Job Overview: The Grants Team at IRC in Northern California’s (IRC NorCal) four offices in Oakland, San Jose, Sacramento, and Turlock/Modesto works to leverage public and private funding opportunities through prospecting, proposal development, grants, and sub-award contract management. The Grants Manager is primarily responsible for overseeing the full range of pre- and post-award activities required to prepare concept notes, proposals, and budgets, comply with internal approval processes, and align with compliance requirements of public agencies and private foundations. Work is performed with a team of local Grants Coordinators in collaboration with IRC NorCal’s senior leadership, finance, programs, as well as headquarters’ technical team, and awards and business development units.

Major Responsibilities:

Development and Grants Management

Prospecting

• Represent NorCal offices in all regional opportunities, particularly for restricted funding, in close coordination with Executive Director, Site Directors, Development Director, Technical Advisors, relevant program leads, and grant coordinators.
• Collaborate with the Development Director in prospecting efforts, utilizing an internal standard operating procedure to support both restricted and unrestricted fundraising needs.
• In collaboration with IRC Nor Cal Development Director, work with Site Leads to develop a funding strategy and timeline and perform prospective research on potential public and private funders.

Proposal Development (Pre-Award)

• Develop and manage the Northern California region’s proposal calendar.
• Lead concepts note, proposal, and budget development, including ensuring log frames, program design, and narrative meet high quality standards in coordination with Programs/Site directors, Finance Director, and headquarters’ Resource Acquisition and Management (RAM), and ensure all supporting documentations in the applications are up to date.
• Provide pre-award support and coverage when needed to the local offices.
• Lead negotiation and agreements stage with donors and ensure contract terms are communicated with Finance and Programs through grant kick off meetings and recorded in Asana project tracking.
• Coordinate grant opening and closing meetings for every funded opportunity across the NorCal portfolio.

Grants Management (Post-Award)

• Modify final budgets as requested by donor and Site Director/program lead and communicate with NorCal Finance and RAM to ensure incoming restricted funds will be tracked.
• Lead negotiation and agreements stage with donors and ensure contract terms are communicated with Finance and Programs through grant kick off meetings and recorded in Asana project tracking.
• Provide support with reports, including copy-editing, coordinating report timelines with headquarters, and submission.
• Serve as a main point of contact for donors across NorCal to ensure communication adheres to IRC policy and best practices.
• Develop and ensure the effective maintenance of contract and grant files for each funded program with consistent documentation standards.
• Be a local subject expert for IRC’s Business Development Standards.
• Be a local subject expert for IRC’s internal grants systems (PEERS and OTIS).

Partnerships

Be a local subject expert in IRC’s internal partnership process, PEERS, to provide technical support to the Partnership Grants Coordinator to ensure subawardees’ contracts are drafted with detailed information on scope of work, deliverables, fund disbursement, and monitoring plans in coordination with the partners and program staff, and in compliance with Finance and RAM.

Supervision & training:

• Provide leadership and management of grants team across Northern California to ensure all offices are covered and team workload is managed in a way that respects and promotes work life balance and professional growth.
• Provide training and support to new hires ensuring staff meet the expectations of their role and meet responsibilities in a timely manner.
• Be a local subject expert in OTIS and IRC’ RAM’s Business Development processes, and the local Northern California Business Development workflow.

Systems & Accountability:

• Maintain proposal calendar, pipelines, grants tracking, and regularly update senior management with up-to-date data
• Ensure the go/no-go review process of opportunities are consistently applied and strengthened by working with senior management to ensure proposals are of high quality and grants staff are at capacity
• Ensure continuous improvement on the utilization of Asana to track opportunity pipelines, award management, and reporting in coordination with senior management, Finance, and program staff
• Establish and continuously update a Standard of Practice (SOP) for Grants staff in coordination with NorCal’s Finance team and headquarters’ Resource Acquisition and Management (RAM
• Leverage regular communications with Finance, RAM, and individual NorCal office to improve SOP and workflow

Secondary duties:

Work closely with site leads and program staff to prepare interim and final reports to grantors.

Key Working Relationships:

Position Reports to: Development Director

Position Supervises: All grants team members across NorCal

Indirect Reporting: Executive Director

Other Internal and/or External Contacts:

Internal: Director of Finance, NorCal Site Directors, NorCal Program Managers & Coordinators, Technical Advisors, HQ Resource Acquisition and Management department

External: Foundations and public funders at city, county, state, and federal levels

Job Requirements:

Education:

• Master’s Degree in nonprofit management, community development, social sciences, social work, or related fields, or demonstrated work experience of similar knowledge.
• Certification or continuing education in project management, proposal development and/or fundraising a strong plus.

Work Experience:

• Three+ years of nonprofit or public sector experience in development and grants
• Three+ years of experience in a supervisory role

Demonstrated Skills and Competencies:

• Excellent writing, research, and organizational skills.
• Familiarity with grants process of government funding agency(ies) (federal, state, or county/city level)
• Familiarity with the Northern California non-profit/philanthropy environment a plus
• Familiarity and comfort working with budgets and finance departments
• Ability to work autonomously in their scheduling and prioritizing within tight deadlines and focused on the work product.
• Self-directed but with strong interpersonal skills and the ability to work well within a team
• Proficiency in Microsoft Office applications: Word, Excel, Outlook, and project management tools, e.g. Asana
• Experience in IRC systems of PEERS and OTIS a plus (for IRC internal candidates)

Language Skills:

Excellence in written and spoken English

Working Environment:

• Standard hybrid office environment (this is not a fully remote position)
• Occasional travel to other regional sites (Oakland, Sacramento, San Jose, Turlock/Modesto) required.

Posted pay ranges apply to US-based candidates. Ranges are based on various factors including the labor market, job type, internal equity, and budget. Exact offers are calibrated by work location, individual candidate experience and skills relative to the defined job requirements.

Gender Equality: IRC is committed to narrowing the gender gap in leadership positions. We offer benefits that provide an enabling environment for women to participate in our workforce including parental leave, gender-sensitive security protocols and other supportive benefits and allowances.

Equal Opportunity Employer: We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status. We will ensure that individuals with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodation to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and to receive other benefits and privileges of employment. Please contact us to request accommodation.

US Benefits: The IRC offers a comprehensive and highly competitive set of benefits. All US employees are eligible for sick time, a 403b retirement savings plans: up to 4.5% immediately vested matching contribution, plus an 3-7% additional IRC contribution, and an Employee Assistance Program which is available to our staff and their families to support in times of crisis and mental health struggles.

In addition, full-time employees are eligible for 10 US paid holidays, 20-25 paid time off days, disability & life insurance, medical, dental, and vision insurance (employee contribution starting at $135, $7, and $5 per month respectively) and FSA for healthcare, childcare, and commuter costs. Part-time employees are eligible for a proportionate amount of paid time off. These additional benefits apply to employees who work at least 6 months within a 12-month time period.