Managing Director, Culture & Operations
The Position
National Center for Youth Law
The National Center for Youth Law (NCYL) is a national nonprofit that puts children — especially those pushed to society’s margins — at the center of every fight for justice. For more than 50 years, we have partnered with young people, families, and communities in efforts to dismantle racism, discrimination, and inequity wherever they appear. We recognize that harmful policies don’t affect children in isolation. Each young person’s well-being depends on their family’s stability, their community’s resources, and the opportunities they can access. By working across all systems that shape young people’s lives in a rapidly evolving society, we advance solutions that are holistic, intersectional, and transformative.
Position
The Managing Director, Culture & Operations will lead the development of an inclusive, equitable, positive, and adaptive culture at the NCYL, while ensuring that operations, systems, and infrastructure are efficient and aligned with NCYL’s mission and values.
They will guide all operational functions—not just the operations team—and work across leadership and staff to ensure people, systems, and resources support NCYL’s impact. The role requires a deep understanding of organizational change, restorative practices, and the value of lived expertise. This is a time-limited position; the position and its scope of responsibilities will be evaluated for continuation at the end of year one of employment. The role will report to the Executive Director.
The ideal candidate is a strategic and collaborative leader who values both structure and care. They will embed wellbeing, belonging, and equity into everyday policies, practices, and decisions. They understand that efficient operations and a thriving culture are deeply connected; they love systems that make teams more effective, are fluent in complex HR and financial matters, and take joy in planning meaningful staff interactions. They thrive on building strong, supportive infrastructure that will allow NCYL’s staff and mission to flourish.
Essential Functions
Culture, Wellbeing, and Staff Experience
Lead internal initiatives that nurture a positive, connected, and adaptive culture through both formal and informal approaches that promote joy, trust, and collaboration.
Design and facilitate inclusive meetings, retreats, and gatherings that foster open communication, creativity, and psychological safety.
Develop and implement an internal plan that advances staff wellbeing, connection, and belonging and ensures organizational systems support these goals.
Cultivate restorative and healing-centered approaches to conflict, promoting understanding, accountability, and growth. 
Embed restorative practices and equity-minded approaches in all policies, systems, and leadership practices.
Lead the planning and facilitation of staff retreats, internal operational communications, and organization-wide initiatives that strengthen connection and performance.
Organizational Leadership and Strategy
Partner with the Executive Director and leadership team to strengthen internal culture and operational effectiveness across all teams and functions.
Lead cross-organizational planning processes to ensure that culture, systems, and strategy are fully integrated and mutually reinforced.
Align operations with NCYL’s strategic plan and organizational values, ensuring policies and practices promote wellbeing, accountability, and belonging.
Support and honor staff with lived experience in the systems NCYL seeks to transform, ensuring their perspectives inform internal structures and decision-making.
Organizational Effectiveness and Operations
Assess current systems and develop, implement, and monitor systems that improve coordination, communication, and decision-making.
Lead process improvement efforts to increase efficiency, reduce duplication, and create clear, equitable workflows.
Ensure practices reflect NCYL’s values and commitment to staff wellbeing and are in compliance with the appropriate legal and financial standards.
Establish and maintain organization-wide project management systems that promote clarity, accountability, and timely completion of goals while also creating appropriately inclusive and equitable processes.
Support teams in planning and executing cross-functional initiatives, ensuring roles, responsibilities, and deliverables are clearly defined as a form of equity and to advance impact.
Monitor progress on major initiatives, assess outcomes, and recommend adjustments to improve performance and alignment with strategic goals.
Conduct regular reviews of and develop recommendations for NCYL’s policies and procedures to identify and address inequities, inefficiencies, or gaps and enhance effectiveness, fairness, and alignment with organizational priorities.
Oversee and strengthen NCYL’s core operations, including HR, Finance, and IT, ensuring that these functions are efficient, transparent, and aligned with NCYL’s mission and values in how they operate.
Supervise and support operations team leads, fostering collaboration and accountability across teams.
Learning, Evaluation and Continuous Improvement
Create mechanisms for feedback and reflection to encourage learning and continuous improvement.
Design and deliver professional development and learning opportunities that strengthen collaboration, leadership, cross-team communication, accountability, and impact.
Collect and analyze data on organizational health, staff experience, and operational performance to guide strategy and decision-making.
Track progress toward cultural and operational goals using data-driven evaluation methods.
Provide leadership with recommendations that strengthen both people-centered culture and organizational systems.
Qualifications
Demonstrated leadership experience in culture-building, staff experience, operations, and organizational development and strategy within a mission-driven non-profit environment.
Experience leading organizational change initiatives, culture and process improvements, cross-functional systems design, and embedding equity-minded practices into policy and operations.
Experience serving as a strategic partner to senior leadership, participating in planning and aligning culture, operations, and strategy.
Experience leading conflict resolution, mediation, and restorative justice work.
Proven track record of using data and evaluation to inform continuous improvement in people systems or organizational health.
Strong background in human resources, finance, or related operational management.
Ability to lead change management efforts in dynamic environments.
Strong facilitation skills and the ability to facilitate spaces that foster psychological safety.
Excellent communication, analytical, and relationship-building skills.
Prior experience designing and facilitating retreats, workshops, or experiential learning sessions with diverse groups.
Comfort and fluency working with diverse identities, lived experiences, and perspectives.
Commitment to fostering wellbeing, belonging, and a healing-centered, high-functioning workplace while working towards NCYL’s mission and vision.
Physical Requirements
Prolonged periods of sitting at a desk and working on a computer. This position requires the ability to travel.
Salary, Benefits and Location
This is a two-year, full-time, exempt position with a competitive salary range of $181,600.00 to $267,000.00 annually. The continuation of this role will be evaluated at the end of the first year of employment.
Once an offer is made, the salary is not open to negotiation. A geographic salary differential may be applied if the candidate resides somewhere other than the Oakland, CA, Los Angeles, CA, Boston, MA, New York City, Washington, DC or equivalent metro areas. This means that the salary would be reduced if the candidate resides in an area where the cost of labor is less than that of the San Francisco Bay Area.
NCYL provides a robust benefits package including health, dental, vision, life, generous vacation and sick benefits, flexible spending account, commuter benefits, employer contribution to a retirement plan and short-term and long-term disability insurance.
NCYL is registered to do business in the following 14 locations: California, Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Texas, Virginia, Washington DC, or Wisconsin. If a candidate is hired but lives in a state where NCYL is not currently registered to do business, their start date may need to be delayed until registration can be completed in the new state. This process may take as many as three months to complete.
All positions at NCYL are at-will and paid for by grants and donations, thus employment with NCYL will be contingent upon continued receipt of funding. Nothing in the statement changes the at-will employment relationship.
How to Apply
Please submit a cover letter and resume at the link below. Please, no emails or calls.
We welcome applications from individuals with different ideas, experiences, and perspectives. Applicants who meet the above criteria with lived experiences within any of our practice areas are strongly encouraged to apply.
It is the policy of NCYL to provide equal employment opportunities to all Applicants (including Employees) regardless of race, ethnicity, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, pregnancy, reproductive health decision-making, breastfeeding, national origin, age, abilities/disabilities, neurotypicality, socioeconomic status, veteran status, marital status, prior convictions, or any other protected classifications under federal, state, or local law. NCYL makes all employment decisions based on job-related factors.