Managing Director UniverCity Alliance

University of Wisconsin Madison • Madison, WI

7d

About The Position

The Managing Director of UniverCity Alliance provides strategic leadership and administrative oversight for a statewide partnership program that connects Wisconsin local governments with University of Wisconsin - Madison resources to advance community-identified priorities. Housed within the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, UniverCity Alliance brings together students, faculty, instructors, and community partners to address pressing local challenges through collaborative engagement rooted in the Wisconsin Idea. The Managing Director leads program planning, implementation, evaluation, and outreach efforts while fostering strong partnerships between the university and local governments. This role is responsible for overseeing strategic initiatives, managing operational policies and budgets, supervising staff, and ensuring effective delivery of outreach programming across diverse communities. The Managing Director also leads fundraising and philanthropic engagement efforts to secure financial support from individuals, foundations, and corporate partners. The ideal candidate will bring strong leadership, communication, relationship-building, and organizational skills, along with experience in public sector collaboration, community engagement, and program management.

Requirements

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Excellent organizational skills
• Experience delivering and planning outreach program activities
• Experience promoting partnerships between institutions
• Leadership and/or management experience
• Undergraduate degree or equivalent in Public Administration, Non-Profit Management, Public Policy, Political Science, Urban Planning, or other social science fields. Applicants with relevant professional backgrounds but different degrees will be considered.

Nice To Haves

• Experience working with local governments
• Familiarity with urban studies and local government issues
• Experience with project management and facilitation
• Substantive knowledge of university-community relations
• Experience preparing for and monitoring a budget
• Experience recruiting, building relationships with, and organizing people from non-profit organizations, businesses, and/or local governments

Responsibilities

• Manage, design, develop, and implement fundraising strategies to secure private philanthropic support for the program from individuals, corporations, and foundations.
• Maintain and develop ongoing relationships to advance giving.
• Monitors the unit or program budget and approves program expenditures
• Supervises the implementation of outreach-program-focused strategic planning initiatives and objectives
• Reviews recommendations for and provides input on the design and development of new outreach programs or services
• Develops and implements operating policies and procedures to promote the outreach program in alignment with the strategic plan
• Determines outreach program needs and the personnel resource allocation plan
• May exercise supervisory authority, including hiring, transferring, suspending, promoting, managing conduct and performance, discharging, assigning, rewarding, disciplining, and/or approving hours worked of at least 2.0 FTE or equivalent employees

Benefits

• The University of Wisconsin System will not reveal the identities of applicants who request confidentiality in writing, except that the identity of the successful candidate will be released.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Manager