Communications Director

**Title:** Communications Director

**Location:** Remote, U.S.

**Compensation:**NEC uses a transparent compensation calculator to determine exact rates. Salaries are non-negotiable and are calculated from the same base rate for all positions, with adjustments upward for factors like geographic location. Most salaries currently fall between $75,000 and $ 90,000 per year. We also offer a generous benefits and PTO package, including fully paid health insurance and an automatic 3% 401(k) employer contribution.

**Time Commitment:** Full-time Salaried Position (32 hours per week)

**Application Deadline:** July 8, 2025

**Start Date:** On or after September 2, 2025

#### **POSITION SUMMARY**

NEC is seeking a full-time (32 hours /week) Communications Director to join our organization. As a team member of our worker-self directed nonprofit, this role would be situated primarily in the Communications & Cultural Organizing and Digital Strategy circles. The focus of this role is to lead, implement, and maintain our communications strategy and expand our reach and engagement with NEC members, solidarity economy, and related movement spaces, the general public, and staff.

NEC’s communications team is highly collaborative – the Communications Director will work closely with the Communications Organizer, Narrative Strategy Director, and Donor Engagement Director. The Communications Director will be a **leading steward for NEC’s communications infrastructure**, ensuring that the systems, tools, and practices supporting effective communication are up-to-date, accessible, and aligned with our narrative and messaging.

This is a full-time (32 hrs/week), salaried position, and can be performed remotely from anywhere in the U.S. This position requires someone to be able to perform tasks on a computer for up to 8 hours a day, inclusive of paid breaks. Our work is rigorous, but we prioritize space for joy, for healing, and connection. The ideal candidate is excited to contribute significant time to maintaining our democratic workplace and moving towards a liberatory work culture. As Southerners on New Ground has said, “we’re looking for people who are looking for us.”

#### **WHO IS NEC?**

New Economy Coalition (NEC) is a membership-based organization working to build the power and scale of the solidarity economy movement in the United States. Our network of 150+ member organizations is working to transform the extractive economy and build up community ownership and just transition solutions with a strong intersectional lens. NEC members work across regions and various solidarity economy sectors, including co-ops, community land trusts, participatory budgeting, public banks, credit unions, energy democracy, and more!

NEC is a worker self-directed nonprofit. This means we operate under a peer-management and collective governance framework. Prior experience in these areas is a plus, but not a requirement. The person who fills this role should be interested in learning about and building their collective governance muscles over time!

NEC is a fully remote organization. The person in this position may be expected to travel within the United States several times a year to staff retreats or conferences. This role requires extended use of a computer. Working hours are flexible but everyone on staff is generally expected to be available between 12-4pm EST Monday through Thursday.

#### **RESPONSIBILITIES**

**Responsibilities include shaping the communications strategy across the organization, managing email and messaging platforms (such as Action Network and listservs), maintaining shared templates and messaging guides, tracking analytics, and coordinating the communications calendar. The Communications Director will also document processes, maintain archives, facilitate team trainings, and build organizational capacity to use communications tools consistently and effectively across NEC staff and membership.**

###### **Strategic Communications (30%)**

• **Communications Strategy:** Co-lead the development and implementation of the overarching communications strategy with the Narrative Strategy Director. Make sure this strategy is accessible and understood across staff and members. Attend monthly Communications Working Group meetings.
• **Maintain and evolve NEC’s website** to ensure it reflects up-to-date and accessible information about our programs and work. This includes regularly keeping our website up to date with accurate programming and organizational information, developing new pages as needed, and making sure it aligns with NEC’s narrative.
• **Digital Strategy:** Set up and track analytics across our digital platforms (website, AirTable, Google Apps, Action Network, and social media) so we can more effectively understand our audiences and engagement. Support the coordination of an upcoming CRM migration as part of the Digital Strategy circle. Steward the Digital Strategy Circle through the yearly program plan, and facilitate regular meetings.
• **Email Strategy:** Work with the Donor Engagement Director to grow and increase engagement on our email list, including the development and implementation of a welcome series and re-engagement campaigns.

###### **Organizational Communications (20%)**

• **Training for Staff:** Provide training and hands-on support for staff to utilize best practices in digital communications across different programs.

**Cross-Circle Support:** Support other circles with communications for their programming. This may include drafting appeals for our summer and end of year fundraising campaigns, supporting outreach for donor or member events, drafting program-specific press releases, etc.

###### **Organizational Governance (20%)**

• Participate in collective decision making and governance – this may mean preparing, editing, providing feedback, and eventually voting on a wide range of proposals related to our work conditions, strategy, and programming.
• Eventually take on discrete governance and organizational stewardship roles that come with being a Worker Self-Directed Non-Profit. This may include joining our HR, IT, Finance, Culture & Care, and/or General Circle(s). Circle coordination will also rotate every year.
• Participate in NEC’s Annual Member Meeting
• Participate in ongoing professional development.

#### **SKILLS & QUALIFICATIONS**

We’re looking for a strategic systems-thinker with plenty of tools under their belt to organize our communications infrastructure and strategy into shape. Our ideal candidate is someone who can collaboratively lead communications planning, bringing their tech savvy, knowledge of digital trends and analytics, and ability to manage content calendars and workflows.

“No one candidate will meet all the preferred qualifications, so please apply if you think you would be a good fit.”

Any combination of formal education, paid work experience, unpaid/volunteer experience, and life experience will be considered to meet the following:

• 4-5 years of experience in communications work.
• Demonstrated ability to design, lead, and implement effective communications strategies.
• Demonstrated ability to lead collaborative communications planning and systems, including facilitating coordination among different teams through shared calendars and content workflows, and fostering collective ownership of messaging.
• Well-versed in digital trends and analytics to measure the effectiveness of digital communications and implement new tactics as needed.
• Skilled at writing, synthesizing and curating content across formats, communications channels and audiences, including press releases, newsletters, website, public statements, social media posts, etc.
• Experience managing editorial calendars.
• Enjoys social media and staying up to date on news and current events around the world.
• Track record of designing and implementing a welcome series and/or other email engagement strategies.
• Regularly writes & edits content in collaborative settings. Familiar with editorial processes, tools, and institutional writing styles (e.g. AP style, MLA, etc.).
• Tech savvy, with transferrable or intuitive website and applications knowledge. Proficient in Action Network, Canva, CRMs (Powerbase, Airtable), as well as Zoom, Google Workspace, Asana, Slack, Google groups.
• Experience setting up & tracking analytics across digital platforms to measure the effectiveness of digital communications and implement new tactics as needed.
• Deep experience building and maintaining communications infrastructure (tools, documentation, templates, analytics). Builds shared systems for collective use and growth.
• Comfortable navigating and managing WordPress.
• Knowledge of basic HTML/CSS or the ability to troubleshoot, understand, and collaborate with developers when needed.
• Experience designing and facilitating internal trainings for staff on comms best practices.
• Experience providing hands-on programmatic communications support (e.g. drafting fundraising appeals, program-specific press releases, editing outreach materials, etc.).
• Track record of managing projects collaboratively across teams.
• Comfortable working independently, reliable, and self-managing.
• Accuracy and attention to detail.
• Experience within the solidarity economy movement, deep understanding of the framework, and vision.
• Strong time management skills: self-motivated with accuracy and attention to detail.
• Comfort and ease with public speaking.
• Familiarity with the breadth of organizational functions in multiracial movement organizations, including team building, strategic planning, organizing, budgeting, fundraising, building culture, and human resources.
• Strong relationship-building skills; listening to and taking an interest in others.
• Desire and ability to work in a remote environment for 32 hours a week.

#### **VALUES**

• Understanding of and commitment to solidarity economy values, such as racial, economic, and climate justice; cooperative ownership; democratic governance; and systems change.
• Desire to work in a Worker Self-Directed organization, including participation in collective governance and democratic decision-making, and taking on roles to support the overall health of the organization.
• Has informal experience with the solidarity economy outside of work/activism (i.e. gift economy, time banking, mutual aid)
• Self-identifies with our North Star Communities, or has organized in deep partnership with North Star Communities
• Has a clear self-defined stake in building solidarity economies
• Excited to learn from mistakes, receive feedback, and give feedback to others.
• Commitment to building a culture of self-direction, mutual accountability, liberation, respect, and joy.

#### **BENEFITS**

Full benefits including healthcare, dental, short and long term disability, retirement fund, employer-provided laptop and home office stipend, flexible schedule, 20 wellness days, 16 vacation days, 3 floating holidays, and summer and winter office closures (in addition to federal holidays).

#### **HOW TO APPLY?**

To apply, please submit this form and upload the following:

1. Resume and/or CV 2. A cover letter describing your interest, qualifications, and stake in the solidarity economy movement. 3. A **sample of communications work** that shows your ability to lead organization-wide communications strategy and infrastructure. Examples can include: communications strategy presentation, media toolkit, messaging guide, press release, fundraising email, newsletter, or a digital tool you’ve created or managed (like a content calendar, template, or analytics dashboard).

The application deadline is July 8, 2025. We will review applications as they come, and hope to schedule first-round interviews in mid-July.

_NEC aspires to build an inclusive and liberatory organization. We value having a diversity of life experiences, identities, and perspectives on our staff. We are an equal opportunity employer and do not discriminate based on race, color, religion or belief, disability, gender, nationality, ethnicity, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, or any other status protected by law. People of color, women, working-class, and LGBTQ candidates are strongly encouraged to apply._