Senior Policy Officer (EU) in Climate Protection

Position description

Future Matters is seeking an experienced EU professional with strong hands-on experience with EU policy (policymaking, advocacy, and/or consulting) to advance highly impactful climate measures.

• Location: Brussels (hybrid-model possible);
• Full-time only: 40 hours per week;
• Compensation: €48.000 – €65.000 gross annual salary, depending on experience;
• Vacation days: 27 paid vacation days;
• Benefits: 10% of work time dedicated to learning and professional development, co-working space allowance, learning budget;
• Start date: Summer 2024;
• Application deadline: May 31st, 2024.

About Future Matters

Future Matters is a non-profit strategy consultancy and think tank, working to address serious threats our world is facing. Climate change endangers the livelihoods of people long-term and on a global scale. Emerging technologies like powerful AI systems and biotechnology enable new forms of destruction, such as advanced bioweapons.

Such great risks must be met with a focus on the most impactful changes we can make – identified through careful prioritization – and thoughtful strategy that scrutinizes its underlying assumptions. Over years, we have crafted our expertise in policy prioritization research and strategy development to support think tanks, government officials, companies, and movements. Past successes include advising leading climate advocates on messaging and movement building, training hundreds in political strategy, creating the first policy prioritisation document for German climate advocates.

Now, we are looking for a Senior Policy Officer to expand our work on leveraging EU climate policy for achieving emission reduction on a global level. (You can read more about our work here).

This position has unusually high impact potential, as your work will have leverage to improve the strategy and capacity of many organizations and individuals in key positions. If hired, you will have a good deal of agency to determine the most useful projects, based on expected impact and where your own expertise is best used.

Your mission as Senior Policy Officer

You enable EU action on outsized opportunities for global emission mitigation through strategic advocacy.

Our EU climate work is based on a key insight: in the next decades, the vast majority of emissions will come from outside the EU. To have the greatest impact, EU climate policy needs to identify ways to drive down emissions beyond its own borders. Our research has identified outstanding opportunities to reduce the legal, technological, and financial barriers that currently hold back global emission mitigation.

Future Matters recently published the systematic prioritization study 8 EU Policy Priorities for Global Decarbonization. Pathways to European Climate Leadership, that identifies the EU’s best climate policy opportunities for the 2024-2029 mandate. Now we work on getting these policy priorities onto the EU agenda.

Since expanding our work to the EU level 10 months ago, we have successfully built relationships with key decision-makers. Examples include the relevant Directors at DG CLIMA, influential members of the European Parliament and other EU institutions as well as German diplomats. Multiple former EU climate leaders such as former DG CLIMA Director-General Jos Delbeke and former EU Commissioner Janez Potočnik are supporting the project with advice and access to their network.

Having established this policy network, we aim to advocate for policy opportunities with major impact on global emission trajectories.

About the role

This role is a blend of advocacy, consulting, policy analysis and research synthesis with a strong emphasis on the political and policy advocacy side.

Historically, most of our work has been in Germany (climate) and the US and UK (AI safety/biosecurity). Given the recurring emergence of great opportunities for EU climate impact, we seek to permanently expand our work to the EU and build a presence in Brussels. For this, we seek to hire a Senior Policy Officer.

As Senior Policy Officer, specializing in Climate Policy, you will:

• Plan, scope, propose, and drive advocacy and consulting projects;
• Develop and implement strategic advocacy campaigns to influence EU policy on climate change;
• Assembling in-depth policy briefs on key EU policy issues, synthesizing complex information for targeted audiences;
• Build strong relationships with key stakeholders in Brussels, including policymakers, NGOs, and industry representatives;
• Network with policymakers, politicians, funders, and other key organizations to generate, qualify and convert promising leads and partnerships;
• Represent Future Matters at meetings and events, persuasively communicating our positions and recommendations;
• Collaborate with teammates to develop internal plans and strategies, staying up-to-date on the latest climate change and EU policy developments.

Qualifications

About you:

• An excellent mind for and approach to political strategy;
• Highly impact oriented; always centering the importance of beneficial outcomes and ‘seeing the forest through the trees’;
• A strong truth-seeking (“Scout”) mindset; constantly updating their views in line with the best evidence and taking an empirical orientation to problem-solving;
• Willing and able to prioritize, recognizing that while there are many important and valuable issues to tackle, but that to have the greatest impact we must focus on the best opportunities we are contextually best suited to handle;
• Autonomous, entrepreneurial and intrinsically motivated to do great work to drive impact;
• Appreciative, empathetic and supportive team player.

Successful candidates must have:

• Strong knowledge of and experience with EU policy and institutions;
• Strong knowledge of and experience with climate policy;
• Ability to generate quality deliverables; expertise at gathering and synthesizing complex information in a compelling, structured manner;
• Well developed soft skills, including verbal and non-verbal communication, persuasive ability, networking fluency, and relationship management;
• The ability to regularly work on-site in Brussels and occasionally travel; Berlin several times a year for team sessions, and elsewhere for relevant events;
• Full professional fluency in English.

You may also have some of these “bonus skills”:

These are not necessary to apply. Exceptional candidates may have one or more:

• An existing network of relevant stakeholders specifically in the EU climate policy space;
• In-depth understanding of climate science and climate solutions;
• Familiarity with gold-standard approaches for data-collection, ability to scrutinize study design and form well-founded critiques of research;
• Sales and business development experience;
• Experience with consulting service delivery, this may be in the field of strategy, systems, communications, policy, or executive advising;
• Fluency in German, French and/or additional EU languages;
• Experience with coalition building, networking to gain influence, negotiations, and/or strategic communications;
• Past experience with the management of a team or department;
• Public speaking or group facilitation skills.

Why work for Future Matters?

• Impact at the core: Fundamental to everything that we do: We seek to have the greatest impact possible with our limited resources. Optimizing for impact means finding leverage points where limited effort can trigger large scale changes. By prioritizing well and focusing strongly, we aim for impact that is usually infeasible for an organization of this size. Multiple grants from grantmakers aiming to find the most cost-effective organizations globally showcase our early success in this endeavour;
• Approaching strategy with the mindset and tools of a scientist: We seek to be unusually systematic and rigorous in the development of strategy. This means: basing our strategy recommendations on the best available evidence and using tools derived from disciplines such as forecasting research or behavioural sciences in strategy development. To be as clear-sighted as possible, we work to overcome our individuals biases and update our views of the world constantly. Therefore, we aim to cultivate a low-ego culture, where the best argument, evidence or reasoning are decisive, not your position in the hierarchy. We celebrate team members sharing where they have been wrong and what they learned from it;
• Striving for an excellent work environment: We believe that excellence comes from giving talented people a work environment where they can thrive. This means: Smooth operations to minimize administrative work, clear roles and responsibilities to limit coordination and increase autonomy to act fast, continuous investment in learning and development of all staff members including using 10% of your work time for learning;
• Supportive team culture: We achieve our successes together and celebrate each other for our win. Despite being a remote team, we make an effort to stay in touch on a personal level. We take time weekly for work-free exchange in the team café and meet three times a year in person for team meetings to get to know each other better and learn together.

What we offer

• The expected annual salary will be between 48,000 EUR and 65,000 EUR depending on relevant experience;
• Generous time off policies, including 27 days of paid vacation;
• Continuing education budget, and allowance for a coworking space.

Application instructions

If entering the second round, will receive a detailed outline of the application process, which may be subject to slight changes depending on the candidate pool.

We are an equal-opportunity employer, and we value diversity at our organization. We do not discriminate on the basis of ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, age, physical attractiveness, marital status, or disability. Therefore, we are happy to make any reasonable accommodations necessary to welcome all to our workplace. Please contact us to discuss adjustments to the application process if needed: [email protected].

We know that great candidates’ CVs don’t always line up with every detail of a job description on paper. You know your strengths best, so if you are passionate about EU climate policy, and you believe you have the relevant knowledge, skills and competencies to do great in this role – we encourage you to apply!

If you are interested in this role, please apply below. Any questions about your application? Please contact [email protected] and we will be happy to assist you.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Fast-track option: If you have 10 years of experience in climate and/or EU-related roles or you are meeting 6 or more bonus criteria as well as all must-have criteria (and can demonstrate so through your work history) you can choose to upload only your CV/LinkedIn and we will most likely fast-track your application to the second stage of the hiring process. Otherwise, we recommend you fill in the questions for the greatest chance of advancing through the next rounds.

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