Director of Partnerships & Pathways

Position: Director of Partnerships & Pathways

Reports to: EVP of Involvement

Lane: Involvement 

Job Summary

The Director of Partnerships & Pathways leads Thread’s strategy to ensure young people are not just connected to opportunities, but are equipped to move from surviving to thriving and to live self-directed lives of purpose. Core to Thread’s work is helping young people build self-efficacy, agency, and resilience through relationships, resources, and meaningful exposure to what is possible for their futures.To facilitate this, Thread has identified five core pathways for young people: Straight to Workforce, 2-Year/4-Year Academic Degree, Trade/Apprenticeship, Entrepreneurship and Military. This role ensures the strategy, partnerships, exposure opportunities, programs, and resource infrastructure are in place to make each pathway visible, accessible, actionable, and supported for young people.

This role sits at the intersection of Thread’s city and statewide programs and partnerships, setting the strategy for how Thread understands the demand among young people for meaningful opportunities while also building the supply of partners, programs, resources, and systems-level agreements needed to meet that demand.

The Director is responsible for the overall strategy of Thread’s career pathways and galvanizing the opportunities and resources to support young people on their journey, including how young people are educated about and exposed to post–high school pathways, how they get connected to the right program or support, and how Thread helps them persist through completion and to and through life. This role ensures that Thread’s Baltimore career programs, resource partnerships, employer relationships,  and public-system relationships are aligned to create clear, accessible, and high-quality routes to paid work, certification, education, civic resources, housing stability, and other opportunities that support young people’s journey.

Where the Sr Manager of Career Pathway Programs  manages day-to-day execution of signature employment programs such as Maryland Service Year and Baltimore City YouthWorks, and the Manager of Partnerships and Resources develops and stewards resource and barrier-removal partnerships, the Director of Partnerships & Pathways sets the overarching strategy, secures and stewards systems-level agreements, removes cross-system barriers, and coaches both roles to ensure the work is coordinated, high-quality, and aligned to Thread’s broader place-based strategy. The Director partners with the Director of Practice, Learning & Quality to ensure partnership and pathway work reflects Thread’s standards for high-fidelity relational and partnership practice. The Director also partners with the Director of Strategic Implementation & Operations to ensure partnership and pathway data, feedback, risks, and implementation needs are incorporated into Thread’s operating rhythm, reporting routines, and leadership decision-making.

Key Responsibilities

Baltimore Strategy & Opportunity Ecosystem

• Develop and lead Thread’s citywide strategy for expanding access to post–high school opportunities, including certification, employment and education, as well as resources that remove barriers to success.
• Define the strategy for how young people are exposed to opportunities, connected to citywide and statewide programs or resources, and supported through participation, persistence, and completion.
• Hold the intersection of supply and demand: ensuring Thread understands young people’s needs, interests, and barriers while also building the partner, program, employer, and resource infrastructure needed to meet them.
• Map Baltimore’s and Maryland’s civic, education, workforce, employer, public-system, and resource landscapes to identify where deeper partnerships create the greatest leverage for young people.
• Ensure citywide programs and partnerships are aligned to Thread’s broader place-based strategy and integrated with site-based engagement across communities.

• Secure, negotiate, and steward citywide and statewide agreements with government agencies, public systems, anchor institutions, employers, civic partners, and other systems-level partners.
• Own senior relationships with key institutions such as Baltimore City Public Schools, the Mayor’s Office, MOED, state agencies, employer partners, civic institutions, and other public or anchor systems.
• Advance systems-level access to jobs, city services, civic resources, and other supports that expand opportunity and reduce barriers for young people.
• Secure data-sharing agreements where appropriate to give Thread greater visibility into the barriers, opportunities, and outcomes young people experience across city and state systems.
• Ensure major agreements include clear commitments, defined outcomes, reciprocal value, data-sharing terms where relevant, succession planning, and multiple points of contact.
• Monitor the health, follow-through, and strategic value of systems-level agreements, proactively addressing gaps or barriers that require director-level intervention.
• Partner with legal, finance, risk management, practice and learning functions to ensure agreements are sound, consistent, and well-governed.

Pathway Strategy, Partnerships & Barrier Removal

• Drive the strategy that makes Thread’s five core pathways — Straight to Workforce, 2- and 4- Year Academic Degree, Trade/Apprenticeship, Entrepreneurship, and Military — visible, accessible, actionable, and supported for young people.
• Ensure each pathway has a clear strategy for education, exposure, participation, persistence, completion, and next-step opportunity.
• Build and steward the partnerships, programs, and resource infrastructure needed to enable young people to access and persist in each pathway.
• Identify the barriers that prevent young people from engaging in or completing pathway opportunities, and develop partnership and resource strategies to address those barriers at scale.
• Partner with Investment leadership, Directors of Communities, and site-based teams to understand what young people, volunteers, collaborators, and sites need from external partners, including pathway opportunities, barrier-removal resources, employer relationships, institutional access, and data-sharing agreements.
• Partner with the Director of Strategic Implementation & Operations to ensure data received through partnerships and data-sharing agreements is incorporated into Thread’s reporting routines, operating rhythm, and leadership decision-making in ways that are usable for Investment leaders and site-based teams.
• Ensure career-connected opportunities and barrier-removal supports are not treated as separate bodies of work, but as integrated parts of a pathway strategy that supports young people’s self-efficacy, agency, resilience, and purpose.
• Secure and steward high-leverage employer, post-secondary, trade, apprenticeship, entrepreneurial, civic, public-system, community-based, and resource partnerships that expand access to opportunity and reduce barriers to participation.
• Ensure meaningful exposure to each pathway through programs, experiences, relationships, site visits, employer engagement, service opportunities, mentorship, resource connections, and other pathway-connected learning.
• Use feedback from young people, their families, volunteers, site-based staff and partners to identify gaps in access, exposure, quality, persistence, completion, and stability.
• Coach the Sr. Manager of Career Pathway Programs and Manager of Citywide Partnerships & Resources to translate the integrated pathway strategy into strong program execution, partner stewardship, referral pathways, resource access, and measurable outcomes.

Multi-Level Relationship Mapping & Coordination

• Ensure Thread maintains strong, multi-level relationships with key citywide and statewide institutions so that partnerships do not depend on a single point of contact.
• Coordinate across Thread staff who hold different layers of relationships within the same institution, ensuring Thread presents one coherent relationship strategy.
• Maintain visibility into citywide relationship maps, partnership ownership, and strategic opportunities across teams.
• Route opportunities to the appropriate internal owners, including Development, Partnerships & Recruitment, Communications, Director of Practice, Learning & Quality, Programs, and Communities.
• Represent Thread in citywide coalitions, government convenings, civic spaces, and systems-level conversations, bringing the voices and needs of young people and communities into decision-making spaces.

Cross-Functional Coordination & Representation

• Serve as the bridge between citywide systems strategy and site-based community strategy, ensuring that citywide programs and partnerships are usable, accessible, and aligned with community needs.
• Partner with Directors of Communities to ensure citywide opportunities are integrated into site-level engagement strategies and that site-based feedback informs citywide priorities.
• Serve as the subject-matter expert on pathway and partnership strategy, partnering with the Director of Practice, Learning & Quality to codify that expertise into playbooks, tools, referral pathways, and quality standards; implement those resources in practice and use learning from young people, partners, and staff to inform ongoing improvement.
• Use data, staff feedback, partner feedback, and young-person outcomes to identify gaps in access, quality, persistence, and completion.
• Ensure the citywide team operates with clear priorities, consistent standards, strong documentation, and a continuous improvement mindset.

Team Leadership & Coaching

• Supervise, coach, and develop the Sr. Manager of Career Pathway Programs, Manager of Partnerships and Resources, and other assigned staff.
• Coach the Sr. Manager of Career Pathway Programs, Manager of Partnerships and Resources to ensure recurring citywide containers are well-planned, high-quality, partner-informed, and connected to measurable outcomes.
• Build a high-performing team culture grounded in accountability, collaboration, learning, restoration, and continuous improvement.
• Help direct reports balance competing priorities, navigate complex partner dynamics, and make sound decisions during high-volume implementation periods.
• Provide regular coaching, feedback, and professional development opportunities for team members.
• Ensure team members effectively use Thread’s playbooks, systems, relationship-management tools, and operating practices.
• Foster an environment of trust, mutual respect, and shared ownership for outcomes across young people, partners, and communities.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree required; Master’s degree (MPA, MPP, MBA, JD, or similar) preferred.
• six or more years of experience in government relations, public partnerships, external affairs, community or economic development, or nonprofit strategy — ideally in Baltimore or Maryland.
• Demonstrated success securing and managing complex institutional agreements or MOUs with government agencies, public systems, or major employers.
• Strong understanding of Baltimore City and Maryland civic, governmental, and educational systems; existing relationships are a strong plus.
• Excellent negotiation, facilitation, and relationship-management skills across lines of power, sector, and difference.
• Experience working across multiple levels of an institution (staff, leadership, governance) and coordinating internal stakeholders.
• Excellent written and verbal communication; ability to represent Thread credibly with senior public- and private-sector leaders.
• Highly organized and proactive, able to manage many relationships and competing priorities simultaneously.
• Deep belief in Thread’s mission and values, with the humility, emotional intelligence, and integrity to lead through service and collaboration.
• Ability to clearly communicate and live out Thread’s core values and core competencies.

Thread Employment Benefits (Full-time) 

• 12 weeks of Paid parental leave 
• Competitive salaries, meaningful equity; 403(b) plan 
• 100% employee coverage of Medical, dental, vision, and life insurance
• 10 Paid holidays 
• 4 weeks of PTO in year 1, increase to 5 weeks in year 2 
• 5 days of sick and safe leave 
• 3 floater holidays 
• Annual Health and Wellness reimbursement 
• Access to counseling/therapy at no cost 
• Paid Sabbatical after 6 years of employment