About us: The mission of the Environmental Leadership Program (ELP) is to support visionary, action-oriented, and diverse leadership for a just and sustainable future. ELP aims to catalyze change by providing environmental and social change leaders with the support and guidance they need to launch new endeavors, achieve new successes, and rise to new leadership positions. We believe in a broad definition of leadership that goes beyond positional power and recognizes that leadership is present and possible at all levels of work in our sectors. Learn More

ELP runs three major programs: a core fellowship program with up to 8 regional and national cohorts annually, the Roger Arliner Young (RAY) Fellowship, a two-year paid fellowship to increase and facilitate conservation, energy efficiency, and renewable energy-related career pathways for emerging leaders from under-represented backgrounds, and the Doris Duke Conservation Scholars Program (DDCSP) Alumni Network. Once they have completed an ELP program, participants become Senior Fellows and ELP facilitates continued programming and events to connect this growing group of alumni in a number of formal and informal ways, from managing a jobs board to hosting all-community retreats.

ELP is currently transitioning new staff, working towards transparent and reorganized financial structures, updating HR policies, and realigning ourselves with the workplace culture that thrives in our programming – a culture rooted in emergence, equity principles, shared leadership, and autonomy. We’re making the changes internally that we wish to see in our focus sectors and in the world, and we’re looking for someone who will bring creativity, deep listening, and great facilitation to the process.

Key areas of focus in the first year include: supporting the Director of People in updating systems for HR/benefits, collaborating with staff to embed ELP’s guiding values throughout our operations, and exploring examples of structures that exist within the environmental and social change sectors that promote shared leadership.

Role Summary: The Executive Director (ED) is responsible for leading a strong team to implement ELP’s mission and provide high-quality, relevant programming for environmental and social change leaders. The ED will model accountability to ELP’s organizational values and our vision that foregrounds justice, equity, meaningful diversity, and inclusive belonging. Reporting to the Board of Directors, the ED will oversee a $2.46M budget and a staff of 12 across programs and operations. The ED will also supervise a leadership team of three program directors, a People and Operations staff person, and the Director of Development, and liaise closely with IT and financial operations vendors. The leadership team will also meet quarterly with the Board of Directors to ensure the overall well-being of the ELP and its ability to successfully deliver the mission.

This successful candidate will have a bold vision for developing inclusive programming for our communities of service, collaborative leadership across the organization, and mission-driven partnerships with organizations. The ideal candidate must demonstrate leadership by example, ability to work across many dimensions of diversity, and motivate others to achieve exceptional results. A successful candidate will exhibit the highest professionalism standards and ethical principles and practices. This is an exciting opportunity to help the organization evolve into a new era of environmental and social justice leadership.

A Few Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

  • Lead ELP in the execution of programs, goals, objectives, policies and decisions to successfully carry out the mission
  • Support a Board of Directors in its governance role, fostering its ongoing development, and keeping it informed about internal conditions and external developments in order to effectively steward the mission
  • Develop and curate the strategic vision and generate the business plan that drives the supporting marketing, financial planning and resourcing activities

Our Commitment to Diversity, Equity, Inclusion & Belonging

Nonprofit HR is committed to fostering and maintaining a work environment where diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) is fully integrated into everything we do for the benefit of our employees and the clients that we serve. To fully realize our goal, we prioritize our understanding of the complexities of DEI within our workforce to inform our approach to talent management. We believe that this guides how we do our work, advises our clients to operationalize DEI and position our content and educational opportunities to help strengthen the talent management capacity of the social impact sector. See the full statement.