Partners for HOME

Chief Program Officer

Atlanta, GA

Background

Partners for HOME (PFH) was founded in 2015. Their mission is to coordinate a comprehensive response to end homelessness in the City of Atlanta.  PFH serves as the Collaborative Applicant for the Atlanta Continuum of Care (CoC) — a HUD program that promotes community-wide commitment to the goal of ending homelessness and provides funding for efforts by nonprofit providers and state and local governments to quickly rehouse people impacted by homelessness.  PFH brings together government, nonprofit, business, and community stakeholders to make homelessness rare, brief, and nonrecurring.

Position

The Chief Program Officer serves as a key thought partner and strategic advisor to the chief executive officer, executive and leadership teams.  The CPO will partner in setting and driving organizational vision, and strategy to ensure that PFH’s program work is directed towards creating a homeless crisis response system that advances equity and achieves the goals of the homeless system’s strategic plan.  The CPO will lead three directors with a current program staff of 15-20, oversee all programmatic work across multiples vertical lines of work, and develop new programs as needs emerge. Responsible for all activities pertaining to HUD requirements, Coordinated Entry, HMIS, Housing Interventions, performance measures and continuous quality improvement.  

The CPO leads all program planning, organizing, operating, and program/projects staffing.  The CPO develops, implements, and manages the program aspects of the annual budget in conjunction with the chief financial officer and CEO.  The CPO is responsible for ensuring that PFH’s services are in compliance with all federal, state, and local regulations, certifications, licensing and funding requirements.  

The ideal candidate brings deep knowledge of the homeless service system and HUD continuum of care structure, policy and regulations, a passion for reducing and ending homelessness using a Housing First philosophy/approach (and believes it is possible), a proven track record of leading high impact strategies and teams, and effectively leveraging and garnering the collaborative engagement of diverse stakeholders throughout the community.   

Role Priorities

• Appreciate the key strategies and vision of the work at PFH and implement them on the ground with urgency.
• Understand the complex issues in homeless systems (city, state, county, federal government HUD) and synthesize to actionable work.
• Oversee Lift 2.0; goal of housing 1500 households by the end of 2024.
• Execute the new Rapid Housing Initiation to create an additional 500 housing interventions.
• Improve access to the COC system by refining the coordinated intake and access system and how it operates.
• Work to build psychological safety within the team at PFH by expanding upon the DEIB work that has been done and fostering an inclusive culture where staff feel a sense of belonging.
• Stabilize program department through leadership, mentoring, and providing professional development opportunities for staff.
• Take PFH team to next level; moving the homeless system to operate in a more sophisticated way than it is today.

Responsibilities

• Provide effective and inspiring leadership, as well as stewardship, by being actively involved in all programs and services. Implement and lead a continuous quality improvement process throughout program and service areas, focusing on systems/process improvement and ensuring incorporation. Promote regular and ongoing opportunities for all staff to give feedback on program operations.
• Lead a high performing team to achieve goals of organizational business plan and the Continuum of Care’s (CoC) strategic plan and vision of creating a homeless response system that advances equity and supporting teams’ development through implementation of recruitment, training/development, and retention strategies.
• Serve as a leader within the broader organization by helping lead cross-team collaborations and cultivate a diverse, inclusive, and equitable organizational culture.
• Partner with the CEO to represent PFH with external constituency groups, including provider, community, governmental, and other stakeholders to ensure comprehensive community wide input and buy-in across all programs and initiatives led by PFH.
• Prepare and submit an annual operational budget to the CEO and CFO for review and approval, manage effectively within this budget, and report accurately on progress made and challenges encountered.
• Ensure the continued financial viability of PFH’s program/service units through sound fiscal management. Provide programmatic leadership and input for all strategic planning processes with the CEO and staff.
• Work collaboratively across organizational departments to ensure programmatic activities are aligned with organization’s mission, business plan, and CoC strategic plan.

Qualifications

PFH recognizes that one candidate may not bring all the experience listed here and is open to candidates with a broad set of experiences and skills.  PFH seeks a candidate with: 

• Bachelor’s degree with at least 10 years of progressive experience in homeless service management role, with a minimum of five years of senior-leadership experience supervising seasoned staff operating multiple vertical programs. 
• Senior-level experience successfully building and managing a collaborative and diverse team; strong interpersonal problem solving and mentoring skills; demonstrated success applying an equity lens to leadership and management.
• Integrity and sound judgment, including the ability to exercise appropriate discretion when dealing with sensitive or confidential matters and demonstrated ability to respond rapidly in urgent/emergent situations.
• Strong relationship builder and communicator with experience leading diverse work teams, developing an organization-wide strategy for program excellence, engaging community partners, and partnering with a CEO, other C-suite team members, and board of directors.
• Visionary leader and proven track record of creating and managing high impact teams and programs.
• Exceptional understanding of the HUD homeless continuum of care policy, function, and priorities.
• Can point to tangible examples of reporting and program measurement and evaluation. 
• Demonstrated ability to work across multiple issues/programs. 
• Experience leading others to new levels of effectiveness and programmatic impact.
• Passionate about PFH’s mission and able to promote and communicate the philosophy, mission, and values of PFH to external and internal stakeholders.
• Ability to work in a fast-paced environment with a high degree of autonomy while managing multiple programs and priorities at the same time.
• Must possess excellent interpersonal, written, and verbal communication skills and confidence in working with internal and external stakeholders, private and public community leaders and a proven track record of public speaking and ability to translate complex information for broader/lay audiences.   
• A deep and wide network of relationships in the homeless service space, philanthropy, and the nonprofit sector more broadly.

Key Relationships

The Chief Program Officer reports directly to the CEO and works closely with other members of the Executive Team, particularly the CFO and CAO.  This position directly supervises the Directors for: Coordinated Entry, Housing and Continuous Quality Improvement.   

Salary

PFH offers a competitive compensation package including generous health benefits, retirement match, up to 4 weeks’ vacation.  The salary range is $117,000 to $145,000 depending on experience.  The successful candidate’s salary will be determined by the number of years of relevant experience they bring to the role and their qualifications.   

Location

This is a hybrid position based in Atlanta, Georgia with Monday and Friday as remote workdays and Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday in office.

This position description is based upon material provided by Partners for HOME. Partners for HOME provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local laws.?? 

To apply for this position, please click HERE.

Shanna Jadwin, Talent Consultant sjadwin@drgtalent.com            

Sarah Raful Whinston, Principal swhinston@drgtalent.com

Gabrielle “Bee” Smith, Associate gsmith@drgtalent.com