Vice President, Economic Mobility

Position Overview: The Vice President of Economic Mobility is an equity-centered, highly collaborative leader responsible for advancing EDC’s economic mobility initiative. This is an exciting opportunity for a business- and equity-centered leader to drive strategies that advance economic justice by expanding access to quality jobs, strengthening worker voice, and building pathways to family-sustaining careers.

Reporting to the Senior Vice President of Equity, this role serves as a strategic partner to senior and executive leadership, co-creating and executing strategies to build, scale and lead EDC’s equity-focused Diverse Entrepreneurship and Workforce Development strategies.

The Vice President of Economic Mobility provides dynamic leadership and administrative oversight of the following: Diverse Entrepreneurship, Placed Based Criteria, business partnerships, workforce development, CBO’s, SBS and academia to advance NYCEDC’s priorities across key verticals, including urban planning and community development, real asset management, and industry growth (e.g. life sciences, tech, industrial, fashion, cyber technology, green economy, offshore winds etc.).  

Essential Duties & Responsibilities:

• Leadership & Strategy:
  • Partner with the Senior Vice President of Equity and Executive Leadership Team to shape and implement long-term economic mobility strategies aligned with EDC’s mission and industry growth priorities.
  • Lead a portfolio spanning economic mobility, BIPOC and diverse entrepreneurship, workforce development, and pathways to quality employment – ensuring measurable outcomes related to living wages, benefits, career advancement and wealth building. Supervise the Economic Mobility team.
  • Lead on the implementation of the organization’s economic mobility planning, placed based criteria and engagement efforts in key cross-departmental projects.
  • Operate effectively in a high-growth, fast-paced environment, balancing multiple complex initiatives and adjusting strategy as conditions evolve.
  • Drive for goal completion and makes adjustments as new demands emerge.
  • Serves as an expert resource both internally and externally for selected economic issues, such as equitable economic development, workforce development, supplier diversity, diverse entrepreneurship.
• Manage Internal Systems:
  • Oversee daily operations including management of KPIs, creates project plans that define actions, stakeholder responsibilities and anticipated progress measures.
  • Strategic Coherence: Provide direction and support to internal colleagues and external partner organizations in aligning their work to a common agenda (e.g., identifying opportunities for program work and systems to support specific goals)
• Partnership and Stakeholder Engagement:
  • Ensure collaboration continues in an effective and team-oriented manner. Relationship management of internal and external partners is a vital role of this position.
  • Provide internal and external leadership to support advancement of economic initiative goals; develop, coach, and facilitate collaboration among economic mobility partners including employers, stakeholders, community-based organizations & city agencies.
  • Design partnership frameworks and proposals based on analysis of a prospective partner organization’s mission and their objectives, capacity, and alignment with EDC’s priorities.
• Data Collection, Analysis and Reporting:
  • Work with strategic partners to refine data points and indicators and identify sources and data collection methods for both qualitative and quantitative measures.
  • Conduct primary and secondary quantitative and qualitative research to develop data-driven hypotheses and deliver clear, effective recommendations to address complex problems.
  • Maintain fluency in and regularly review KPIs, project plans, and performance metrics tied to economic justice outcomes.( (e.g., wage thresholds, benefit access, retention, advancement, union pathways).
  • Managing data collection, performing metrics analysis, and writing key reports.
• Communication:
  • Provide subject matter consultation to project teams across the organization on variety of economic mobility topics.
  • Create and deliver presentations and memos that effectively communicate project milestones, findings and recommendations to various audiences (e.g., senior EDC staff, City Hall, partners, etc.)
  • Supporting content writing (e.g., articles, newsletters), operations (social media, website) and other duties
  • As needed, serve as spokesperson, representative, and ambassador of EDC at workforce development public events and conferences
  • Perform other duties as assigned.

Qualifications:

• Expertise in equitable economic development, economic justice framework strongly preferred.
• Master’s degree in social work, business, public policy, urban planning or related field preferred; and/or at least seven years of relevant work experience, including at least three years managing collaborative teams in a fast-paced nonprofit, community organizing, public sector, social enterprise, or start-up environment.
• Demonstrated ability to work in close partnership with senior and executive leadership and to drive cross-functional collaboration across complex organizations.
• Demonstrated ability to lead in a fast-paced environment with a track record of managing complexity, shifting priorities, and competing deadlines.
• Advanced strategy and planning skills, including an ability to think strategically on both organizational and systemic levels over multi-year horizons.
• Familiarity with the local area and workforce development and diverse entrepreneurship best practices
• Demonstrated experience advancing initiatives that promote living wages, benefits, union pathways, worker voice and career mobility.
• Proven experience leading cross-sector teams to design and implement economic mobility strategies that improve outcomes for specific demographic groups—particularly communities historically excluded from opportunity—while aligning with current and future industry workforce needs.
• Demonstrated track record of identifying and engaging key strategic external partners (individual or institutional) for the purpose of building collaborative initiatives to deliver programs, services, industry partnerships, etc.
• Must be a New York City resident within 180 days of hire