Associate Project Director, Healthy Start Special Projects

Organization Overview 

The National Institute for Children’s Health Quality (NICHQ) is an independent nonprofit organization working for more than a decade to improve children’s health. We help organizations and professionals who share this mission make breakthrough improvements, so children and families live healthier lives. While NICHQ is Boston based, we have a strong remote culture and invite candidates from across the country to apply.

Position Overview

The Associate Project Director (APD), Healthy Start Special Projects will manage the development and implementation of special project activities for the Supporting Healthy Start Technical Assistance and Support Center at NICHQ. With leadership and oversight from the Senior Project Director will act as a subject matter expert to provide tailored technical assistance and support around social determinants of health (SDOH) and other pertinent project content, as needed. In partnership with project lead and funder, conduct site visits, engaging project partners to further assess need for training and technical assistance (TTA) relative to special content areas.

Position Responsibilities

• Project Direction
  1. Directing all aspects of project scope, workplan, and deliverables of a project complex in size and scope in collaboration with senior project leadership
  2. Making sure changes to scope are documented, communicated and approved by senior project leadership or designee
  3. Ensuring internal accountability, integration and project success in meeting overall project aim(s) with support from project lead
  4. Contributing to cross team and cross functional leadership including advanced communication and collaboration
  5. Managing relationship with funders and partners
  6. Ensuring alignment and engagement of partners, consultants, and faculty
  7. Overseeing and/or leading periodic reporting
  8. Being responsible for the quality and content of virtual or in person project-related events
  9. Representing the project and organization at internal and external meetings and conferences
  10. Other tasks as requested
• People Management
  1. Overseeing project team and ensuring roles and responsibilities on project are clearly delineated and managed
  2. Supervising interns, Project Coordinators, Project Managers and/or Senior Project Managers. This includes managing project work, performance assessment, and professional development.
• Fiscal Management
  1. Providing oversight for project budget and contracts. The APD is responsible for tracking questions, concerns and issues, and devising solutions before coming to senior project staff and/or Programs leadership with updates and assistance request
  2. Managing the administration of contracts, including monthly and quarterly reporting of time and deliverables, addressing scope of work changes and invoicing approval
  3. Managing project-specific contracting with consultants including writing detailed scopes of work and managing implementation
• Organizational Contributions
  1. Developing and implementing products and plans for project-related dissemination
  2. Managing additional internal special projects, as requested
  3. Contributing to cross project sharing, learning, and consistent integration of organization processes
  4. May represent and present projects in public facing engagements
  5. Other responsibilities as directed

Position Qualifications

1. Strong proficiency with office systems, computers, and MS Office Suite: Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint and virtual meeting platforms (Zoom, Webex)
2. Strong oral and written communication skills, including the ability to communicate sensitive information with a variety of partners in a tactful manner
3. Highly skilled multi-tasker who can manage themselves and others in prioritizing tasks, establishing work-related timelines, and meeting deadline and deliverable requirements
4. Has strong organization and time management skills, meticulous attention to detail across varied tasks, and is responsible for generating, approving, and implementing solutions to issues as they arise
5. Works well in a team environment and is a team player with customer service orientation, including demonstrated skill and experience in relationship management- both internally and externally
6. Highly flexible and adjustable
7. Ability to apply principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion in the workplace
8. Experience planning, coordinating, and directing in-person and virtual events
9. Experience in or knowledge of public health- especially maternal and child health, health care or related systems strongly preferred
10. Master’s degree in Public Health or related field preferred and 7-10 years managing or leading programs/projects in a healthcare, academic, or nonprofit setting. Equivalent relevant experience may be substituted for education.
11. Demonstrates strong understanding of project methods and/or subject matter (e.g., quality improvement, collaborative learning, health equity, children and youth with special health care needs) and can manage the frameworks in a high-quality way independently.
12. Demonstrated ability to influence, manage, and drive teams/individuals/project towards success
13. Works independently, capable of making independent decisions
14. Advanced problem-solving skills including the ability to think quickly, creatively, and strategically, using process-level thinking to optimize systems and resources to implement plans/structure for accomplishing current work and think ahead to next steps
15. Possesses advanced insight and skills in partner management, proposal development, and budgeting
16. Demonstrated leadership in managing people and complex projects in health care or related settings
17. Demonstrated experience cultivating partnerships
18. Strong supervisory experience and the ability to delegate and help others manage and prioritize their work
19. Experience in public speaking and presentation
20. Demonstrated experience managing large federal grants and/or contracts

Benefits  

We offer a generous benefits package for employees including competitive compensation; remote work; paid time off including vacation, sick and holidays; insurance including medical, dental, vision, disability and life; flexible spending accounts; employee assistance programs; and professional development benefits.

Equity Hiring Statement

NICHQ is committed to increasing the representation of people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds in our workforce and to value and embrace their skills, perspectives and experiences for the benefit of our mission. NICHQ is an equal opportunity employer; all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, gender or gender expression, sexual orientation, age, marital status or disability. NICHQ strongly encourages applications from candidates who identify as BIPOC, LGBTQI, or from any other minoritized group.

See all current openings at NICHQ