Madhi Foundation - Senior Manager - Partnerships & Communication (6-8 yrs)

Your team (Partnerships and Communication)

The job opening detailed here pertains to the Partnerships team.

The Partnerships team comprises the fundraising and communications team.

'Madhi envisions building partnerships with potential funders who share the vision and mission of Madhi through its fundraising initiatives and improving Madhi's brand visibility in the social sector.

About the role:

- The Senior Manager, Partnerships and Communications will lead the Donor Relations and External Partnerships sub-verticals while co-managing the Associate, Partnerships and Communication.

- This role is pivotal in ensuring the organization achieves its funding and branding targets within stipulated timelines.

- Additionally, the Senior Manager will foster meaningful and impactful partnerships with organizations in the sector, driving collaboration to further the organization's mission.

- This position offers an exciting opportunity to cultivate purposeful relationships and build synergies across a diverse range of stakeholders.

The Job Description:

Below is an indicative set of responsibilities you will be required to lead as part of your role.

We believe that a job description is best created collaboratively where the individual joining the team and the senior leadership team together define the role in greater detail so it reflects your aspirations and ambitions as much as it does the organisation's needs.

A detailed description can be jointly created once the selection process has been completed and you have accepted our offer of employment.

In this role, some of your responsibilities will include:

Strategic Planning and Execution:

- Collaborate with the Vertical Head to develop a robust strategy and plan for fundraising and communications, ensuring its effective execution by the team.

- Support the Vertical Head in building and maintaining a strong network of donors, government bodies, and synergistic organizations, strategically managing each relationship.

- Assist the CEO in consistently meeting Madhi's defined fundraising targets.

Research and Outreach:

- Provide a structured framework to conduct in-depth research on potential partners that align with Madhi's mission and values.

- Build connections with organizations that advocate for collective action to transform educational outcomes and steer those efforts towards meaningful change.

Donor Relations and Grant Management:

- Review presentations and periodic reports for donor groups, ensuring they meet the highest standards of quality and professionalism.

- Collaborate with the grants writing team to develop compelling grant applications and secure institutional funding.

- Represent Madhi and its core values in all interactions with partners, donors, and stakeholders.

Communications Leadership:

- Lead Madhi's communications and outreach strategy, managing both the internal team and external freelancers to deliver high-quality outputs.

Desired experience and competencies:

- Experience in the development sector with a deep understanding of what it takes for nonprofits to collaborate effectively and purposefully.

- Proven ability to build and maintain relationships with individuals across a diverse spectrum, including varying seniority levels and organizational types (e.g, for-profit, non-profit).

- Exceptional attention to detail with the ability to produce high-quality technical proposals and official documents (such as MoUs) under tight deadlines.

- Strong influencing and negotiating skills, effectively tailored to a wide range of audiences.

- Outstanding communication and interpersonal skills, fostering trust and collaboration.

- Demonstrated planning and organizational skills, with a commitment to ensuring projects are seen through to successful completion.

- Proficiency in proofreading and editing both formal and informal documents for internal and external dissemination.

Prerequisites include:

- At least 6-8 years of work experience with a minimum of 2-4 years of people management and project management experience

- A bachelor's degree in a relevant subject; qualifications in Education would be an added advantage

- At least 2 years of managerial experience with a team span of minimum 3 members.

- Experience in the education/development sector is mandatory

- Excellent knowledge of MS Office, G Suite, Digital Survey Tools and Data Visualisation Tools

- Excellent written communication and report writing skills in English

- Ability and willingness to work in a start-up non-profit environment

This role will report to: Vertical Head, Partnerships and Communication

Location: Chennai, Tamil Nadu

Please note: You will be expected to bring your own laptop with updated software (MS Office 2016)

What we do:

Madhi works closely with the Tamil Nadu School Education Department to conceptualise and implement large scale quality improvement programmes in Tamil Nadu's government schools.

Over the course of the next 5 years Madhi will strengthen its existing programmes in the state (as well as undertake new programmes) with the singular aim of ensuring transformative improvement in the quality of school education in Tamil Nadu and beyond.

Ennum Ezhuthum: We are currently also working as the 'Chief Management Partner' for Tamil Nadu's official

Foundational Learning Mission, The 'Ennum Ezhuthum Mission' - a Rs.

500 Cr Mission of national and regional importance aimed at universalising foundational learning for all children in Tamil Nadu's 37,000 government schools.

Enjoy English: Enjoy English is a tech-based product-service offering aimed at improving foundational English among children from low-exposure to English contexts.

It is one-of-a-kind idea that adopts an oracy first approach to language learning which is different from most programmes that adopt a subject teaching approach to English learning.

Communities Enabling Foundational Learning (CEFL): CEFL aims to equip the parents with the knowledge, skills and tools to understand the quality of foundational education their children receive in public schools and in turn, start advocating for improving the quality of education with stakeholders such as teachers, administrators and local political leaders.

We support parents to establish peer groups and networks of parents and community members to support each other towards educating their child and collectively demand for the same.

What is the work culture at Madhi like?

The work culture at Madhi is built both organically and inorganically.

We articulate our core values and reinforce them through actions consistently.

Team members imbibe Madhi's values and help grow the culture.

Our core values (Mission obsession, Empathy, Resilience, Integrity, Inquiry) form the basis of our actions, policy and interactions.

Madhi nurtures a collaborative work culture where individual growth and team success go hand in hand.

Given the nature of our work (our close partnership with the government) we often realise that we work with partners who espouse a work culture that is vastly different from ours which can sometimes create a sense of cultural dissonance.

This is not something we are able to change and we expect team members to join us knowing full well that when working with critical partners and stakeholders there would certainly arise a need to adapt and accept the differences and the challenges that come from working in such an environment.

We have been fortunate to find team members over the years who have joined us and helped build a strong and purposeful culture and despite our rapid growth we have been able to sustain our culture over time