Job Details

YWCA Kalamazoo is on a Mission!

 At YWCA Kalamazoo, we look for people who want to make a difference and do something that MATTERS. YWCA Kalamazoo is your ally who is on a mission to eliminate racism, empower women, stand up for social justice, help families, and strengthen communities. When you work for YWCA Kalamazoo, you become part of a worldwide movement: eliminating racism and empowering women.

Simply put, YWCA Kalamazoo draws together members who strive to create opportunities for women’s growth, leadership, and power to attain a common vision of peace, justice, freedom and dignity for all people.

Our employee-centric philosophies focus on taking care of you and promoting a healthy work-life balance. We offer a benefits package tailored with YOU in mind!

 WHAT YOU’LL DO:

PRIMARY FUNCTION:  The Senior Director of Research, Evaluation, and Program Development is a strategic executive leader. This position serves as an inspiring thought partner, supporting YW programs to integrate research and evaluation into practice, and supporting the sector to benefit from the YW’s findings.

 QUALIFICATIONS:

• Masters in social work or related field required, including applied research, OR PhD strongly preferred in social work, early childhood, public health or related field 
• Experience bridging the research-practice divide through implementation science and practice
• 10+ years of developing and executing social service programs
• Personal or professional experience related to at least one of the agency’s service pillars
• Demonstrated experience in all of the following: designing and executing impact evaluations; strategic planning; personnel supervision and growth; conducting needs assessments; facilitating research partnerships; leading direct service teams

 KEY SKILLS:

• Expertise in implementation science and practice
• Strategic planning and innovation
• Curiosity, humility, boldness, creativity, connectedness
• Strong group facilitation, including personnel and community members
• Tool, research, and EBP/best practice identification and development
• Strengths-based personnel development, including for highly credentialed teams
• Commitment to anti-racist, feminist perspectives in social work
• Bilingual Spanish/English candidates encouraged to apply

 The following statements are intended to describe the general nature and level of work being performed. They are not intended to be construed as an exhaustive list of all responsibilities, duties and skills required.

RESPONSIBILITIES:

1. Centers anti-racism, feminism, and trauma-responsive leadership in all activities, including in leadership, partnership, and research.
2. Consults on research design and implementation, including development and direct facilitation of groups, interviews, and surveys when necessary
3. Collaboratively develops, manages, and forecasts departmental budget
4. Serves as the principal writer for research funding opportunities
5. Manages funded research projects in accordance with contractual requirements
6. Collaboratively creates and executes agency-wide research, evaluation, and program development protocols
7. Ensure all programs agency-wide are supported with a collaboratively created, rigorous, measurable logic model
8. Ensure all tools and interventions used agency-wide are vetted and either a) evidence-based or b) if no appropriate tool/intervention exists, have an actionable plan to develop the evidence-base
9. Maintain a comprehensive roster of the tools and interventions used across the agency, including confirmation (and citations) for whether the tools/interventions have been evaluated with like-populations to the communities served by YWCA Kalamazoo
10. Ensure research methods deployed are an effective, rigorous blend of qualitative and quantitative methods, and that the analysis and discussion around results uses best practices
11. Lead the organization’s research-to-practice strategy, including:
12. In partnership with the PIs and program teams, identifying what needs assessments, evaluations, and research studies would be strategic in furthering the agency’s mission
13. Identifying research/practice gaps, and ways the organization can bridge the research-practice divide internally and externally
14. The strategy for organizational studies to be shared publicly for maximum impact
15. Secure, facilitate, and monitor research partnerships, including developing the agency IRB process
16. Directs the development and issuance of data for monthly KPI reports, annual reports, advocacy reports, and funder data reports
17. Collaborates across departments to develop policy papers
18. Honors and uplifts the expertise held by others
19. Develops and provides senior oversight for research partnerships, including subaward management, contract performance review, and fiscal oversight
20. Demonstrates consistent visibility and on-site engagement across the agency, developing the critical relationships necessary for mutual information sharing and collaborative action
21. Intentionally builds partnership and relationship with personnel at all levels
22. Participates in public information sharing with partners, legislators, media, conferences, and other opportunities
23. Engages in weekly 1:1 supervision, committed to personal growth and coaching others in accordance with agency leadership requirements
24. Develop and support a team of specialists and principal investigators to:

• Identify relevant data trends in their pillars of service
• Effectively manage research subawards and partnerships
• Facilitate a collaborative and actionable discussion regarding what action may be needed based on data observations
• Develop and implement needs assessments, evaluations, and research studies within their target service pillar
• Support programs to translate findings into appropriate understanding of implications, collaboratively generated recommendations, and actionable steps
• Engage routinely and meaningfully in pillar operations to enhance relationship and understanding
• Produce sound, accessible research reports that further organizational and sector practice
• Conduct impact evaluations that inform the agency’s strategy to eliminate racism and empower women
• Ensure ethical practice in all aspects of research activities
• Share results in the public sphere
• Grow professionally as leaders, researchers, innovators, and collaborators
• Become leaders in bridging the research-practice divide

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.