Vice President of Operations

Position Closing: November 18, 2026

About Us
At Creative West, we build equitable technology, funding, advocacy, and policy systems to generate creative capacity in the West and beyond. We offer direct, practical support to state arts agencies, advocacy groups, artists, culture bearers, and creative organizations, serving a region that stretches from the Arctic Coast to the Desert Southwest, and from the Great Plains to the Pacific Islands. By building systems that change systems, we advance equity, justice, and regenerative action - seeing these values as essential as creativity itself.

Position Overview
The Creative West organization continues to grow within a virtual workplace. This growth presents tremendous opportunity as well as risk through deepening silos and increasing strain on work systems and culture. As development efforts expand, so too does this work demand more of the CEO's dedicated attention. As Creative West re-imagines its covenant with State Arts Agencies, collaborates in national initiatives of the USRAO collective, and stewards key relationships with the NEA, NASAA, and AFTA, greater dedicated strategic attention from the CEO is required.

A newly conceptualized position, the Vice President of Operations (VPO) is the primary architect and manager of Creative West's internal systems. In a 100% virtual environment, the VPO ensures that diverse departments—from grant funding to state arts agencies, advocacy to technology platforms—operate as a cohesive and efficient system. The VPO tracks projects, programs, services, and activities to ensure that all relevant parties receive communications updates and decisions stick, ensuring deadlines are met and budgets are maintained. The VPO will bridge the gap between high-level vision and execution. They will do this by developing, implementing, and monitoring cross-departmental processes, ensuring that new and existing programs are vetted, funded, and technically supported before launch.

Key Responsibilities

1. Processes and Policies

a) Workflow Design: Develop and enforce standardized "Inter-Departmental Agreements" (IDAs) – policies to ensure clarity when projects move from Development to Grants or from Tech to Marketing.

b) The "Buy-In" Gatekeeper: Establish a formal vetting process for new initiatives, ensuring inter-departmental sign-off before resources are committed.

c) Virtual Infrastructure: Oversee the auditing and optimizing of the Creative West tech stack to ensure seamless communication and project tracking across all departments.

1. Strategic Departmental Oversight

a) Public Policy & Advocacy: Partner with Directors to ensure state arts agency programs, and state and federal advocacy efforts are operationally supported and aligned with organizational milestones.

b) Grants & Programs: Oversee the operational lifecycle of grant cycles, ensuring the Grants, Awards, and Programs (GAP) team has the administrative and technical support needed for high-volume periods.

c) Revenue & Growth: Work with Development and Finance to ensure fundraising targets are integrated into the operational budget and that Business is positioned as a sustainable revenue or service pillar.

1. Financial, Legal, & Risk Management

a) Budget Optimization: Collaborate with the Finance Director to monitor departmental budgets and ensure operational spending aligns with long-term sustainability.

b) Silo Risk Mitigation: Mitigate "Silo Risk" by establishing cross-functional syncs that prevent departments from developing programs lacking consensus, stakeholder buy-in, redundant tools, or conflicting schedules.

c) Legal & Compliance: Identify and manage legal risk, including human resources, to determine when to prioritize or deprioritize specific concerns.

1. Culture & Remote Leadership

a) Accountability Systems: Foster a high-accountability and high-reliability culture in a virtual setting, utilizing asynchronous communication tools to maintain momentum without "meeting fatigue."

b) Team Supervision: Supervise a diverse group of Directors with a wide range of skills and competencies, balancing the needs of the sector with the rigorous demands of program development and execution.

1. Organizational Planning & Prioritization

a) Strategy Translation: Translate CEO and Trustee priorities into a sequenced, organization-wide operating plan with clear dependencies and timelines.

b) Enterprise Prioritization: Lead an annual and quarterly enterprise prioritization process, ensuring staff capacity aligns with strategic goals.

c) Portfolio Management: Maintain a centralized initiative portfolio dashboard tracking status, risks, and resource allocation.

d) Operational Solutions: Identify and resolve pain points across departments before they impact delivery.

1. Decision Architecture & Governance

a) Governance Frameworks: Define and implement decision-making frameworks to clarify ownership and input across teams.

b) Cross-Functional Resolution: Serve as the final arbiter for cross-functional trade-offs when Directors cannot reach alignment.

c) Escalation Thresholds: Establish thresholds for what requires executive (CEO/Chair) escalation vs. internal resolution.

d) Metrics & Oversight: Ensure major initiatives have clearly defined success metrics, owners, and post-mortem processes.

1. Cross-Functional Program Integration

a) Lifecycle Integration: Oversee "start-to-finish" integration of major initiatives spanning multiple departments (e.g., new grant programs, tech launches, policy campaigns).

b) Cross-Department Alignment: Ensure Development, Finance, Programs, and Technology are aligned before external commitments are made.

c) Capacity Protocols: Create program launch and sunset protocols to manage organizational capacity.

d) Workflow Optimization: Monitor and resolve breakdowns in handoffs between departments.

1. Data, Metrics & Organizational Intelligence

a) Metric Definition: Define a core set of organizational metrics spanning programs, revenue, advocacy, and platform performance.

b) Executive Dashboards: Build and maintain executive dashboards for real-time insight into organizational health.

c) Data Integrity: Partner with Directors to ensure data consistency and integrity across systems.

d) Performance Reviews: Lead regular performance reviews (monthly/quarterly) focused on insight, not just reporting.

1. Budget Integration & Resource Allocation

a) Budget Process: Lead a cross-departmental budget integration process in partnership with Finance.

b) Integrated Planning: Ensure budgets reflect true operational needs and interdependencies, not siloed planning.

c) Resource Monitoring: Monitor resource allocation (staff time, contractors, tech) across initiatives.

d) Agile Reallocation: Recommend resource reallocation or de-prioritization when conditions shift.

1. Internal Communication Systems

a) Communication Architecture: Design and maintain a clear internal communication architecture (what is shared, where, and how often).

b) Asynchronous Norms: Establish norms for asynchronous updates, decision logs, and documentation.

c) Information Flow: Reduce "noise" while ensuring transparency and alignment across remote teams.

d) Leadership Facilitation: Facilitate high-impact leadership meetings with clear agendas, decisions, and follow-ups.

1. Vendor, Partner & Platform Oversight

a) Tech Stack Oversight: Oversee selection and management of key operational vendors and platforms (e.g., Asana, Sage Intacct, Raiser's Edge, GO Smart).

b) Partner Integration: Ensure external partners are integrated into internal workflows and expectations.

c) ROI Assessment: Evaluate ROI and effectiveness of service providers.

d) Contracting Standards: Standardize contracting and onboarding processes across departments.

1. Risk Identification & Mitigation

a) Risk Identification: Proactively identify operational, financial, reputational, and delivery risks.

b) Risk Register: Maintain a centralized risk register with mitigation strategies and ownership.

c) Compliance: Ensure compliance with grant requirements, contracts, and reporting obligations.

d) Contingency Planning: Enable contingency planning for high-risk or high-visibility initiatives.

1. Leadership Enablement & Team Effectiveness

a) Leadership Coaching: Coach Directors on managing in a systems-based, cross-functional environment.

b) Capacity Building: Identify and address gaps in leadership capacity, structure, expertise, or clarity.

c) Team Performance: Support Directors in building high-performing teams with clear roles and accountability.

d) Director Onboarding: Lead onboarding for new Directors to ensure rapid integration into the organizational system.

1. Continuous Improvement & Innovation

a) Iterative Culture: Establish a culture of iterative improvement, including retrospectives and process refinement.

b) Automation & Efficiency: Identify opportunities to automate, streamline, or eliminate redundant work.

c) Operational Pilots: Pilot new operational models or tools that increase efficiency and scalability.

d) Industry Benchmarking: Benchmark against peer organizations to bring in best practices.

1. Board & Executive Support

a) Board Materials: Partner with the CEO to prepare operational insights and materials for Board meetings.

b) Plan Execution: Translate Board-level recommendations into actionable operational plans.

c) Directive Tracking: Track and ensure follow-through on Board-approved initiatives and directives.

d) Executive Briefings: Provide the CEO with clear, concise operational briefings and decision points.

Required Qualifications

Experience: 10+ years in senior operational leadership, preferably within a complex non-profit, government agency, or arts-integrated organization.

Systems Thinking: A proven track record of creating order out of ambiguity by building workflows that people want to use.

Sector Knowledge: Familiarity with the unique landscapes of State Arts Agencies (SAAs), arts advocacy, grantmaking, and Software as a Service (SaaS) is a significant plus.

Tech Literacy: Thorough understanding of project management software (Asana) and remote collaboration tools (Slack, Zoom).

Preferred Competencies

An active commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility, social justice, and anti-racism.

A commitment to, interest in, and understanding of the Creative West region.

An experienced and effective virtual worker.

An effective communicator and consensus builder.

An ability to manage rapidly-shifting priorities.

An ease with navigating and operating within an environment of ambiguity from time to time.

Motivated to work both independently with self-sufficiency, as well as warmly and collaboratively with a group.

Strong problem-solving and solution-oriented mindset.

An advanced level of emotional intelligence.

A strong desire to establish trusting relationships.

Compensation
The salary range is $175,000 to $185,000 annually.

Benefits

Employer-paid health insurance

Employer-paid life and disability insurance

Dental insurance partially subsidized by employee

401(k) with up to

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