Chief Operating Officer

Families in Action for Quality Education•Oakland, CA

2d•Hybrid

About The Position

Founded in 2019, Families in Action for Quality Education (FIA) is a regional power-building organization rooted in the belief that Black and Brown families are the irreplaceable center of educational change. Over six years, FIA has grown from a local coalition into a Bay Area political force — cultivating family leadership that produces measurable academic outcomes, wins policy change, and is now sought by peer organizations and school districts across the region. FIA’s three-part model — Grassroots Leadership, Impactful Campaigns, and Grasstops Partnership — has delivered a 221% increase in students’ A-G eligibility knowledge after a single workshop, an 88% family reading-gains rate across Lit for Literacy schools, and a unanimous OUSD resolution to double reading and math proficiency for Black and Brown students by 2034. FIA now stands at an inflection point. With a board-approved 2030 growth strategy, new district partnerships, and a field increasingly looking to FIA for replication guidance, the organization is ready to grow with discipline — from a ~$1.8M operation today to ~$3.4M by FY29-30. The Chief Operating Officer is the organizational architecture that makes that growth possible. The Chief Operating Officer is a new and critical role at FIA. It is a strategic partner to the CEO — someone who holds the connective tissue of a growing organization: keeping strategy and execution aligned, translating vision into structured plans, managing the CEO’s highest-leverage priorities, and building the internal systems that allow FIA to grow without sacrificing quality or staff wellbeing. The ideal candidate is someone who has worked in — or worked closely with — both the programmatic and operational sides of a mission-driven organization, understands the rhythms of philanthropic fundraising, and brings both analytical rigor and relational depth to the work of organizational leadership. This role will be a thought partner on the 2030 growth strategy, own internal organizational design, lead cross-functional coordination, and support the CEO in FIA’s fundraising and external partnership efforts during a period of significant expansion.

Requirements

Deep alignment with FIA’s theory of change: that Black and Brown families, when properly equipped and organized, are the most powerful force for educational equity
7+ years of experience in the nonprofit, education, or public sector, with demonstrated leadership responsibility
Proven ability to manage complex, multi-stakeholder initiatives with clarity and follow-through
Experience working directly with or for executive leadership in a fast-paced, mission-driven environment
Strong written communication skills — you write with clarity, intentionality, and FIA’s voice in mind
Analytical ability to synthesize financial data, program metrics, and strategic information for diverse audiences (funders, board, staff, district partners)

Nice To Haves

Experience in K-12 education reform, family engagement, or community organizing
Experience in development or fundraising — particularly with institutional philanthropic funders
Familiarity with district-school partnership models and/or the Bay Area education landscape
Experience managing organizational growth, restructuring, or multi-year strategic planning
Bilingual (English/Spanish) a plus

Responsibilities

Serve as the CEO’s primary thought partner on strategy, organizational priorities, and stakeholder relationships
Manage the CEO’s time and attention — ensuring capacity is directed to the highest-impact work, and that commitments are followed through reliably
Prepare the CEO for board meetings, major donor conversations, district partnerships, and field-facing engagements
Track the organization’s annual and multi-year goals; provide regular synthesis of progress, risks, and decisions needed
Supervise, mentor, and coach the leadership team to ensure alignment with organizational goals, fostering a culture of accountability and continuous development while building a strong, cohesive team environment where collaboration, professional growth, and effective decision-making thrive across all functions.
Oversee leadership team step backs, and cross-team planning processes
Own the operational backbone of FIA’s four-year Power to Lead campaign including the expansion of Oakland Enrolls, coordinating across program, development, finance, and communications
Manage the launch of Lit for Literacy expansion with partner districts
Develop and maintain work plans, milestones, and accountability structures for each phase of the growth strategy
Identify risks to expansion timelines and proactively surface them to the CEO with proposed mitigations
Support the development of district-level partnership frameworks
Serve as a core member of FIA’s development capacity in conjunction with development consultant and CEO during the Power to Lead campaign, which seeks multi-year philanthropic support through FY30
Manage the development calendar and pipeline in coordination with the development consultant and CEO: tracking prospects, deadlines, reporting requirements, and relationship-cultivation touchpoints
Manage development consultant who drafts and edits grant proposals, donor reports, and funder communications — ensuring FIA’s story is told with precision and power
Coordinate the preparation of financial narratives, program data packages, and impact documentation for major funders
Support field partnership development — consulting and train-the-trainer arrangements that represent FIA’s emerging earned-revenue strategy
Lead the design and implementation at FIA as the organization scales from ~$2.4M to ~$3.4M
Address documented overallocation of program leadership (currently operating at 113–123% FTE on core programs alone) through role redesign, workload redistribution, and operational support structures
Develop and refine job descriptions, hiring and onboarding processes, and performance management systems for new roles added in each year of the growth plan
Build or optimize internal infrastructure — project management, knowledge management, staff communication, data collection, analysis and reporting processes — commensurate with the organization’s growing complexity
Partner with the CEO and board on compensation philosophy, staff performance systems, and organizational culture as FIA grows
Ensure that overhead investments are deployed strategically: protecting program staff from administrative burden while maintaining the financial discipline of FIA’s true-cost accounting model
Manage board relationships in partnership with the CEO
Work with the Operations Team to prepare materials for the board