Overview

Bellwether Education Partners is a nonprofit dedicated to helping education organizations in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors become more effective in their work and achieve dramatic results, especially for high-need students. To do so, we provide a unique combination of exceptional thinking, talent, and hands-on strategic support:

Our Strategic Advising practice works with leading education organizations on their most pressing strategic and operational issues. We partner to create bold but achievable plans, while ensuring that leaders and stakeholders are in alignment around the path forward.
Our Policy and Thought Leadership practice works to shape the broader education landscape by conducting policy analysis, research and writing, and idea generation, and by advising education entities on policy and public affairs.
Our Talent Services practice identifies, places, and supports education leaders through comprehensive executive searches, customized search advisery services, and individual coaching. We also partner with clients to build talent-ready organizations where diverse teams can work, develop, and thrive.

Why bring all this together? Bellwether was founded on the belief that the only way to ensure that all children have access to high-quality schools is to take a holistic approach to education’s most pressing challenges. We believe the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and many of the challenges organizations face are so complex that they require all three areas of expertise. Having all three makes our work stronger by tying innovative thinking to perspectives regarding on-the-ground realities.

In this way, Bellwether has carved out a special and desperately needed niche in the education reform landscape. We aren’t just a think tank, or a consulting firm, or a human capital organization. We are all of the above and more, providing comprehensive, coherent, and lasting solutions to education’s most longstanding and complicated problems.

Organizational Culture

An entrepreneurial, rapidly growing organization, Bellwether is mission-driven and committed to a set ofcore values that guide our work. Leveraging our distinct organizational culture, as well as the combined skills and experience of our team, we are an “action tank” – both a generator of innovative and purposeful reform ideas and a provider of direct services and momentum-building activity to the field.

We do not cover the waterfront like some large consulting firms; instead, by remaining strictly focused in our areas of expertise and the needs of underserved students, we provide unparalleled leadership, support, wisdom, and experience to help build the field of education change agents and help the organizations they lead have the greatest impact possible.

Our work is national in scope, and our team is primarily concentrated in four major cities: Boston; Washington, D.C.; Chicago; and San Francisco.

For more information on our organization, please visit:www.bellwethereducation.org.

Position

Bellwether’s Office Manager and Executive Assistant will work as a key member of the Washington, DC office by providing office management and administrative assistance to Partners, Principals, and/or Associate Partners – some of whom work in different cities and time zones. While the Office Manager and Executive Assistant will report to the Operations Manager, their daily work is guided by the Partners, Principals, and Associate Partners they support.

The Office Manager and Executive Assistant’s primary responsibilities and duties will include:

scheduling complex meetings or calls involving multiple people – both internal staff and client staff – for up to five Bellwether team members including those at the Partner level;
arranging extensive domestic travel for these five team members, negotiating corporate rates as necessary;
preparing, reconciling, and submitting expense reports for five team members;
adding client information to the contact database (Salesforce) on a regular basis;
scheduling and taking notes at quarterly board of directors meetings;
ordering supplies and maintaining a clean and professional office;
coordinating with the property management company for any building related issues;
troubleshooting any technology issues and working with the IT company to resolve them;
greeting clients, visitors, vendors, and delivery personnel;
arranging for office-wide lunches or celebrations, when requested;
distributing mail and packages; and
providing meeting planning and support to the Operations Manager for all-staff retreats.

Qualifications

Bellwether is a good fit for professionals who possess strong personal drive and motivation, demonstrate exemplary professional behavior and values, and who are resourceful, responsible, tenacious, independent, and self-confident.

The ideal candidate will have at least 5 years’ office management and administrative experience supporting multiple professionals in a nonprofit, entrepreneurial environment. In addition, the successful candidate will have:

professional administrative experience supporting multiple people, while remaining organized and maintaining their attention to detail;
office management experience;
excellent problem-solving skills;
a highly self-motivated work style and willingness to proactively take on projects;
a track record as an outcome-driven self-starter;
flexibility and the ability to deal well with ambiguity and the fast-paced nature of a rapidly expanding organization;
strong communication skills, both verbal and written;
comprehensive computer skills including calendaring, word processing, and using spreadsheet and database software;
experience problem solving internet and technology issues;
well-rounded inter-personal skills with the capacity to work effectively in a team environment;
strong ethics and personal integrity;
a professional attitude and client-service orientation; and
minimally, a Bachelor’s degree.

The following is ideal but not required:

a passion for and commitment to working in the field of urban education reform.

How to apply

Bellwether Education Partners is committed to providing equal opportunities. We believe that to achieve our mission, we must be a diverse and inclusive organization broadly reflecting the various communities we serve. It is our policy to ensure that all individuals with whom we are in contact are not discriminated against on the basis of age, race, ethnicity, color, disability, gender identity, gender expression, marital status, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, or veteran’s status.

The review of applications will begin immediately and will continue until the position(s) is filled. Applications should consist of a letter of interest and a current resume and should be submitted electronically. Applications or inquiries about the position should be directed to:

Moire Carmody, Operations Manager

Bellwether Education Partners

via: moire.carmody@bellwethereducation.org