Director of Service Initiatives and Special Projects

Unidos MN is an immigrant led, women led, BIPOC majority, multiracial, statewide organization building power for Minnesotan working families to advance social, racial, and environmental justice. Born out of the immigration justice movement, our work centers immigration reform, democracy, education, healthcare, workers' rights, and climate justice.

We organize across Minnesota through a dual structure, pairing a 501(c)(3) with a 501(c)(4) so that our base can move from the doorstep to the ballot to the capitol without losing a step. Our model grows from the relational organizing tradition: we build one to one relationships, we develop leaders out of our own base, and we ask people to act on what they say they care about.

Over the past two years, Unidos MN has stood at the center of Minnesota's response to federal immigration enforcement. Through Project Monarca, we trained more than fifty thousand Minnesotans as constitutional observers and upstanders during Operation Metro Surge and Operation Parris, grounding that training in the First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendments and in the practice of showing up for a neighbor. That same network now carries our 2026 election protection work. Alongside it, we gather community testimony through our Preventive Truth Commission, we advance the Democracy, Freedom and Shared Prosperity Agenda with candidates and elected officials, and we build community wealth through the Rise Up Center, including Future Builders, a worker owned construction cooperative, and Mercado Unidos in Shakopee.

We hold a simple conviction: organizing is public love. The programs in this position exist because our community needs someone to answer the phone at the worst moment of their week, and because our community deserves a path into dignified work and ownership after that moment passes.

ABOUT THE PROGRAMS

Monarca Dispatch is the operational heart of our rapid response infrastructure. Operators receive reports from community members, verify what is happening, document it to a standard that holds up in legal and public settings, and move confirmed incidents to legal, communications, and organizing leads. Dispatch runs steady in quiet weeks and surges hard during enforcement operations and election periods.

Our workforce development program moves community members into living wage careers and into ownership. The program connects participants to training, credentialing, employer placements, and the building trades, and it feeds our worker owned cooperative model. It carries public and philanthropic funding, including Minnesota DEED programs, with the reporting requirements that come with it.

POSITION SUMMARY

The Director of Service Initiatives and Special Projects leads the programs our community relies on in real time. This role supervises the operators who staff Monarca Dispatch and directs our workforce development program, holding both teams to a standard of readiness, accuracy, and care.

Working in close partnership with the Executive Director, the Director provides strategic and operational leadership across both program areas, including staff supervision, budgeting, resource development, programmatic grant compliance, and evaluation. This includes maintaining dispatch protocols and escalation pathways, managing participant pathways into living wage careers and ownership, securing and stewarding program funding, and building the measurement systems that show what the work produces.

This role plays a critical part in converting community need into dependable service, and in ensuring that the organization can prove, fund, and improve the programs people call on in moments of crisis and in moments of opportunity.

REPORTING & TEAM STRUCTURE

The Director of Service Initiatives and Special Projects reports to the Executive Director. The Director has day-to-day decision-making authority over program operations, staffing, protocols, and program budgets within approved organizational plans and policies.

The Director supervises Monarca Dispatch operators and workforce development program staff, and is responsible for program performance, staffing and shift coverage, protocol integrity, program budgets, funder relationships, quality control and outcome reporting. The Director coordinates closely with policy, communications, organizing, data, and executive leads, and carries special projects assigned by the Executive Director.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

Program Strategy, Budget & Risk

• Set annual goals, operating plans, staffing priorities, and success measures for both program areas.

• Develop and manage program budgets, monitor spending and forecasts, and make resource recommendations in partnership with finance and executive leadership.

• Identify operational, staffing, compliance, and data privacy risks and bring clear recommendations to executive leadership.

Monarca Dispatch Operations

• Supervise the dispatch operator team, including hiring, onboarding, scheduling, shift coverage, coaching, and performance review

• Maintain and strengthen protocols for intake, verification, escalation, and closure of community reports

• Maintain strong confidentiality, data access, retention, and privacy practices for sensitive community and incident information, in coordination with Data and Policy teams.

• Hold the escalation ladder, routing verified incidents to legal, communications, and organizing leads within agreed timeframes

• Serve as the operational escalation point for calls that carry legal, safety, or emotional complexity, promptly engaging legal, executive, or other specialized support when needed.

• Own the dispatch record system, including call logs, verification standards, incident documentation, and reporting that meets established organizational, confidentiality, legal, and funder requirements.

• Run debriefs, scenario rehearsals, and skills practice so operators stay sharp between surges

• Coordinate with Project Monarca trainers so dispatch practice matches what observers learn in the field

• Track patterns across reports and translate them into trends for organizing, legal, and public advocacy strategy

Workforce Development Program

• Direct day to day operations of the program, including outreach, intake, assessment, placement, and follow through

• Supervise program staff and coordinate closely with the Rise Up Center and the Future Builders worker owned construction cooperative

• Build and steward relationships with employers, unions, building trades, training providers, and community partners

• Design participant support that sustain placements, including transportation, credentialing, language access, and connections to additional services

• Keep the program aligned with our conviction that dignified work and ownership build lasting community power

• Own and advance the workforce development advocacy portfolio, advocating alongside program participants and workers in employer, union, funder, government, coalition, and public settings so their experiences and priorities shape program and policy decisions.

Supervision & Staff Development

• Supervise operators and program staff with clear expectations, regular individual supervision meetings, and direct feedback

• Develop each person on the team and build a pipeline that moves operators and participants into deeper roles inside the organization

• Model the standard we set in public: accuracy over speed, verified information over rumor, and steady presence in moments of fear

• Attend to the wellbeing of a team that absorbs difficult material daily, including debriefing practice and sustainable scheduling

Fundraising & Resource Development

• Partner with the Executive Director and development staff to identify, cultivate, and secure funding for both program areas across foundation, corporate, government, and individual sources

• Draft program narratives, budgets, work plans, and logic models for proposals and letters of inquiry

• Own programmatic grant compliance, in coordination with development and finance, including deliverable tracking, documentation, interim and final reports, and site visit preparation; monitor spending against grant requirements with finance staff.

• Serve as the program expert in funder meetings and donor briefings, translating operational detail into a clear case for support

• Maintain a funder calendar that keeps renewals, reports, and new opportunities on schedule

• Build the revenue mix for workforce development, including employer contributions, training reimbursements, and public workforce dollars

• Surface stories and data that strengthen fundraising and communications, always with participant consent

Evaluation & Learning

• Define outcome measures for both program areas, including response time, verification protocols and documentation quality, escalation follow through, participant placement, retention, wage gains, and movement into ownership roles

• Build and maintain the data collection and reporting systems in coordination with data and technology staff, with attention to accuracy, consistency, confidentiality, and appropriate access.

• Produce monthly dashboards for the Executive Director and quarterly reports for the leadership team and board

• Lead learning cycles with staff, using after action reviews, participant feedback, and data review to adjust practice

• Design feedback loops that give participants and community members real influence over program design

• Manage relationships with external evaluators, academic partners, and technical assistance providers

• Translate findings into organizational learning, funder reporting, and public advocacy

Special Projects & Organizational Response

• Lead time bound initiatives assigned by the Executive Director that align with organizational strategy, service delivery, or cross-functional operational needs, including program pilots, and rapid launches.

• Carry operational responsibility during organizational emergency response, enforcement surges, and election periods

• Represent Unidos MN in coalition tables, partner meetings, and public settings as assigned

WHAT SUCCESS LOOKS LIKE IN THE FIRST YEAR

• Dispatch runs on documented protocols with trained operators, full shift coverage, and records that hold up under legal and funder review

• Workforce development participants move through a clear pathway with placement and retention numbers we can report with confidence

• Both programs carry a funding plan with renewals secured and new proposals in motion

• Leadership, staff, and board see the same picture of program performance through regular reporting

• Operators and program staff describe their supervision as clear, developmental, and steady

WHO YOU ARE:

You are a steady, systems minded leader who builds order that holds up under pressure. You supervise people well, you make sound decisions with incomplete information, and you keep your footing when a situation moves quickly.

You care about the details that protect people: an accurate log, a verified report, a participant who stays in their placement, a grant report submitted on time. You understand that service delivery and organizing strengthen each other, and you take pride in running programs that people trust in the hardest moments of their lives.

You believe that the people closest to the harm belong at the center of the response, and you carry that belief into how you hire, supervise, and design.

REQUIRED EXPERIENCE & SKILLS:

• Five or more years of experience in program management, operations, organizing, case management, or a related field

• Two or more years supervising staff, with a track record of developing people

• Full professional fluency in Spanish and English, spoken and written

• Strong systems thinking, with experience building procedures, schedules, and documentation that other people follow

• Comfort with spreadsheets, databases, and CRM or case management systems

• Experience managing grant-funded programs and program budgets, including proposal development, deliverable tracking, compliance, or funder reporting.

• Experience defining outcome measures and using data to improve a program

• Sound judgment under pressure and comfort in fast paced, high variability environments

• Commitment to immigrant rights, worker power, and community led change

Experience in electoral, advocacy, nonprofit, or movement organizations is helpful but not required.

HOURS AND COMPENSATION

• Salary range: Starting at $78,000 - $90,000, commensurate with experience

• Premium Blue Cross Blue Shield Zero Deductible Plan, with 100% premium coverage for employees and 70% premium coverage for dependents—an employer-paid benefit valued up to $22,000 annually.

• Vision and dental insurance coverage included.

• Generous Paid Time Off (PTO): Vacation days plus additional office-wide breaks throughout the year.

• Leadership & Professional Development: Opportunities to grow within Unidos MN, including access to skill-building workshops and leadership training.

• Cell phone stipend

This is a full-time position with a six-month probation period. This position requires regular evening and weekend work and periodic after-hours availability during enforcement surges and election periods. Unidos MN supports sustainable scheduling and adjusted work hours following high-intensity periods.

Helpful but Not Required

• Experience with hotline, dispatch, or rapid response operations, workforce development, apprenticeship, cooperative development, or public workforce funding is helpful.

• Experience managing government-funded workforce programs, contracts, or reimbursements, including Minnesota DEED funding

• Proficiency in additional languages such as Somali, Oromo, Hmong, Amharic, Mam, or Quechua

• Lived experience in the communities Unidos MN serves

• Experience in a dual 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) organization

How to Apply

Send a cover letter indicating areas and issues of interest, a resume, and three work related references to emilia@unidos-mn.org. Position open until filled.

Unidos MN is an equal opportunity employer. We welcome applicants of every background, and we encourage immigrants, women, people of color, LGBTQ people, and people with disabilities to apply. We provide accommodations throughout the hiring process on request.

All applicants must have reliable transportation, a smartphone, a valid driver's license, and proof of valid auto insurance.