We are hiring: Communications Strategist (NOW CLOSED)
Help us use research and strategy to change the world
THIS JOB POSTING IS NOW CLOSED (AS OF AUG. 22, 2022)
We are Black Sheep, a cause-driven creative and brand strategy agency that works with impactful companies and organizations to activate communities around things that matter. We are recruiting for a Communications Strategist.
Learn more here:
Communications Strategist Job Description
As Communications Strategist you'll be a bold, strategic thinker and continuous learner, using your curiosity and drive to understand the world to support and develop brand, campaign and marketing strategies for our clients. You are skilled at conducting research, analyzing data and pulling insights and patterns from what you’ve learned. You’ll generously share those insights and patterns with your teammates, documenting your research with precision and developing summaries and briefs that inspire and inform our team’s best work. Last but not least, you’ll act as a tactical consultant to your clients—using your well-rounded digital and marketing knowledge to strategize with them on the best ways to reach audiences.
You are ready to:
- Generate smart, sustainable strategies & communications plans that are rooted in research and connect the dots between client work and current culture.
- Build on your already solid knowledge of research methods and tools, using a robust internal toolbox that will allow you to deploy the right types of research for each of your projects.
- Be a generous communicator of research findings, strategic highlights and context to both your internal team and your clients, anticipating their needs and thinking steps ahead to ensure everyone has the information they need.
- Use your well-rounded digital and marketing knowledge and risk-tolerant innovator mindset to provide communications consulting to our team and clients, being a vocal participant in brainstorms, generating smart ideas quickly and having sharp instincts for how to stretch, question and pivot our strategies day-to-day.
Your day might include:
Strategy Research, Development and Activation
- Developing research plans and roadmaps with mentorship from the Strategy Director
- Engaging directly in data collection, taking ownership of producing research deliverables and conducting the research first-hand in partnership with the project team
- Recording and coding gathered data, summarizing interview transcripts and highlighting important themes, creating bibliographies and research hubs for desk research, summarizing survey data into easy-to-read reports, etc.
- Communicating research findings to stakeholders in draft mode and in final presentations, also writing email updates, briefs and reports when needed
- Staying in researcher mode up until presentation day, keeping an eye out for new information, news articles, alerts, client milestones and political shifts that may change how our work is perceived or necessitate a change in direction
- Providing a sounding board for strategic decisions, weighing them against research findings and supporting the Strategy Director by giving feedback and asking clarifying questions
- Using well-rounded marketing and advertising knowledge to think about how our strategies will be implemented and identifying ideas for how to bring the strategy to life in later phases
- Developing robust, research-backed tactical and comms plans in partnership with your project team(s)
- Collaborating with digital and creative teams to ideate, select and develop the right tactical approaches—mapping each approach to audience groups, key messages, KPIs and timelines
- Developing channel or initiative-specific strategies in partnership with digital and creative teams, contributing to ideating sessions, overseeing the production of your strategies and ensuring a cohesive, strategic approach
Creative Development and Brand Foundations
- Developing calls-to-action, key messaging points and recommended emphasis points based on research and well-rounded marketing knowledge
- Contributing to brand architecture, naming and brand development work
- Conducting research to support the naming process, looking into potential pitfalls, word associations, available digital properties, copyrights/trademarks and other implications of name selection
Strategy Leadership
- Supporting Strategy Director on managing vendors and tools
- Staying on top of current events—subscribing to newsletters, setting Google alerts and following all client channels, bringing a constant flow of resources and updates to the team as strategies are being developed and implemented
- Participating in brainstorms with the creative team, bringing relevant and unexpected ideas to the table as creative work is being developed
- Identifying learning opportunities for the team, attending webinars and lectures and providing notes and takeaways so learnings can be shared and maximized
Job Requirements
Below is a description of the traditional experience that can lead to strength in this role, but we are background agnostic and value candidates with different and unique work histories. Please, share your experience with us and tell us why you believe you'd be a strong candidate for this strategy role.
- 2-4 years of relevant experience in which you have conducted, analyzed and presented findings on multiple types of market research, as well as provided marketing consulting on multi-channel brands or campaigns
- Exceptional organizational skills with attention to detail
- Understanding of the creative process, marketing and branding best practices and the nuanced digital landscape
- Experience measuring marketing initiatives and reporting on results—Google Analytics, Sprout Social, email or other similar platforms
- Strong, concise, creative writing skills
- Advanced communication skills, including both written (documents and presentations) and interpersonal communication skills
- Confidence and poise to successfully present strategy or program recommendations to clients
- Ability to confidently handle 3-4 client projects simultaneously
- Tendency to identify problems/challenges early and provide suggested solutions
- A strong demonstration of learner and opportunity/growth mindsets
- Ability to thrive in new/uncharted work assignments, situational ambiguity and messy problems
- Strong time management skills and comfort level with tracking and documenting time
- A desire to work in a high-trust environment where comfort with autonomy and self-direction are a must
- Location: Remote, but located and approved to work within North America
Salary Range
$55,000 to $80,000
Open-Book Management and Bonus Compensation
From the inception of Black Sheep, we've made a conscious effort to always keep people as the central focus of our growth strategy. As a team we practice open-book management and huddle weekly to discuss our financial trajectory. We pay out quarterly bonuses to the team based on specified quarterly agency targets. Team members have averaged 12% of their annual salary in bonus annually with potential to increase based on agency performance. We win and lose as a team and our bonus structure is no different.
Inclusion at The Black Sheep Agency
Yes, we’re a gathering of rebels. We’ve come together to change minds and accelerate impact for organizations and businesses that are leading communities toward a more equitable future. In our field of strategy, marketing and creative ideas, we know the playing field isn’t fair, and getting a dream job is easier for some than others.
We believe our ecosystem is strengthened through perspective and collaboration, and that can only happen when mentorship, leadership and career opportunities are open to all. We’re looking for go-getters and figure-it-outers— people who think beyond the ordinary list of awards and internships and tell the story of how they’ve transformed their professional life through personal initiative and creativity.
We don’t believe talent and expertise should look the same—ever. Tell us how you’ll join us in sparking an empowered and brilliant future for our communities. Be your own agent of change. We want to meet you.
How to Apply
Does this role excite you? Us too!
Apply by clicking here and answering a few questions. Thank you!
You can expect the following in this recruiting process:
- Completion of the application above
- Upon review of applications, some candidates will move on to an additional screening survey
- After grading screening submissions, some candidates will move on to a first-round interview with our Director of Strategy [1 hr]
- After the Director qualifies interviewed candidates, some will move on to a panel interview with three other Director level team members. This panel interview will include the presentation of your own strategic work from your previous work experience. [1.5 hr]
- After the panel qualifies the interviewed candidates, some will move on to a final interview with our Managing Director. This interview will have two parts: 1) a 'reverse interview' where the candidates show off their interviewing skills by guiding a conversation to learn about our culture, work environment, processes, etc. Following the interview, we'll ask candidates to send a summary report of what they learned. [45 min] + 2) a conversation to go over additional important factors of the job and work life at Black Sheep. It's our intention to make sure every candidate has access to the same important information about what it's like to work at the agency. [45 min]
- After step five, candidates will be qualified and we'll make a decision about who we are making an offer to.