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Location: This is a fully remote, work from home position. Candidates may be based anywhere within NBRC’s territory (Maine, New Hampshire, New York & Vermont)

Position Title: Executive Director

Supervisor: 5-Member Commission Executive Leadership: Federal Co-Chairperson & Governor’s Representatives to the Commission from Maine, New Hampshire, New York, and Vermont

Travel Requirements: Periodic travel within the NBRC’s territory for stakeholder, staff, and Commission meetings, and periodic travel to Washington, DC for stakeholder meetings and Congressional visits.

Position Summary:

This position serves as the Executive Director for the Northern Border Regional Commission (NBRC), an 18-person Federal organization with a mission to catalyze community vitality and economic prosperity in the northern border region with flexible funding and strategic support. The NBRC is an economic development organization, and has undergone significant growth in the past six years, resulting in the addition of numerous grant programs deployed in each of the NBRC’s States. Additionally, the NBRC is a peer organization to multiple Commissions throughout the Country, the largest of which is the Appalachian Regional Commission.

The Executive Director is responsible for the administrative and fiscal management of the NBRC, and for ensuring that the organization’s structure, budget, and overall functions align with the organization’s strategic plan and executive branch initiatives within the region. The position oversees the NBRC’s programmatic, finance and administrative staff, and reports to the Federal Co-Chairperson, as well as to representatives from each of the four NBRC States. The ED, in collaboration with the Federal Co-Chairperson, also operates as a lead public face of the NBRC in the region.

The NBRC is a fully remote organization, and as such, the role may be based anywhere within a NBRC State (Maine, New Hampshire, New York, or Vermont), with periodic travel as noted in the Travel Requirements section above. The position is a full-time, non-political role.

Roles and Responsibilities:

The Executive Director should be able to shift subjects seamlessly throughout a given day or week, providing consistent leadership to NBRC team members on matters ranging from financial topics to program items, community investment data, compliance, and legal and statutory matters. Specific responsibilities include:

Finance

• Directly supervises the NBRC’s finance functions and is responsible for the NBRC’s internal financial controls.
• Leads the NBRC through the annual internal administrative budget process, and external Administration budget process, including coordination with various stakeholders to include U.S. Senate and U.S. House appropriations Committees, and the U.S. Office of Management & Budget (OMB).
• Coordinates NBRC decision making on allocations and deployment of appropriated funds.
• Oversees the NBRC’s financial reporting, ensuring that reports are robust enough to support decision making.

Administration

• Organizes, coordinates, plans, executes, and documents periodic NBRC Commission Meetings, to ensure that votes are appropriately scheduled and codified, and that the business of the NBRC is conducted in an efficient manner.
• Responds in a timely manner to technical assistance requests from the Federal Co-Chairperson and representatives of each NBRC State.
• Responsible for ensuring that NBRC milestones, such as budget submissions and the annual report, adhere to Statutory and stakeholder requirements.

Leadership

• Utilizes the principles and practices required to build and maintain high-functioning teams and will lead by example within an environment that fosters partnership, innovation and continuous process improvement.
• Manage, lead, and inspire in a fully remote working environment.
• Passion for understanding current economic development issues and trends within the northern border region, identifying potential solutions, and marshaling the resources and relationships necessary to prioritize and implement solutions.

Operations

• At a high level, the role is responsible for developing, maintaining, and if necessary, growing a staff to meet the mission of the NBRC and to successfully deploy new and existing programs.
• Prioritize and lead continuous improvement of existing internal procedures, identify gaps in procedures, and work collaboratively to develop solutions to ensure the efficient operation of the NBRC.
• Manage cross-functionally, spanning finance, human resources, communications, data collection, and compliance.

Skills and Experience:

The ideal candidate will possess at least 10 years of economic development experience, and will bring to the role relationships with economic development professionals in Northern New England, New York, and beyond.

Economic & Community Development

• Superior knowledge of community and economic development practices and principles – specifically the diverse range of potential projects, capital stacks associated with these projects, and capacity constraints – in rural areas, preferably in the northern border region.
• Knowledge of the role of Federal funding in community and economic development projects.
• Familiarity with the range of organizations that participate in community and economic development projects in rural areas, preferably in the northern border region.

Finance Skills

• Understanding of operational budgeting, both development and tracking and management.
• Understanding of financial flows and management of multiple sources of funding with varying constraints and compliance requirements.
• Strong understanding of internal financial controls, both development and management.
• Ability to develop a budget message for external audiences that articulates the priorities expressed in budget tables and appendices.

Administrative Skills

• Ability to articulate the organization’s needs and requirements, express these in financial and operational terms, and generate support for the resources needed to meet these needs.
• Ability to organize meetings of the NBRC’s leadership and identify key issues to be addressed in this venue.
• Superior organization and prioritization skills, necessary to meet multiple deadlines throughout the year that require input from multiple individuals.

Leadership & Management Skills

• Proven track record of successfully managing multiple individuals working across different business lines; intergenerational management experience a plus.
• Proven ability to support and maintain a positive organizational culture that focuses on continuous improvement, care for individuals, exceptional customer service, and is rooted in public service. Virtual / remote team management a plus.

Relationship Building

• Proven ability to build and maintain new and existing relationships with stakeholders both internally and externally.
• Experience working with Congressional Delegation Members and staff members and other Federal Agency staff and leadership.

Baseline Skills

• Superior communication abilities, including the ability to communicate with a diverse group of individuals.
• Flexibility and versatility: Provide rapid response to varying, often time-pressured assignments; possesses the agility to move quickly between complicated issues.
• Ability to synthesize voluminous materials, and to present ideas and recommendations clearly and effectively, both orally and in writing.
• Ability to organize and present complex analyses and issues to support decision-making.

This is a full-time role, defined as 40 hours/week. The hiring range for this role is $150,000 - $165,000/annually, depending on the skills and experiences of the successful candidate (for internal equity, NBRC cannot engage in salary negotiations outside of this range). This position is benefits-eligible, and the position is eligible for annual salary increases based on cost-of-living adjustments and merit.

To apply: Please submit a resume and cover letter to fedcochair@nbrc.gov. Please do not include photos or social media links with your application materials.

This job description is intended to provide general information about the position. It is not an employment contract and is not intended as a complete list of all job roles and responsibilities. The incumbent may be required to perform other roles and responsibilities. As with all positions, the responsibilities, roles, and requirements of this job may change. The organization, at its discretion, may alter this job description at any time with or without notice.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

The NBRC is an Equal Opportunity Employer. The NBRC does not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment on the basis of race, religion, color, sex, gender identity, gender expression, arrest record, sexual orientation, age, non-disqualifying physical or mental disability, national origin, veteran status or any other basis covered by appropriate law. All employment and personnel actions such as compensation, promotion, benefits, layoffs, or terminations are decided on the basis of qualifications, merit, and business need.