Job Title: Advocacy Manager
Reports to: Senior Director of Communications
Healthier Colorado is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to raising the voices of Coloradans in the public policy process to improve the health of our state’s residents. We believe that every Coloradan should have an equal opportunity of living a healthy life. Healthier Colorado aims to make meaningful change to improve people’s health throughout our state’s diverse communities.
We are the only health advocacy organization in the country that deploys the full range of political activity—from political giving, to grassroots organizing, to lobbying, to running an in-house canvass to further our mission. We believe in the power of public policy and in the power of voters being informed participants in our democracy. Mixing politics and health is uncommon work, but we’re comfortable being a bit of a unicorn.
Position Overview
The Advocacy Manager applies a blend of communication and organizing skills to springboard grassroots Coloradans interested in health policy into action, and translates health policy into accessible content for a variety of audiences. The person filling this position serves as a bridge between Healthier Colorado members and the processes that help pass pro health policies. The Advocacy Manager is a critical position that supports both local and statewide policy campaigns and drives engagement of members to see campaigns successfully across the finish line.
The Advocacy Manager will also have primary responsibility for managing member integration into Healthier Colorado’s campaigns, including story preparation, written comment and testimony, and preparing them to engage in earned media opportunities. The Advocacy Manager will perform functions equivalent to what is described above for local campaigns and statewide.
The Advocacy Manager will recruit new members who have a personal connection to any of our policy campaigns and will be responsible for finding members interested in getting further involved in Healthier Colorado’s.
Job Duties
Recruitment
- From our base of members, use our CRM to identify those individuals who are willing to volunteer (testify, canvass, submit an LTE etc) to support our campaigns and identify areas of the state in which we are lacking that base of activists.
- Identify and recruit new potential members through advocacy trainings and Healthier Colorado events or campaigns.
- Build a speakers’ bureau of activists who are committed to testifying or sharing their health story in support of a policy campaign on behalf of Healthier Colorado.
- As required, attend partner events as the representative of Healthier Colorado to recruit new members.
Activist management
- Communicate with our identified activists on campaign needs. Plan advocacy trainings, coordination with coalition partners, and prepare activists for key meetings with policy makers.
- Coordinate with the policy and local policy teams on specific grassroots support needed for legislative campaigns.
- Work with the field and policy teams to help train and prepare our members for action – Advocacy trainings, LTE’s, and testimony.
- Coordinate with communications team to develop spokespeople for earned media and online collateral for state and local policy campaigns.
Campaign Support
- Create materials and content for Healthier Colorado campaigns for public facing communications.
- As needed, represent Healthier Colorado in ballot initiative and campaign specific field and communication coalitions to seamlessly mobilize our resources in tandem with the campaign’s strategy.
Preferred qualifications:
- Bachelor’s degree in a related field OR related experience.
- Bilingual a plus
- At least three years experience working in the political sphere, campaigns, local government and/or relatable experience
- Experience recruiting and mobilizing communities into action
- Understanding of CRM management (preferably EveryAction).
- Excellent written, verbal, and public communications skills.
- Able to work both independently and in a team environment.
- Strong time management and organizational skills.
- Compassionate listener and ability to connect with diverse communities
Compensation and Benefits
Compensation
Salary is commensurate with qualifications and experience. Salary range is $55,000 to $62,000 annually. Healthier Colorado’s office environment is relaxed and a culture of accountability which allows for significant workplace flexibility.
Benefits
Healthier Colorado offers a very generous benefits package. We value the opportunity for our employees to support their physical, mental, and social health as well as practice a work and life balance. Our benefits package includes:
- Health, vision, and dental insurance;
- Retirement plan (no match requirement);
- 20 days of PTO;
- Eight paid holidays;
- Professional development stipends;
- Wellness and cell phone benefit reimbursed monthly; and
- Paid sabbatical after five years of employment
Healthier Colorado Non-Discrimination Policy
Healthier Colorado is dedicated to the principles of equal employment opportunity in any term, condition or privilege of employment. Healthier Colorado does not discriminate in employment or advancement opportunities on the basis of race, sex, color, creed, national origin, ancestry, age, sexual orientation (including gender identity and gender expression), disability or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local law.
We believe that traditional hiring practices have historically and systemically marginalized entire groups of people — including people of color, people from different socio-economic backgrounds, women, and people in the LGBTQIA+ community, to name a few. We believe that we are better as an organization when we work to deconstruct barriers and build a team that has authentic representation from diverse communities, backgrounds and beliefs. Hence, we strongly encourage qualified candidates from those mentioned, as well as other marginalized communities, to apply for roles within our team.