Director, State Advocacy

Job Overview/Summary

The Director, State Advocacy will lead development of state and local Resettlement, Asylum, and Integration (RAI) Policy and Advocacy strategies, managing at least one full‑time staff, and directly engage with RAI program offices, strengthening the Policy and Advocacy team’s capacity to provide direct advocacy support throughout the network and providing tools, resources and learning support to build advocacy capacity among staff throughout the RAI network, advancing policy and programmatic goals in tandem.

This role serves as a key external representative of the IRC – engaging with coalition partners, policy makers, and other stakeholders to drive change. The Director facilitates these engagements by playing a direct role with IRC’s network of U.S. offices. The Director will collaborate closely with colleagues in the RAI federal policy and advocacy team and the RAI program delivery team.

• Advocacy Strategy
  :
  Develop and oversee implementation of a multi‑year advocacy strategy, in close collaboration with global policy leads, policy communications and digital communications, to advance IRC’s key influence priorities and maximize the opportunity for IRC to advance our influence objectives.

• Advocacy
  :
  Build and manage IRC’s credibility, profile and relationships with key U.S. stakeholders in support of advocacy strategies on IRC’s priority issues. Spot and deliver on external opportunities to advance IRC’s profile, policy and influence objectives; advise on IRC positioning and prioritization vis a vis the U.S. Government and Congress. Direct executive branch and legislative initiatives and represent the IRC at key meetings and fora.
  
  Partner and coordinate with the RAI U.S. network on legislator engagement to drive or prevent policy.

• Influence Analysis
  :
  Lead the strategy for influence and development of power maps for key policy issues to identify influence priorities and targets, and to develop and execute creative influence strategies, including with nontraditional partners. Continuously ideate and identify new approaches and partners that go beyond advocacy as usual.

• Legislative and Policy Tracking
  :
  Oversee the expansion of IRC’s legislative reach by tracking, understanding and anticipating policy trends, shifting government positions, individuals and organizations engaging on our issues, and the politics around our issues. Build strategic influence plans around legislative processes & profile opportunities/events; this includes hearings, deadlines and processes for engaging in annual bills, and major ad hoc bills moving in our space.
  
  Actively pivot and execute on influence strategy based on emerging opportunities.

• Policy Generation and Contextualization
  :
  Contribute to policy generation and prioritization by providing U.S. specific insights that increase the credibility and efficacy of our solutions through constant collaboration with Policy and Solutions colleagues. Support IRC’s policy team in identifying and developing policy priorities that are impactful and achievable. Draft policy, amendments, and research state regulations to inform recommendations and enhance program implementations.

• Communications and Profile Strategy
  :
  In close collaboration with the global communications team, identify shared external relations priorities and opportunities. Provide market and audience expertise to communications team to shape communications specific to the U.S. and develop materials for advocacy targets, including digital/social content and take‑actions. Act as sign‑off point on U.S.‑facing external content when relevant. Identify and leverage opportunities to raise influence and profile in the U.S. through strategic events and other activities.

• Senior Leadership Engagement
  :
  Identify and implement opportunities to leverage IRC's CEO and other senior leaders to amplify IRC's thought leadership on our issue areas through meetings with senior officials, politicians and other NGOs. Provide briefing materials and provide in‑person staffing for meetings as appropriate.

• Testing and Innovation
  :
  Use network to conduct rapid analysis to test political and policy environment…