Director/Senior Director of Data Strategy & Insights

DIRECTOR/SENIOR DIRECTOR OF DATA STRATEGY & INSIGHTS 

Location: Birmingham, Alabama
Department: Data & Impact
Reports To: CEO | Role Level: Senior Leadership 

Direct Report(s): Data & Impact Team; team structure and roles will evolve based on organizational needs

THE ORGANIZATION: Birmingham Promise is a nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering Birmingham City Schools (BCS) students and graduates with opportunities that lead to economic mobility for our program participants. Through workforce exposure, last-dollar tuition scholarships, postsecondary coaching, and sustained wrap-around support, we help students create pathways that change the trajectory of their lives. As we scale our impact, we are investing in a robust data strategy to ensure we can measure, improve, and clearly communicate outcomes to stakeholders.

THE ROLE: Birmingham Promise is seeking an experienced and entrepreneurial leader to serve as its Director/Senior Director of Data Strategy & Insights. This newly created leadership position will establish and lead Birmingham Promise’s first dedicated Data & Impact function. While the organization has existing staff, systems, and data-related responsibilities, this work has not previously operated as a standalone department with a unified strategy and structure. The Director/Senior Director will be responsible for bringing these resources together and building the people, systems, processes, and strategy necessary to effectively collect, manage, analyze, and use data across the organization.

This leader will own data strategy, reporting, and decision support, ensuring the CEO, Senior Leadership Team, Board, funders, and other stakeholders have timely, accurate, and actionable information. The Director/Senior Director will assess Birmingham Promise’s current data capabilities and needs, develop the appropriate team structure, and build and manage a high-performing data team aligned with the organization’s evolving priorities.

The role is also accountable for improving existing systems and setting the strategic vision for evaluation and data infrastructure. Where specialized technical expertise or rigorous longitudinal evaluation is required, this leader will determine whether needs are best met through internal capacity or external partners and will manage those resources accordingly.

The ideal candidate is both strategic and hands-on: someone who can establish a long-term vision while also creating the systems, processes, reporting practices, and team necessary to make reliable data readily available today. This person anticipates needs, creates clarity, holds a high standard for data quality, and translates information into insights that strengthen organizational decision-making.

This role reports directly to the CEO and serves as a member of the Senior Leadership Team.

RESPONSIBILITIES

Build and Lead the Data & Impact Team (20%)

Building Birmingham Promise’s first dedicated Data & Impact function requires the right combination of people, roles, systems, and expertise.

• Assess the organization’s current and future data needs, capabilities, workflows, and staffing structure
• Develop and implement a clear organizational structure for the Data & Impact function, including defining roles, responsibilities, and areas of accountability
• Assess existing roles and responsibilities to recommend changes or realignment necessary to meet organizational data needs
• Recruit, hire, onboard, manage, and develop data team members as needed
• Establish clear goals, priorities, performance expectations, and accountability for the Data & Impact team
• Determine when organizational needs are best addressed through internal staff, external partners or technology solutions
• Develop a phased staffing and capacity plan that aligns team growth with organizational priorities and resources
• Manage the Data & Impact budget, vendor relationships, evaluation timelines, and other administrative aspects of the function
• Ensure compliance with applicable data privacy requirements, funder requirements, and reporting obligations
• Build a collaborative data culture in which program teams understand their responsibilities for data quality, collection, and use

Create, Own and Execute Data Strategy (25%)

Strong data strategy ensures we are measuring what matters and using data-derived insights to continuously improve outcomes for students.

• Develop and operationalize a clear, organization-wide data strategy aligned to strategic priorities
• Define and standardize key performance indicators (KPIs), benchmarks, and success metrics across programs
• Establish a proactive reporting cadence for leadership and Board use
• Create systems for using data to provide ongoing feedback and support to providers for the improvement of program practices
• Partner with leadership to ensure data is used consistently in decision-making
• Consolidate all current tools and practices for measuring impact to ensure consistent, high quality data collection and analysis
• Work closely with team to build evaluation tools and create a strategic evaluation plan that measures progress and success against key metrics for both internal program improvement and external reporting purposes
• Facilitate communication of policies, procedures, schedules and other logistics associated with external evaluation
• Ensure all teams are collecting data consistently and correctly
• Develop a phased roadmap for when it makes sense to add team capacity or outsource complex technical and evaluation work as the organization scales

Build Scalable Data Infrastructure (20%)

Reliable, accessible data systems are essential to making informed decisions and reducing inefficiencies across the organization.

• Provide strategic oversight of Salesforce and other core data systems, ensuring our data is accurate 
• Audit, streamline, and improve existing data systems into a more centralized, user-friendly ecosystem
• Ensure leadership has timely access to critical data (dashboards, reports, etc.)
• Establish and enforce data governance, quality standards, and documentation protocols
• Set the strategic vision for infrastructure improvements and advanced technical builds, managing external vendors or consultants for complex implementation needs
• Build capacity for and manage internal systems for conducting ongoing outcomes measurement and assessment

Lead Evaluation and Insights (15%)

Research and evaluation help Birmingham Promise understand the outcomes of our work and opportunities to strengthen our impact.

• Develop and maintain an organization-wide research and learning agenda aligned with Birmingham Promise’s strategic priorities, program model, and key questions about student educational and career outcomes.
• Identify and prioritize research and evaluation questions that strengthen understanding of program effectiveness, student outcomes, and opportunities for continuous improvement.
• Design and oversee practical evaluation approaches, including longitudinal strategies, that balance methodological rigor with the need for timely, actionable information.
• Establish the vision and framework for Birmingham Promise’s research and evaluation efforts, determining which capabilities should be developed internally and when specialized external expertise is needed.
• Lead Birmingham Promise’s research partnership with the American Institutes for Research (AIR) and manage other research and evaluation partners, leveraging these partnerships to strengthen data infrastructure, data access and sharing, research capabilities, organizational use of data, and long-term internal capacity.
• Manage a portfolio of research and evaluation initiatives, working closely with program teams to ensure findings are accurate, relevant, timely, and translated into actionable insights that inform program improvement and organizational decision-making.
• Build the organizational capacity and foundational data infrastructure necessary to support increasingly rigorous research, including future implementation and impact evaluations.

Deliver High-Quality Reporting & Insights (20%)

Data only creates value when it is clear, timely and usable by our team.

• Own the production of Board-ready dashboards, reports, and presentations
• Translate complex data into clear, compelling narratives for non-technical audiences
• Ensure stakeholders can quickly access accurate, relevant information when needed
• Partner with Communications to align data storytelling with organizational messaging
• Support grant reporting and proposal development with accurate data and insights
• Work with external stakeholders, including funders and partners, to assure best practices and transparency
• Produce publications, presentations, research resources and briefing/white papers designed to inform the field and policy makers

WHAT DOES SUCCESS IN THIS ROLE LOOK LIKE?

• Birmingham Promise has a clearly defined, organization-wide data strategy that aligns with its strategic plan and establishes how data is collected, managed, analyzed, shared, and used to advance organizational priorities.
• The organization has a strong and sustainable Data & Impact function, with the right team structure, roles, systems, processes, and external resources to meet current needs and evolve as the organization grows.
• Accurate, timely, and trusted data is readily available and consistently used across the organization, with clear ownership and accountability for data quality at every level.

• Birmingham Promise uses data to actively manage and assess progress toward its strategic plan, with clearly defined measures that are regularly updated and used to identify progress, challenges, and opportunities.
• The CEO, Senior Leadership Team, and Board have reliable access to the information and insights needed to make informed decisions, with reporting that is accurate, timely, clear, and requires minimal revision.
• Programs have clearly defined KPIs, outcomes, and measures of success, and program leaders routinely use data and evaluation findings to understand performance, strengthen program delivery, and improve outcomes for students.
• External stakeholders—including funders, partners, and other key audiences—receive a clear and reliable cadence of outcomes and impact reporting that demonstrates Birmingham Promise's progress, effectiveness, and contribution to student economic mobility.
• Data systems and infrastructure are integrated, efficient, well-documented, and scalable, reducing unnecessary manual processes and allowing information to be accessed and analyzed efficiently.
• Evaluation and learning are embedded into organizational practice, enabling Birmingham Promise to understand not only what outcomes are occurring, but what is working, what is not, for whom, and where adjustments or deeper inquiry are needed.
• Data is translated into meaningful insights and compelling narratives, strengthening Birmingham Promise's ability to communicate its impact to students and families, the Board, funders, partners, policymakers, and the broader community.
• Internal capacity and external expertise are used intentionally, with a clear understanding of what capabilities should exist within Birmingham Promise and when specialized partners are needed to advance more complex technical, research, or evaluation work.
• The organization moves from reactive data requests to proactive insight, with emerging trends, risks, opportunities, and questions surfaced early enough to inform strategy and actions.

DIRECTOR/SENIOR DIRECTOR DESIGNATION: Birmingham Promise is open to candidates at either the Director or Senior Director level. The final title will be determined based on the selected candidate’s experience, demonstrated scope of leadership, technical and strategic expertise, and experience building and leading an organizational data function. 

QUALIFICATIONS: Candidates considered at the Senior Director level will demonstrate significant experience independently setting organizational data strategy, building or transforming teams and functions, leading complex cross-functional initiatives, and serving as a strategic advisor to senior leadership. Candidates at the Director level may have less experience across these areas but must demonstrate the ability and readiness to successfully build and lead this function.

The ideal candidate will have:

• 7+ years of progressively responsible experience in data strategy, analytics, research, evaluation, or a related field; experience in education, nonprofit, workforce development, or social impact strongly preferred
• Demonstrated experience building, restructuring, or significantly strengthening a data function or team
• Demonstrated success assessing organizational data needs and translating those needs into staffing, systems and processes
• Experience hiring, managing, coaching, and developing data professionals
• Strong experience with quantitative and qualitative methods and the ability to determine the appropriate level of rigor for different organizational needs
• Experience working with senior leadership and translating complex data into clear, actionable insights for Boards, funders, program leaders, and other non-technical audiences
• Strong project and change-management skills, including the ability to lead cross-functional work and establish accountability across teams
• Proficiency with Salesforce, Power BI, Tableau, or similar platforms
• Master’s degree in data science, statistics, public policy, education, social science, computer science, or a related field preferred; equivalent relevant professional experience will be considered

COMPENSATION & BENEFITS: Compensation for this role will be determined by experience level and background. Director range: $80,000 - $112,000 and Senior Director range: $90,000 - $126,000. Birmingham Promise also offers a generous benefit package including medical, dental, vision, matched 401(k) retirement savings plan, flexible PTO, a hybrid work environment and professional development opportunities.

Birmingham Promise is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization and an Equal Opportunity Employer that strives to have a diverse team representative of the community it serves.