Government Affairs Director

Government Affairs Director

Location: Denver Metro

Work Schedule: Non-exempt, Full-time

Deadline for submission:  June 27, 2024

About Conservation Colorado
As the largest statewide environmental organization in Colorado, we work to protect our state’s climate, air, land, water, and communities. We play a unique role in Colorado as our work focuses on organizing communities, influencing decision-makers, and electing conservation-minded leaders. That work includes Protégete, which is focused on building Latine leadership and engagement on environmental issues. We believe that achieving racial, social, and environmental justice are critical to our mission.  You can learn more about our mission here.

What You’ll Do

This position reports to the VP of Programs and plays a vital role in delivering effective policy solutions for all Coloradans. You, and the government affairs team you’ll lead, will work with coalitions and in the state Capitol to influence people, policies, structures, and systems in order to bring about change and to build relationships and communicate with those in power to persuade them to act. The work can evolve over time, but it contains these areas of responsibility.

Build and leverage relationships with decision makers

• Identify and cultivate relationships with decision makers at the legislature, state agencies, the governor’s administration, and others.

• Act as a key consultant to the political team in making high-level political decisions including endorsements, candidate contributions, etc.  
• Play a key role in coordinated electoral work to help elect pro-conservation candidates.

Win policy campaigns 

• Design and implement policy campaign goals, strategies, and tactics.
• Lobby decision makers to achieve policy victories. 

• Maintain a sophisticated understanding of policy issues especially as they relate to racial justice and equity and disproportionately impacted communities.

Develop coalitions 

• Work with issue campaign managers, the Protégete team, and the organizing team to ensure that Conservation Colorado is a strong and helpful partner to environmental, social justice, progressive, local, and other groups. 
• Support issue managers in building coalitions and relationships with partners and in their efforts to diversify and grow coalitions to include a variety of voices and interests who support our work and influence decision makers; as needed, lead key environmental community coalitions. 

• Own relationships with key partners. 

Management & Leadership Responsibilities

• Hire & manage a team to deliver policy wins.
• Promote a culture of high performance and continuous improvement.
• Oversee the day-to-day activities of the team including budgeting, planning, staff development.

• Sets strategy for our advocacy work based on overall organization goals & sets individual priorities.
• Advises the executive team on strategic plans and advocates for their program.

In addition to your regular responsibilities, all staff are expected to participate at some level in organizational priorities including taking part in election-related activities, and committing to organizational efforts around equity & inclusivity.

Qualifications

To do any of our work, our staff need to be natural relationship builders, have the resilience to handle tough situations, have excellent problem-solving skills with a results-focused orientation, bring an equity analysis to the work, and be highly collaborative. For this position, fundamentally, we want someone who loves the fight to deliver policy wins and who has the drive to take our work to the next level. More specifically, you will have or be most or all of the following:

Political Strategist:   8+ years of relevant experience working as a lobbyist and/or in passing policies through various governmental venues, preferably in issue advocacy with the ability to develop and execute sophisticated strategies to pass policies.  You can create actionable campaign plans that create the pressure and leverage to drive decision-makers to act in our favor. And you’ll have excellent judgment & confidentiality.

People Management Chops:  4+ years of experience managing a team of people with a supportive & collaborative approach.  We believe in transparency in communication, accountability, humility and collaboration in our people management.  Hiring & managing a results-oriented team is a large part of this job as is the need to closely collaborate with other internal and external stakeholders.

Flexibility:  This position requires being able to set and manage competing priorities while embracing uncertainty.  Being able to adapt behavior or work methods in response to new information, changing conditions, or unexpected obstacles without placing blame & taking learnings into other similar situations is critical for success.  

Build & exercise power effectively:  You’ll need to be committed to our theory of change that centers bringing together the people, policy and politics to make real change on environmental issues.  You can build relationships that bring together a wide range of interested people to support and advance goals; Can understand the political and social dynamics at play – including racial, gender, and class inequities — and view achievements within the context of a long-term agenda.  

Equity Analysis:  This position requires an understanding of the impact of systemic inequities on people’s lives and how your own identities impact your work along with the ability to bring different communities together to develop policy solutions that lead to better outcomes for Coloradoans.  A sophisticated understanding of how racial dynamics in particular impact managerial relationships, campaigns, and coalitions, along with a history successfully navigating those dynamics is essential for success.

This position does not have an undergraduate education requirement. Spanish/English bilingual is a skill we value, but it is not a requirement. This is a full-time job, but there can be some flexibility in the exact schedule.

Compensation and Benefits

The full-time salary range for this role is between $95,000-$110,000 based on a wage analysis across the organization and new staff rarely starting at the top of the range.  For candidates with higher-level experience and expertise than those stipulated in the qualifications, we would consider a Senior Director-level position, with an accompanying higher salary range.

We provide high-quality health insurance and a strong benefits package that includes a SIMPLE IRA retirement plan with a match, at least 30 days of vacation & holidays in addition to six physical & mental wellness days in your first year, and parental leave and a sabbatical program. Please note that as a 501(c)(4) nonprofit organization, Conservation Colorado employees are not eligible to participate in the Federal Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program.

This position does require in-person work in the form of meeting with decision makers and partners, attending events, and participating in team & organizational meetings.  Therefore, we do require our staff to be vaccinated against COVID. We have embraced a hybrid work model and this position generally will need to be in our office or otherwise in person between one and  four days a week depending on the time of year, though everyone is welcome to work in the office 100% of the time if they prefer.

We are committed to building a more diverse and inclusive organization and conservation movement to fully represent and engage all Coloradans and to build as powerful a movement as we can. Recruiting staff that better reflects Colorado is a priority and we encourage applicants from all cultures, race, ethnicity, geographies, political affiliation, sexual orientations, gender identities, and all other identities represented in Colorado or protected by law. We are proud to be an equal opportunity employer.