Talent on Fire Consulting

 

A Dual Role by Design This is a hybrid position, jointly held between Bay Ed Fund and the Sunnyvale School District. The Fellow is embedded within the district as Chief of Staff to the Superintendent — serving as on-the-ground, day-to-day support for the district’s most critical strategic and community work — while remaining part of the BEF team, drawing on the organization’s cross-district knowledge, tools, and network to accelerate impact.   The Fellow brings the best of both organizations to every interaction: BEF’s systems-level expertise and the district’s deep community relationships.

THE OPPORTUNITY

The District Fellow & Chief of Staff is a strategic partner, project leader, and systems thinker embedded at the heart of district operations. Positioned at the intersection of the Superintendent’s office, district leadership, BEF, and the broader school community, this role will guide a year-long visioning process enabling stakeholders across the Sunnyvale community to define what they want for their districts and schools.

The Fellow is a trusted thought partner who translates vision into action, builds authentic relationships across the organization and community, and serves as an essential bridge connecting district leadership, BEF, and external partners.

This is a year-long position, with the potential opportunity to transition to a full-time role at Sunnyvale School District or Bay Ed Fund if there is fit and need.

ABOUT THE BAY ED FUND

The Bay Ed Fund, founded in 2022, is taking a new approach to closing the opportunity gap and ensuring all students are prepared to thrive in the Bay Area. We begin with the voices and aspirations of students, families, and communities to create a local vision for how graduates will be prepared to thrive as adults in the Bay Area. We then support the district and community over ten years to realize that vision through collaborative, transformative work at both the district and school levels. This support includes investments in instruction, talent, data, and change management. Currently, we are working in South San Francisco, East Palo Alto, and San Mateo - Foster City. We are exploring an expansion to Sunnyvale during the 26-27 school year.

ABOUT THE SUNNYVALE SCHOOL DISTRICT

The Sunnyvale School District team comprises more than 800 highly qualified educators, administrators, and support staff whose primary goal is to enable the approximately 5,600 students enrolled to achieve academic success.  The district includes a comprehensive preschool program, eight elementary schools serving students in transitional kindergarten through fifth grade, and two middle schools serving students in sixth through eighth grade. The district reflects the diversity of Silicon Valley, with approximately 45 languages represented among its students, and partners with more than 35 community organizations — including world-class universities, high-tech leaders, health organizations, and community groups — to leverage resources and expertise to help children develop the self-respect, healthy habits, and academic skills they need to thrive. 

ROLE & RESPONSIBILITIES

COMMUNITY VISION & STRATEGIC PLANNING

You’ll ensure that the community-led vision process is executed with excellence: students, families, educators, and community members feel heard, and the resulting strategic plan reflects their voices.

• Serve as the district’s primary point of contact for all visioning and strategic planning activities, managing the relationship between the district, BEF, and external partners
• Develop and manage materials for vision design team and community vision meetings, including bilingual communications for families and community members
• Provide substantive feedback on deliverables developed by external planning partners
• Conduct empathy interviews and gather insights from teachers, administrators, families, and community members to inform planning
• Leverage cross-district learnings from BEF’s network to strengthen the district’s approach

ACCOUNTABILITY, TRACKING, & PARTNER MANAGEMENT

BEF and district initiatives are tightly managed, with clear accountability structures, strong cross-organization relationships, and timely deliverables.

• Develop and maintain objectives, key results, and milestones for all BEF initiatives; build tracking systems to monitor progress
• Co-lead BEF project management meetings and facilitate stepbacks with the BEF team
• Serve as the connective tissue between the district team, BEF, and external partners — ensuring both organizations are aligned on priorities, progress, and next steps
• Work closely with third-party vendors and ensure deliverable quality and timeliness

LONG-TERM STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT PLANNING

Leveraging backwards mapping and ongoing monitoring, you’ll ensure local leaders across all groups — families, teachers, school leaders, district leaders — understand the vision process, feel informed at every stage, and trust that their input shaped the outcome. Engagement is not a one-time event but a sustained, well-sequenced experience that moves key audiences toward genuine ownership of the community vision.

• Identify high-leverage opportunities for the district leadership team — including principals and site administrators — to engage in the strategic planning process and BEF initiatives
• Design and maintain a year-long engagement plan that sequences touchpoints intentionally across stakeholder groups — educators, families, school leaders, and community members
• Segment and tailor engagement by audience, recognizing that different groups require different entry points and levels of involvement
• Identify and cultivate early adopters who can co-facilitate engagement and amplify the work within their communities
• Build visible feedback loops that show stakeholders how their input shaped the plan
• Manage the engagement calendar to sequence asks, avoid fatigue, and sustain momentum across the full arc of the planning process

COMMUNITY NARRATIVE & STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS

The vision will only effectively create momentum for improvement if stakeholders see themselves and their input carried through the process and outcomes. The district’s public narrative around the visioning and strategic planning work is clear, consistent, and proactively maintained — even in the absence of a dedicated communications director.

• Own the narrative of the community vision and strategic planning process — ensuring all stakeholders understand where the district is, where it’s headed, and why their voice matters
• Draft communications across formats and audiences: family-facing updates, administrator briefings, board summaries, and community announcements
• Serve as the primary communications lead for visioning work, including in contexts without a dedicated communications director, ensuring consistency, accessibility, and bilingual reach
• Equip school site leaders and educators with materials to communicate vision progress to their own communities — making them messengers, not just recipients

COMMUNITY EVENT MANAGEMENT

The vision process will include critical gatherings of teams, leaders, and the broader community. These are critical moments for building connection and shared understanding. Exceptional experiences for those who attend build momentum and continued buy-in.

• Lead operations for large-scale in-person events, including visioning meetings, family engagement nights, and district-wide gatherings
• Coordinate translation, childcare, event setup, staffing, and logistics with district and operations teams
• Develop run-of-show documents and manage day-of execution

QUALIFICATIONS

We recognize that qualifications extend beyond a checklist, and we encourage candidates who believe they could be a good fit to apply, even if they do not meet every qualification. We value diversity, inclusivity, and belonging, and we invite all to join us in driving transformative change in education.

1. Diverse Set of Education Leadership Experiences: You have 7+ years of professional experience, across K-12 education, education reform, consulting, or a district/nonprofit leadership context. You can leverage your experiences to manage up to senior leaders and create exceptional teams, products, and experiences. 
2. Strategic & Analytical Decision-Making: You regularly evaluate your work and the team’s work to identify highest-leverage priorities amid competing demands. You consistently bring data to bear when making decisions and iterate based on quantitative and qualitative feedback.
3. Relational and Community-Centered: You hold a deep commitment to building authentic trust with families, educators, and community members. You also know how to navigate sensitive information, competing stakeholder interests, and organizational dynamics with care.
4. Communication & Narrative-Building: You are an exceptional written communicator who can own a public narrative across audiences and formats; comfortable driving communications independently when no dedicated comms staff is available; experience with bilingual contexts a plus
5. Engagement & Operations Management: You’ve proven your ability to design and sequence stakeholder engagement, adapting strategy to shift different audiences toward ownership over time. You’re also able to manage complex, multi-stakeholder projects from planning through execution.
6. Empathy and Active Listening: You are skilled at drawing out authentic stakeholder voice through interviews, focus groups, and feedback sessions — and translating what’s heard into meaningful action.
7. Adaptive and Self-Directed:  You are comfortable in ambiguity, able to create structure and clarity where none yet exist. You thrive in a fast-moving, startup-like environment. 
8. Based Locally: We have found there is no substitute for in-person meetings to build the relationships needed for this work. Therefore, we require the person in this role to live in Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo, or Santa Clara county. Additionally, we have a preference for a candidate with experience working directly in Sunnyvale.
9. (Preferred but not required) Adept at communicating in Spanish: You are able to engage a diverse range of community members, including many who are Spanish-speaking.

Additional Details & How to Apply

You will report both to the Community Lead Partner at Bay Ed Fund and the District Superintendent at Sunnyvale.

This role has a salary range of $160K-$215K based on experience. You will receive Bay Ed Fund’s generous benefits package, including holiday and vacation time; health, vision, and dental insurance; and 401K matching.