Chief Operating Officer (Washington)

About Inclusive Abundance

Abundance is a new and growing movement to foster a more vibrant economy with widespread flourishing.

Inclusive Abundance is an affiliated 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) nonprofit bringing together notable policy experts, think tanks, and advocacy groups to shape America’s future through an abundance-focused agenda. In the coming year, we are excited to promote new approaches to housing, energy, innovation, child care, health care, and government effectiveness. We believe in the power of ideas, and we are fostering a community to champion them.

We are a $5 million organization with a staff of 15, and both numbers are growing. The organization is changing quickly, and we want someone who likes it that way.

Role Overview

We are hiring a Chief Operating Officer (COO) to lead the internal life of the organization: planning, performance, culture, operations, and growth. The COO is responsible for aligning the management team at Inclusive Abundance, which includes the CEO, COO, and five senior leaders. The COO will lead the management team to greater organizational effectiveness, including regularly providing coaching to Inclusive Abundance’s senior leaders. The COO also manages our Operations Manager, Executive Assistant, and Events and Convenings Manager. The COO reports to the CEO, who is also the founder of our organization.

We are looking for an experienced organizational and operations leader: someone who has managed a growing organization before and loves helping leaders and teams achieve greater effectiveness and growth. Experience in policy or politics helps but is not required.

Key Responsibilities

Drive Organizational Performance

• Support the CEO in articulating and internally socializing a clear vision for organizational success in the context of dynamic opportunities and challenges.
• Run the organization’s planning and goal setting, including annual and quarterly planning, with an eye towards articulating concrete metrics and deliverables that reflect ambitious performance towards the Inclusive Abundance vision.
• Collaborate with the Operations Manager and team members to build sustainable, manageable tracking processes to document performance to metrics and deliverables. Enforce consistent tracking and documentation across the organization.
• Develop and implement regular processes for reviewing performance to goals and metrics. Facilitate structured troubleshooting. Build outcomes-focus into organizational culture, including regular recognition and feedback.
• Facilitate the CEO and management team to regularly assess active projects and events for alignment with organizational goals, as well as to evaluate and appropriately incorporate new ideas and opportunities.
• Manage the Events and Convenings Manager to ensure seamless events delivery and that events strategically advance organizational goals and are constantly assessed and optimized for value.
• Lead pivots and change management when major opportunities arise: facilitate planning around vision, deliverables, incentives, metrics, and capacity; decide what gets dropped; and document, communicate, and reinforce plans.
• With the CEO and management team, assess and refine organizational design, staffing structure, and the sequencing of new hires.
• Strategically foster a high-performance and high-satisfaction organizational culture. Collaborate with the CEO, management team, and staff to define cultural values and implement practices to sustain them. Actively facilitate practices that ensure staff are invested in the organization’s mission, engaged and continuously learning, and collaborate effectively with colleagues, particularly in the context of a distributed organization, with a large hybrid team in DC and additional fully remote staff elsewhere.

Oversee Organizational Operations

• Oversee finance (including budgeting, bookkeeping, and audit), HR, technology, compliance, and 501(c)(3)/501(c)(4) time tracking, including by supervising the Operations Manager and growing that role into greater leadership.
• Collaborate with outside counsel to ensure compliance across all activities and legal entities; collaborate with Operations Manager to ensure compliance guidelines are clearly articulated and tightly reinforced across the organization.
• Manage the Executive Assistant to ensure the CEO and management team have excellent support and organizational administrative functions run smoothly.
• Collaborate with the Operations Manager and CEO to lead the annual budgeting process and conduct regular financial health and budget review.
• With the Operations Manager and with input from the management team, develop and implement key HR frameworks, including hiring, onboarding, compensation and bonus frameworks, promotions and title clarity, performance management, and benefits.
• Develop and implement project management practices, including reinforcing and calibrating Inclusive Abundance’s existing frameworks around ownership, project scoping, timelines, and decision-making. Introduce and implement new frameworks as needed to support greater clarity, collaboration, and organizational excellence.
• Drive AI adoption and other innovation across the organization to enhance productivity and staff satisfaction.
• Ensure decision discipline and strategic continuity to provide sufficient predictability for staff to do great work and maintain organizational discipline.

Lead and Align the Management Team

• Actively facilitate alignment between CEO and management team, including ensuring that the CEO is looped into decisions at the right level and time.
• Run ongoing management meetings to align on areas of disagreement, advance cross-cutting collaborative projects, surface growth challenges, problem-solve against metrics, plan staff communications, and strengthen organizational talent and management.
• Lead conversations that resolve areas of ambiguity or disagreement within the management team, and then implement practices to apply decisions or revisit when appropriate. Make and reinforce judgment calls about when alignment is needed, and the process, timeline, and ownership of alignment.
• Provide regular coaching to senior leaders on professional growth, team leadership, balancing organizational perspectives with the perspectives of their vertical, and negotiating effectively internally.
• Support CEO and management team in guiding staff through potential political losses and public criticism, facilitating debriefs and organizational communications.

Successful candidates will have

• 10-20+ years of professional experience, including senior management of a growing organization, ideally as a COO, managing director, executive director, or deputy director.
• A record of building organizations: hiring and developing teams, managing managers, building high-performance and high-satisfaction cultures, and designing and implementing the systems that keep work on track.
• Excellent people management skills, with a proven ability to develop senior leaders to become more effective leaders and managers, provide candid upward feedback, and help teams to become more aligned, collaborative, and impactful.
• The ability to drive work forward across teams they do not directly manage.
• Strong facilitation skills, and good judgment about what to decide, what to elevate, and how to act on a chief executive’s behalf.
• Experience with nonprofit budgeting, financial oversight, and compliance at the highest standards.
• Familiarity with 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) structures, and experience in policy, advocacy, or political organizations, are each a plus.
• Passion for and proven alignment with our organization’s mission and values.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, and the ability to handle sensitive information with discretion.

What We Offer

• Competitive salary commensurate with experience (ranging from $210,000 to $260,000 per year).
• A comprehensive benefits package that includes medical insurance with premiums covered at up to 100% by the employer across four plan options, as well as 100% employer-paid dental and vision. Depending on your plan selection, you may be eligible for an HSA, FSA, or DCFSA. A 401(k) with employer match is coming soon. We also provide employee paid short‑term disability, long‑term disability, and life insurance options. Beyond core coverage, employees receive a One Medical membership, access to discounted gynecological and fertility services through Kindbody, 12 free video therapy sessions annually via Talkspace, and personalized patient advocacy support through Health Advocate.
• Opportunities for professional development and growth.
• A collaborative, supportive, and exciting work environment.

Inclusive Abundance is an equal opportunity employer.