Executive Director (Charlotte)

Executive Director

About NXT | CLT

NXT | CLT is a Charlotte-based nonprofit dedicated to building the region’s next generation of successful entrepreneurial companies by equipping emerging business owners with the tools, mentorship, relationships, and resources to grow.

Established in 2021 and operating under Junction Business Services, NXT | CLT strengthens Charlotte’s entrepreneurial ecosystem, particularly high-potential small and medium-sized businesses owned by Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC).

Its intensive six-month business development program helps established entrepreneurs scale through coaching, mentorship, workshops, executive engagement, networking, and access to capital resources.

Position Summary

The Executive Director serves as the chief executive leader of NXT | CLT and is responsible for the organization’s strategic, financial, operational, programmatic, and external leadership. Reporting to the Board of Directors, the Executive Director will lead with the mindset of both a nonprofit executive and an entrepreneur, balancing mission and impact with the accountability, resourcefulness, and financial discipline required to build and sustain a successful enterprise.

The Executive Director will strengthen NXT | CLT’s cohort-based programming while positioning the organization for sustainable growth and expanded community impact.

The Executive Director will also serve as principal fundraiser, relationship builder, and external ambassador, working with the Board to diversify revenue through partnerships, philanthropy, grants, and individual giving.

Because NXT | CLT exists to serve entrepreneurs, the successful candidate must possess firsthand experience building, operating, growing, or carrying meaningful financial responsibility for an entrepreneurial enterprise.

Position Duties and Responsibilities

Strategic and Organizational Leadership

• Serve as NXT | CLT’s chief executive leader, providing vision, direction, accountability, and leadership across the organization.
• Partner with the Board to establish strategic priorities and translate organizational vision into measurable goals and outcomes.
• Build the systems, infrastructure, partnerships, and resources necessary to support sustainable growth.

Program Leadership and Entrepreneur Engagement

• Provide strategic leadership and oversight for NXT | CLT’s cohort-based programming and entrepreneurial initiatives.
• Ensure programming remains relevant, innovative, practical, and responsive to the needs of growth-oriented entrepreneurs.
• Build meaningful relationships with participating and alumni entrepreneurs and maintain an understanding of their businesses, opportunities, and challenges.
• Establish measurable goals to assess participant outcomes and organizational impact.
• Expand access to mentorship, executive expertise, procurement opportunities, capital, networks, and other resources that help participating businesses grow.

Fundraising and Resource Development

• Lead a comprehensive and diversified fundraising strategy in partnership with the Board.
• Establish annual resource development goals and maintain accountability for achieving revenue targets.
• Personally cultivate, solicit, secure, and steward relationships with corporations, foundations, individual donors, and funding partners.
• Identify appropriate grant opportunities and ensure fulfillment of grant requirements and stewardship.
• Explore innovative revenue opportunities that contribute to long-term financial sustainability.

Financial and Operational Management

• Maintain responsibility for NXT | CLT’s overall financial health and operational effectiveness.
• Develop and manage the annual operating budget in partnership with the Board.
• Oversee accounting, financial operations, reporting, forecasting, policies, and internal controls.
• Develop efficient and scalable operational systems and ensure compliance with applicable nonprofit, financial, grant, and organizational requirements.

Community Engagement, Partnerships, and Brand Leadership

• Serve as a visible and credible ambassador throughout Charlotte’s business, entrepreneurial, philanthropic, corporate, and civic communities.
• Develop strategic partnerships that expand resources available to NXT | CLT participants.
• Position NXT | CLT as an important contributor within Charlotte’s entrepreneurial ecosystem.
• Oversee organizational communications and strengthen awareness of NXT | CLT’s mission, programs, outcomes, and opportunities for engagement.

Team and Organizational Culture

• Recruit, retain, lead, and develop the staff, consultants, volunteers, coaches, and other resources necessary to fulfill NXT | CLT’s mission.
• Establish clear expectations, accountability, and performance standards.
• Foster a collaborative, entrepreneurial, results-oriented culture that encourages initiative, innovation, problem-solving, and continuous improvement.

Candidate Qualifications

Candidates should demonstrate:

• Five or more years of progressive leadership, management, or supervisory experience.
• Demonstrated success leading an organization, business, business unit, or entrepreneurial enterprise.
• Strong financial acumen, including budgeting, forecasting, financial reporting, revenue generation, and financial decision-making.
• Demonstrated ability to develop financial resources through fundraising, business development, sales, partnerships, grants, or other revenue-generating activities.
• Experience developing, implementing, and evaluating programs, initiatives, or services.
• Exceptional relationship-building skills and credibility with entrepreneurs, executives, donors, and community leaders.
• Strong strategic planning, organizational development, project management, and execution capabilities.
• Experience leading staff, consultants, contractors, volunteers, or multidisciplinary teams.
• Excellent written, verbal, presentation, and public-speaking skills.
• Knowledge of Charlotte’s entrepreneurial, corporate, philanthropic, and community landscape is strongly preferred.
• A bachelor’s degree in business or a related field is preferred; an advanced business degree or nonprofit management certification is desirable.

Entrepreneurial Operating Experience — Mandatory Requirement

The Executive Director must have personally run a business or built an entrepreneurial organization and carried meaningful responsibility for its success or failure. Candidates who do not meet this requirement will not advance in the search regardless of other qualifications.

To satisfy this requirement, a candidate must have accomplished at least one of the following:

• Founded and operated a company with meaningful revenue, employees, and responsibility for consistently meeting payroll over multiple years.
• Held full profit-and-loss (P&L) responsibility for a business or business unit, accountable for generating revenue and managing costs rather than solely administering an allocated budget.
• Built an entrepreneurial support organization—such as an accelerator, incubator, venture studio, fund, or founder network—from an early stage into an established operation with earned or raised revenue and measurable participant outcomes.
• Acquired, turned around, grown, or exited a business in which they held meaningful personal or fiduciary responsibility and risk.

The following experiences, while valuable, do not independently satisfy this requirement:

• Managing a program, department, or initiative within a larger institution against an allocated budget.
• Grantmaking, grant administration, or portfolio oversight without responsibility for generating the underlying revenue.
• Advising, consulting to, mentoring, or investing in entrepreneurs without personally building or operating an enterprise.
• Corporate leadership where an established revenue stream existed before the candidate assumed responsibility and was not meaningfully dependent upon their leadership or revenue-generation efforts.

This firsthand operating experience is essential. The Executive Director must understand through personal experience the accountability, uncertainty, financial pressures, resource constraints, and decision-making required to build and sustain an enterprise.

Compensation

The Executive Director will receive an annual base salary of $90,000–$100,000 and will be eligible for a performance-based bonus of up to 30% of base salary, tied to established fundraising, development, and grant revenue goals.

NXT | CLT will also provide an annual $5,000 health insurance benefit.

POLICY ON PLACEMENT AND RECRUITING

The Batten Group and NXT | CLT are equal opportunity employers committed to identifying and recruiting highly qualified candidates based on the experience, leadership capabilities, competencies, and qualifications necessary for success in the position. All qualified applicants will receive consideration without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, or any other status protected