Vice President of Campaigns: Ballot Initiatives

Reporting to the Head of Program, this Vice President of Campaigns: Ballot Initiatives is accountable for delivering policy victories that advance primary reform in states across the country, helping Unite America deliver on its mission to win nonpartisan election reform that realigns political incentives and puts voters first. This role leads Unite America's multi-state, multi-pronged strategy to protect and win open, all-candidate primary reforms largely through ballot initiative pathways. This VP oversees a small team of both full-time staff and consultants who complete state diligence, make investment recommendations, manage grants, develop state strategies from ground-softening through implementation, provide strategic and hands-on operating support to state partners, and provide updates internally and externally. This role will work closely with the Vice President of Campaigns: Legislative Initiatives to defend and advance primary reform; they will also partner with the External Affairs and Policy department leaders within our Program team. The ideal candidate is a seasoned operative who has experience leading a portfolio of campaigns with deep political campaign experience, a demonstrated track record of success, a passion for structural reform, and the leadership skills to deliver impact at scale.

Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

Campaign Strategy and Leadership

• Drive a strategic, portfolio-level approach to state-based campaign work—ensuring the team focuses on the highest-impact campaigns and develops the pipeline of future campaign opportunities by weighing tradeoffs and prioritizing based on organizational goals, staff capacity, financial resource allocation, risk, and field intelligence.
• Develop and then execute, with support from a small team, state strategies by providing strategic and financial support to win legislative and ballot campaigns.
• Drive planning and execution—including budgeting, project management, KPI tracking, and post-campaign evaluation—and communicate progress and outcomes to organizational leadership.
• Identify and evaluate new opportunities for policy impact.
• Foster strategic alignment and collaboration with peer funders to amplify impact and advance shared policy objectives.
• Effectively and persuasively communicate and represent Unite America's strategy and priorities with internal and external stakeholders—including the board, funders, and partners—to build alignment and momentum.

Team Management

• Manage, coach, and mentor a small team, setting clear expectations, aligning individual goals with campaign strategy, providing regular feedback, and removing obstacles to support strong performance.
• Monitor team capacity and align resources with evolving priorities, including proactively designing future team structure, supporting staffing plans, and ensuring the team is resourced to deliver impact at scale.
• Foster a high-performing, inclusive team culture, and support ongoing professional development for all direct reports.
• Oversee and integrate the work of consultants and contractors, ensuring alignment with team goals and efficient use of external support.

Organizational Alignment and Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Embody organizational values and cultivate them in team members and ensure adherence with organizational norms and policies.
• Foster collaboration and communication between the Campaigns team and other functions and departments within the organization, ensuring alignment and resolving ambiguity.
• Represent the perspective of your department and direct reports within the organization and ensure effective and transparent communication of strategic plans, decisions, and progress back to your departmental teams.
• Advise and collaborate on new strategies (outside of Campaign's direct work) to achieve the organization's objectives, in alignment with core values, including evaluation of new opportunities and assessment for risks, feasibility, mission-alignment, viability, and impact.
• Ensure responsible stewardship of resources, effective budget management practices, and compliance with fiscal and legal policies.

• A strong desire to fix a broken political system and a passion for primary reform
• 10+ years of experience, with at least 5 years in a management role, including remote employee management
• Successful management of teams overseeing state campaign portfolios (particularly ballot campaigns) across the country, ensuring collaboration, coordination, and strategic resource allocation and the proven ability to align campaign efforts with organization-wide strategic goals
• Familiarity with grantmaking and philanthropic strategy and processes is preferred, not required
• Strong alignment and commitment to Unite America's mission, vision, culture, and values
• Entrepreneurial self-starter with strong critical thinking skills and proven ability to effectively manage details, recognize trends, analyze data, and make strategic recommendations
• Strong relationship builder and networker with ability to quickly build rapport and establish trust and respect among colleagues, our grantees, partners, and other stakeholders
• Track record of developing, managing, and driving multi-faceted projects and initiatives
• Exceptional leadership qualities with the ability to inspire and lead a high-performing team
• Solutions orientation with proven track record of identifying gaps and recommending improvements
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills with the ability to represent Unite America in many environments

Location & Travel
Flexible location; candidates must be authorized to work in the U.S. Unite America is a hybrid workplace, with about half of the staff working on site in our Denver office three days a week.

This person may be expected to travel 2-4 times per month for both campaign efforts and broader organizational needs (team meetings, retreats, etc).

Unite America believes that there is strength in diversity and strongly encourages candidates from diverse backgrounds and from across the political and ideological spectrum to apply. Like Unite America, On-Ramps is deeply committed to equity. We believe social change happens when people with a wide range of backgrounds, experiences, and identities come together with a common purpose.