Define the Partnerships Lead role

[choldgraf]

Context

In #300 we've discussed defining a Sustainability Team, that would focus its strategy and efforts around sustainability, sales, partnerships, fundraising, etc. As a part of this, we should define the major roles in this division of 2i2c so that we can understand their responsibilities and how they fit in with the organization.

Proposal

To begin, we should define the lead position for this division, since it will be the one driving much of these efforts. We should define things like:

• The title
• The responsibilities and expectations for this role
• How this role interfaces with others inside of 2i2c
• What qualities and experience are ideal for this role

We have ~a draft of this role at this HackMD. Please provide feedback!~ See this PR instead:

• https://github.com/2i2c-org/team-compass/pull/416

Actions and updates

• [x] @colliand agreed to take a first pass at defining this role
• [x] Define a starting salary for this role
• [x] Agree on a "part time" / "alpha period" contract for Jim to serve in before September
  • 60-80% until September depending on budget, and 20% during the Fall semester. Plan on 1 year contract
• [ ] https://github.com/2i2c-org/team-compass/issues/424
• [x] https://github.com/2i2c-org/team-compass/issues/485
• [ ] Proposal for Steering Council
  • Make a proposal for our Steerco to make sure they approve of this since it'll be an unexpected / significant expense.
• [ ] Add to our CS&S advisory council
  • Our advisory council with CS&S must be >50% made of people who are not paid by CS&S funds.
  • If @colliand is paid by 2i2c fundswe'd need to either remove him and add a different person, or add two other people to the advisory council.
  • We've got a few months of buffer time to do this as long as we're making a genuine effort to do so

References

Data Dryad Head of Partnerships copy description

Head of Partnership Development (Remote, North America) Dryad is recruiting a Head of Partnership Development to help grow the community of academic and research institutions, research funders, journals and publishers that invest in us to pursue the open sharing and full reuse of all research data. Our partnerships are core to our success and our Head of Partnership Development will be a powerful and dedicated advocate for Dryad’s vision, mission, values, and offering to each of our stakeholder groups. Responsibilities The Dryad Head of Partnership Development will have primary responsibility for growing the community of organisations investing in Dryad. In support of this key objective, they will also have specific responsibility for: Designing and executing strategies for outreach and recruitment of academic and research institutions, research funders, journals and publishers from around the globe. Cultivating and maintaining an understanding of open data policy, initiatives, and developments that impact Dryad and its investors. Developing a pipeline of prospective investors and growing the community Representing Dryad’s vision, mission, values and culture as well as our offering and the reasons why the community invests in us – in written and oral communications Demonstrating the Dryad data platform features, publication process and workflows for submission, curation and publication – at large and small meetings, in person and online Identifying, developing and facilitating regional and national consortial relationships worldwide Ensuring the smooth on-boarding of new members and partners Working with current members and partners to renew annual agreements Establishing and maintaining documentation, records and reports related to recruitment and retention, including Salesforce Qualifications Dryad’s Head of Partnership Development will be: An experienced relationship manager, with a track record in partner relations, community development, marketing, sales or other community-facing role, in the library and/or publishing space A confident and skilled presenter, well-spoken and able to adapt style to different contexts Able to express complex concepts clearly, in detail, and in a way that’s accessible to others An exceptional communicator, in writing and in person Able to travel up to 30% of the time Independently motivated, willing and able to identify and assume responsibility for initiatives within the scope of this role A team player, ready to work in close collaboration with others within and beyond Dryad Highly organised and accustomed to keeping thorough, clear and current documentation They will also: Have a minimum seven years’ experience in a scholarly communication, publishing, academic library, or research institution context Be educated to degree level or with equivalent professional experience Possess expert-level confidence with online communication and video conference platforms (such as Zoom, MS Teams and Webex) Possess a high level of confidence with recruitment tools such as Salesforce (or other CRM) plus associated data analysis and reporting Candidates with knowledge of open research communication and/or research data management may be given preference. Compensation and benefits This is a remote, full-time position based in North America. The U.S. equivalent base salary range for this role is $75,000 to $85,000 (depending on experience), plus commission. Dryad offers a competitive benefits package and a fantastic set of co-workers.

[colliand]

Here is a draft description of the sustainability team lead role with job title Partnerships Lead. I think @choldgraf for input on an earlier draft. I invite feedback and improvements!

[sgibson91]

@colliand I believe that link is broken :(

[colliand]

Thanks Sarah. I fixed the broken link.

[choldgraf]

I took another pass and think that this is a really great start. I left a few comments and suggestions here and there, but I do not think that anything really substantive needs to change fundamentally in that content.

I think that it is too early to know exactly what the "day in the life" of this role would be, so my feeling is that we should get this to a place where we like the overall framing and how it fits in with 2i2c's teams and strategy more broadly. I think that it is close to that already. What do others think?

[choldgraf]

Update: can we get feedback?

It would be helpful if others on the @2i2c-org/tech-team could take a look at the Draft that @colliand put together at the HackMD link above. Do you think that this is a reasonable scope for the role? Any thoughts or suggestions?

[choldgraf]

Update: Next step is to formalize this role

I spoke with @colliand yesterday after our cycle planning meeting, and he suggested that the role's description was satisfactory to him to move on. I will take on the next step since it involves defining a starting salary in the abstract, and it'd be awkward for Jim to do that for his own position. I've added a few more to-dos above and will start to work on those in the coming days.

[choldgraf]

Update: next steps for this role

A few more updates as we've had some iterations on this that aren't encoded in this issue:

• Contract length for @colliand
  • We'll plan on a contract length for 1 year
  • Between now and September 1st, @colliand will operate in 80% capacity here, potentially 60% if we are tight on budget.
  • From September to December, it will drop to 20% since Jim is teaching for the semester.
• [ ] Budget analysis
  • We'll need to do a budget analysis to make sure that this is a financially responsible decision
  • I need to do a quick analysis and write up a short impact report
• [ ] Proposal for Steering Council
  • I'll need to make a proposal for our Steerco to make sure they approve of this since it'll be an unexpected / significant expense.
• [ ] Add to our CS&S advisory council
  • Our advisory council with CS&S must be >50% made of people who are not paid by CS&S funds, so since @colliand is in this group, we'd need to get at least 2 other people to join.
  • [ ] Confirm that it is > 50%, and not >= 50%.

will add this above as well

[choldgraf]

I had a meeting with CS&S yesterday and confirmed with them that we need greater than 50% of our advisory council made up of non-paid people. So I've updated that action item above.

I've also added an issue to track the budgetary process, and added Jim as he said he could spearhead that effort, with me providing support to him: https://github.com/2i2c-org/team-compass/issues/424

[choldgraf]

Update: Draft contract written up

We've had a few conversations with CS&S and with Jim and have some draft contract language written up.

I also found a useful set of text for a similar role via the DataDryad project, it was a temporary website so I copy/pasted the text into the top comment above. We can use that to continue shaping the scope of this role.