Vice President, Innovative Partnerships for Health Equity (Chicago/Hybrid)

Description

Work. Serve. Thrive.

Imagine a place where your talent can make a meaningful difference in peoples' lives. Working at Feeding America is a uniquely rewarding experience in which our employees work together as vital parts of a much larger mission. We are innovative, mission-focused, diverse, collaborative, values-driven and focused on results.

Feeding America is the nation's second largest charity and the leading domestic hunger-relief charity in the United States. Our mission is to feed America's hungry through a nationwide network of member food banks and engage our country in the fight to end hunger.

Learn more about Feeding America here.

This position is based out of Feeding America's new office location in the heart of downtown Chicago. At Feeding America, we believe in offering a flexible work environment. Employees can be in the office an average of 2-3 days a week (when not travelling for work) and work from home on other days. Employees also have access to a 30-day "work anywhere" program during the course of each calendar year that can be combined with PTO and/or holidays.
The Opportunity

Reporting to the Executive Vice President of Innovation, the Vice President of Innovative Partnerships for Health Equity provides vision, leadership, and priority-setting for the strategic partnerships, interventions, innovations, and programs that engage communities and seek to improve the health and wellbeing of neighbors experiencing food insecurity. This role is responsible for leading a strong, high-performing team of innovation-minded subject matter experts focused on health and nutrition - including a range of health equity approaches, healthcare partnerships and models, community-centered interventions, and nutrition efforts. By leveraging internal and external partnerships, the Vice President will be responsible for developing and executing their team's multi-year strategy, as well as serving on the Department Leadership Team to support the Innovation department's and Feeding America's strategic plans. Deep knowledge and expertise of health equity, community nutrition, strategic relationships across health systems, health policy, and the relationships between social determinants of health, race, and place will be vital to the success of this role.

Salary Range: $137,000 to $175,000+ Based on Experience

Responsibilities:

• Develop, in partnership with internal and external stakeholders, a 2030 strategic plan for the team that supports Feeding America's strategic, measurement, and process frameworks.
• Coach and develop a team of multi-disciplinary subject matter experts focused on healthcare partnerships and models, community-centered interventions, health equity approaches, and community nutrition efforts.
• Ensure the development of strategically aligned and outcomes-driven health and nutrition models, partnerships, and commitments, while collaborating closely with external funders and partners, neighbors and communities, network members, and internal departments (e.g., Government Relations, Research, Strategic Capacity Development, Marketing, Equity, Fundraising).
• Work regularly with other departments on developing transformative revenue and non-revenue generating strategic partnerships and alliances (e.g., nonprofits, health plans, medical providers, national, state and local agencies, philanthropy, other relationships) that aim to increase - through shared goals - impact for and with people facing hunger; this includes opportunities to meet neighbors' needs, solve long-term food insecurity, and reduce racial and place-based gaps in food insecurity and adverse health outcomes.
• Bring a deep understanding of health, racial, and place-based equity, community nutrition, strategic relationships in and affecting health systems, policies, and social determinants of health, so as to support the conceptualization and execution of strategic innovation programming and partnerships.
• Serve on the Innovation Department Leadership Team, providing counsel and insight to the strategic work and cross-departmental collaborations impacting Innovation and Feeding America, as well as the department's evolution to a more neighbor-centered, co-creation innovation process.
• Oversee and manage a multi-million-dollar annual team budget, taxonomy, and related expense reporting, with the support and engagement of Member Grants, Finance, and team members.
• Cultivate strong relationships and trust with network members (e.g., Chief Executive Officers/Executive Directors, health and nutrition senior leaders) and external partners, while developing an understanding of their expertise, innovation efforts, and collaboration opportunities (e.g., advisory council).
• Represent Feeding America as the health and nutrition subject matter expert at internal and public events (e.g., policy hearings, media requests, conferences, webinars, forums, and similar events).
• Participate as an active member on internal/external committees, as needed/requested.
• Over 40% Travel

Required Experience and Qualifications:

• 10+ years of experience in health innovation, public health, community nutrition, healthcare, health policy, social determinants of health, or related fields.
• 10+ years of experience designing, building, and executing programs and continuous improvement efforts - with an innovation mindset - to address social determinants of health.
• 8+ years in progressively responsible management-level positions with experience coaching and supervising diverse staff and growing teams.
• Skills in design-thinking, systems-thinking, human-centered design, and community engagement strongly preferred.

Foundational Requirements:

• Mission Focused - Demonstrates a commitment to Feeding America's mission through work and action. Is committed to people keep people facing hunger at the center of our work and strives to translate this commitment into action on a daily basis. Willing to advocate for people facing hunger and serve as an ambassador for Feeding America inside and outside of work.
• Embraces Equity, Diversity and Inclusion - Demonstrates a personal commitment to valuing different background and life experiences through word and action. Takes personal actions to build an inclusive culture that ensures everyone can fully contribute based on their unique talents, skills and perspectives and feels welcomed and valued. Commits to driving equitable solutions to address root cause issues by incorporating an equity framework in their daily work. Committed to continuous personal EDI development.

Required Leadership Competencies:

• Coaches and Develops Talent and Teams: Spends a generous amount of time coaching, mentoring, and providing helpful feedback to others. Allocates resources for development and creates strategic growth opportunities for talent across the organization. Creates a development-focused culture by speaking regularly with staff at all levels about their career interests and development. Focuses on building a deep talent bench and has succession plans for direct report positions. Demonstrates commitment to talent development through active involvement in all phases of talent management cycle, including recruiting, performance, development, and compensation.
• Fosters Innovation: Ensures that systems and processes are in place to identify new ideas, scan for best practices, share learnings, and drive continuous improvement. Evaluates trends in best-in-class organizations and assesses organizational processes to pursue opportunities for improvement. Mobilizes people across the organization to seek and use innovative internal and external ideas in support of achieving our strategic goals. Contributes to organizational learning by recognizing successful innovations and sharing insights from unsuccessful experimental efforts.
• Establishes Vision and Crafts Strategy: Creates function/department strategy and goals that are aligned with organization-wide goals and those of other functions/departments. Identifies and anticipates industry, political and environmental trends likely to affect operations and proposes appropriate mitigation strategies.
• Collaborates Internally & Externally: Promotes an integrated, collaborative approach to solving challenges by reaching out to and engaging people from other departments, across the Network, and with external partners. Acts as a sounding-board resource for others and reaches out to colleagues to provide support. Looks beyond own area to make sure the right person or resource is involved in discussions. De-escalates and depersonalizes conflict to find common ground and focus conversations on our shared mission and the people we serve. Rejects others' finger-pointing and preserves others' reputations while addressing concerns.
• Manages for Results/Delegates Effectively: Creates a culture of accountability by communicating and holding self and others to high performance standards, ensuring efficient use of organization and department resources, and delivering against agreed-upon goals. Reinforces a systems perspective to diagnose organizational issues and improve processes and outcomes. Engages representatives of those who need to execute plans in the creation of feasible approaches to implementing them. Monitors strategic progress and provides transparent feedback to all levels of the organization. Uses performance management processes effectively and provides helpful feedback to others. Empowers those closest to a situation to make and own decisions and supports them even when decisions are not perfectly aligned to own preferences.

Feeding America recognizes and values diversity. Our goal is to attract, develop, retain, and promote a talented diverse workforce where all employees feel a sense of belonging and contribute to a culture that values differences, ideas, and experiences. We intentionally seek out diverse perspectives and skills on our teams, knowing that it makes us stronger as an organization and better equipped to serve our neighbors in need. We encourage individuals from historically under-represented communities and individuals with lived experience of hunger to apply.