and engage target audiences – Work collaboratively with policy areas to determine key audiences, such as state and local government policymakers, other practitioners, and policy area thought leaders, and develop strategies to reach these audiences. These efforts may include developing and managing new collaborations with professional organizations and other conveners, creating and curating outreach lists of key audience members, working closely with senior GPL staff to facilitate individual outreach, creating curated sets of existing GPL resources for target audiences, recruiting governments for participation in GPL trainings and other light-touch technical assistance offerings, and responding to requests for information from government leaders. 

Additionally, the Assistant Director may work with the Taubman Center Director of Communications to respond to media inquiries and requests. Distribute content to target audiences – Collaborate with policy areas to distribute content to target audiences and improve the visibility of the GPL to policy and practitioner audiences. These efforts may include regularly updating the GPL’s website, creating content for GPL newsletters, placing pieces in publications, securing presentation or speaking invitations at conferences, submitting pitches to media outlets, and managing social media accounts. Maintain communications supports and resources – Work independently and with the Taubman Center Director of Communications and the Harvard Kennedy School communications office to develop and maintain communications resources and supports, including a digital asset library (e.g., photos, videos, logos), content library, news coverage alerts, GPL style guide, key GPL presentations, and templates for common written products. Supporting enterprise communications and projects – Deliver writing and editing support on grant proposals/reports, internal strategy documents, and other materials advancing GPL operational goals. This may also include leading ad hoc projects on topics related to impact measurement, enterprise technology, and more.

Qualifications

Required Qualifications: 

– Bachelor’s degree and at least 2 years of related work experience, including research, writing, public policy, editing, or communications 

– Excellent writing and editing skills, including the ability to consistently and independently produce compelling well-written, and error-free work products with only light-touch guidance – Ability to communicate complex ideas clearly, efficiently, and with humility both verbally and in writing 

– Strong project management capabilities, with a demonstrated ability to independently manage projects to completion, establish priorities among multiple simultaneous deadlines, and sustain timely responses to deadlines and requests 

– Capacity and willingness to both manage an organization-wide strategy for translational research and/or communications, and to undertake day-to-day implementation 

– Demonstrated ability to manage and coach direct reports 

Preferred Qualifications: 

Many kinds of experiences could prepare an individual to thrive in this role. We expect candidates to have many, but not necessarily all the qualifications listed below: 

– Graduate degree in law, public policy, writing, communications, or related fields 

– 5 years of work experience 

– Experience managing online media, including websites and social media accounts 

– Strong research and research translation or knowledge management skills 

– Ability to identify core concepts and insights and synthesize them into clear, plain language descriptions 

– Experience directly managing communications or research dissemination projects 

– Experience assigning and overseeing a high volume of projects simultaneously

– Familiarity with state and local government or public policy 

– Team player with proven ability to build strong relationships and develop trust with colleagues 

-High level of competency with software applications including word processing and collaborative tools such as Microsoft OneDrive and project management software like Asana

Application instructions

Please be sure to indicate you saw this position on jobs-near-me.org