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Our client is a fast-growing Charter School Management Organization. They received their first charter in January 2006 from The State University of New York. Two founders of a highly successful hedge fund are the President and Treasurer of the Board of Trustees. A former New York City Council Member and Chair of the Education Committee, is the CEO. The annual operating budget is currently $20 million with 140 staff working in instruction and operations.

Currently, our client operates its flagship school, a K-8 school opened in August 2006 with Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grades as well as 3 new schools in Harlem launched in 2008 with Kindergarten and 1st grades. Despite having a student population that is nearly 23% special education students admitted through a non-selective and oversubscribed lottery process, in its first year of instruction, the flagship school increased the reading scores of its incoming students dramatically. While only 24% of the first graders entered school reading on grade level, they concluded the school year with 94% of students reading on grade level. Rigorous data analysis allows educators to intervene early to prevent any students from falling behind. Tutoring has been directed to students so that only 4% were below grade level at the end of their first year. The goal of the organization is to expand from 4 schools serving nearly 1,000 students today to 30-40 schools over the next decade.

Our client seeks a Chief Operating Officer (COO) to develop and lead its operations division and to grow with the organization as it builds a network of 30-40 schools serving up to 20,000 students on a $250mn budget. The COO will play a key leadership role in this pivotal position reporting to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and will have primary responsibility for the development and execution of the network’s ambitious goals. This is an extraordinary opportunity for an experienced senior manager to apply sophisticated and effective operating systems in the setting of a mission-driven organization dedicated to academic excellence and accountability.

As a member of the leadership team, the COO will participate in setting the network’s future strategic direction and establishing policies and procedures that will guide its operations. He or she will drive the organization's business operations, including conceptualizing strategy, implementing operating plans and budgets, and achieving targets through oversight and leadership of the Finance, Human Resources, External Affairs, Operations, Instructional Development, Data, and Information and Communications Technology departments.

The successful candidate will be a strong strategic thinker with proven leadership and management abilities, and the drive and energy to thrive in a results-focused, no excuses, entrepreneurial environment. He or she will have managed an organization with scale and complexity, either in the non-profit or corporate sector. The COO will lead a back office team of twenty-nine talented and dedicated social entrepreneurs hired through a very competitive recruitment process who are making a positive impact on the educational opportunities for previously underserved children. The network has significant support from a team of committed and visionary individuals in the business, arts, government, social services, and education sectors.

Our client's ideal candidate will have a demonstrated track record of sound, crisp decision making in an executive operations role where rapid growth or other complex challenges demanded quick, thoughtful, detailed and common sense solutions. He or she will be a superb manager who relishes building an organization from the ground up and is simultaneously a big picture thinker, yet relentless on specifics, a motivator of people through outstanding interpersonal and negotiation skills, and who has the bandwidth to serve as deputy and thought partner to the CEO whose commitment to the very highest performance standards is uncompromising. Candidates with successful experience in a chief of staff role, or other senior operations role, start-up experience, proven management, excellent oral and written communications skills and familiarity with urban public education are highly desirable.

Key Challenges for the Chief Operating Officer

Our client seeks an exceptional individual who has the capacity and the demonstrated track record to respond effectively to the following challenges:

Build Critical Organizational Capacities:

• Build and manage the implementation of operational best practices, policies and procedures for all network operations, communications, staffing and financial reporting to meet exceedingly high academic standards

• Coordinate the annual operating plan and budget, assess and report organizational performance and facilitate integration of operations among central headquarters and satellite schools to leverage the talent of all staff to improve student achievement

• Establish standards, metrics and systems to ensure quality control, cost management, and timeliness

• Continue the recruitment and building of a high performing team. Hire, train, develop and appraise staff effectively

Lead Network Performance and The Senior Management Team:

• Work closely with the CEO to transfer responsibility for the daily management of the school, while keeping her regularly updated

• Supervise six senior department managers to achieve efficiency and best practices, clarity of roles and functions, and accountability for results

• Make time-sensitive decisions on a daily basis, and direct staff on solutions to short and long term operations questions

• Lead performance management process that measures and evaluates progress against goals for the organization and for all staff

• Manage process for determining priorities and set development timetables and support the team in achieving deliverables

• Lead strategic planning, process improvement, and problem resolution

The successful candidate will be relentless in the pursuit of excellence and be an individual who will do whatever it takes to ensure results. He or she will have high energy, a strong work ethic, a commitment to measuring and achieving results, an ability to learn quickly and work well in teams, and have a passion for the vision, mission and strategies of the organization. The ideal candidate will have:

• Experience leading a staff of a hard-driving, entrepreneurial, results-oriented organization

• Related work experience directing administration and programs in a complex organization and achieving results, with a minimum 3-5 years at senior management level

• Conceptual understanding of, and demonstrated skills in, strategic and operational planning, organizational development, finance, business process development, capacity-building, and performance management and measurement

• Ability to lead cross-functional teams

• Capacity to be direct, decisive, and collegial

• Passion for and career interest in nonprofit management and social enterprise

• Multi-sector and/or cross-sector experience (a plus)

• Evidence of strong written and oral communication and presentation skills

• Bachelor's Degree and preferably a graduate degree, such as MBA or MPA

• Compensation will be highly competitive and commensurate with experience. Our client offers a generous benefits package.

• Results-oriented and flexible culture.