About Rare

Rare is a fast-growing, international environmental organization that runs social marketing campaigns to change the behaviors of communities that live in, and around, areas of important biodiversity.   Over the past five years, the organization has tripled its staff and quintupled its budget – a result of burgeoning demand throughout our sector for more innovative methods to engage local communities, and change the way they relate to dwindling natural resources. To that end, Rare searches the globe for replicable, sustainable environmental success stories, and then trains conservation leaders to develop and market these proven practices to benefit both community livelihoods and biodiversity. 

Rare’s impact is delivered via its Pride program, a powerful blend of local capacity building, the replication of technical solutions, and grassroots communications for behavior change that has been empowering local conservation leaders since 1988 at more than 200 sites around the world. Rare Pride focuses on building support for conservation at the community level and is centered on three-year intensive social marketing campaigns launched in collaboration with NGO, government, and international partners.   By catalyzing in-country private and public sector funding, shifting behavior toward more sustainable practices, and focusing attention on critically threatened ecosystems and species, Rare’s Pride campaigns dramatically build momentum for conservation – ultimately creating the constituencies necessary for initiating legislative reform, creating new protected areas, and saving the habitats of those species on the brink of extinction.

Rare is committed to hiring entrepreneurial, best-in-their-field staff at all levels of the organization -- each staff member at Rare possesses a desire to change the way non-profits do business and to help scale an exciting model for social change.

Position Overview

The primary purpose of this position is to provide technical assistance, professional development training, and management support in the area of social marketing to Rare’s Pride campaigns around the world. The successful applicant will help provide:

• Technical assistance in the design and development of environmental social marketing campaigns including reviewing/advising on audience segmentation, messaging strategies, material design and monitoring for efficacy.
• Write, review and revise curriculum content for Rare’s Pride MA in communications for conservation, which is taught at universities on three continents in collaboration with the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP); as well as prepare curricula and teach social marketing at internal and external workshops for Rare’s own staff and our partners.
• Prepare and present (at appropriate venues) technical peer-reviewed papers on Rare’s approach to social marketing and lessons learned from campaign implementation.

Rare is seeking an individual with a broad knowledge of social marketing in the public health, economic development and, ideally, environmental field. These skills should be complemented with a willingness to work with staff and partners globally to help make Rare’s campaigns an industry-wide “gold standard”.

The Director will work closely with Rare’s leadership team and our field programs around the world to develop cost-effective, sustainable campaigns that lead to resource-use behavior change, and ultimately threat reduction and biodiversity conservation -- in accordance with the organization’s vision and strategic plan. The ideal candidate will have a demonstrable record as an innovator in the field, and serve as a catalyst within Rare to establish leading practices in the field of social marketing.   This position not only requires a professional level of technical knowledge in social marketing and communications, but also strong administrative, training and management skills since some of the work will involve capacity development and institutionalization within Rare.

Areas of Responsibility/Performance Expectations

• Consultation and Technical Assistance to Regions (Asia/Pacific including China; Latin America and the English-speaking World)

Provide technical assistance and consultation to our regional teams in social marketing and communication.

o    Support the design of social marketing strategies for a cohort of Pride campaigns.  Issues that require advising include:

§  Assessment of the target audience

§  What are the barriers to behavior change

§  What previous work has been done on this theme

§  What is the estimated cost of the change proposed

§  How many earlier adopters of the change are necessary to create social tipping points

o    Work directly with Pride Program Managers and other regional staff — who have been assigned to teach, mentor and monitor Pride campaigns.  This will include reviewing Project Plans (audience segmentation, creative briefs, marketing mix, benefit/barrier strategies etc), as well as draft campaign materials. This employee will be a primary source of support and assistance for the regions in areas of social marketing and communication.

• Content preparation and/or review for continuous improvements to Rare’s Pride curriculum

A primary responsibility of this employee will be to provide and/or review existing social marketing content for the MA Curriculum. This will include provision of case studies, new tools and ensuring that what is taught is “cutting-edge” in terms of the latest innovations in social marketing. S/he is likely to also be involved in conducting training in the areas of social marketing and effective communication, thus expanding the capacity of Rare to support and teach concepts as part of its work. In some cases, this employee may be asked to assist with developing social marketing capacity for our local partners via workshops and other venues. This may include working with Rare’s Director of Training to produce e-learning modules

• Design, Build and Maintain a Marketing Mix Optimization Tool

This model would integrate our past campaigns with industry leading research to create a marketing mix optimization tool that would guide each campaign manager in designing the marketing mix.  Illustrative questions addressed are:

o    What is the best way to reach that target audience e.g. farmers, fishers

o    How often do I need to reach them to influence knowledge

o    What are the best tools to stimulate interpersonal communication

o    What is the role of influencers

o    How should we reach influencers

• Administrative and Management Capacity Development to Support Social Marketing

This employee will be expected to initiate and manage an information dissemination program to inform Rare’s staff and our partners about recent developments in the field of social marketing and communication.

• Preparation and presentation of peer-reviewed papers

This employee will be expected to write and present papers for publication in peer-reviewed journals and to present at appropriate domestic and international conferences. This will include a paper or papers on Rare’s approach to social marketing.

• Other Responsibilities

This position will have routine responsibilities which will include participation in meetings as assigned by the supervisor, Rare’s annual retreat, occasional board meetings, etc. The employee will also be required to develop an annual work plan that will be the basis for his/her work. This plan, along with regular progress reports, will be provided to the supervisor and evaluated against appropriate performance measures.

Required Qualifications (Skills & Knowledge, and Abilities)

• MBA, MA or MS degree in Social marketing, Market Research, New Product Development or a related field. 
• Advanced knowledge of the principles, practices and procedures relevant to social marketing is required
• At least 10 years experience in developing and implementing social marketing campaigns ideally in the developing tropics.
• Experience in planning campaigns and evaluating their efficacy; including producing evidence of ROI, and the analysis of quantitative and qualitative data
• Ability to work well and communicate effectively cross-culturally; role includes serving multiple constituencies and moving initiatives forward, as well as report writing and presentation
• Demonstrated ability to develop sound recommendations and effectively direct and evaluate the work of others.     
• Superior interpersonal, organizational, and communication skills are essential
• Proficiency in MS Office (Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint). 
• Fluency in English; Spanish, Chinese or Bahasa Indonesian language skills preferred
• Ability to and willingness to travel internationally roughly 25% of the time

Personal Attributes

• Commitment to Rare’s values, approach to conservation impact, and vision.
• Inspires others within the organization.
• Visionary, thought leader who proactively make positive changes within his/her program.
• Integrity.
• Productive work ethic; willing to pay attention to details as necessary.
• Capable of initiating and planning program and organizational change.
• Demonstrated mentoring/conflict resolution abilities.
• Able to delegate effectively.
• Strong empathy with local people, the rural poor, and development challenges facing local communities.
• Demonstrated commitment to community-based conservation and local empowerment.

Compensation & Benefits

Rare not only inspires conservation, we also inspire our employees. In addition to generous health insurance coverage, a retirement savings plan, and generous vacation/holiday leave time, Rare’s benefits include an annual training budget for continuous learning and growth, a bonus plan that ties to individual and organizational performance, and a flexible and fun work environment. And to make sure no one gets cabin fever, there’s an annual staff retreat that brings every staff member together to support our work around the world.

To Apply

Please email a resume and thoughtful cover letter, both in Word format, outlining how your skills and experience meet the qualifications of the position and stating how you heard about this opportunity to Kristen Carson-Owens, Manager of Human Resources at humres@rareconservation.org. Subject line of the email should read, “Director, Social Marketing.”  Please also indicate your ideal salary requirements. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis.

Rare is an equal opportunity employer and diverse candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.

Location:                               Arlington, VA