Job Title: Program Manager, Recruitment and Workforce Strategy (BravenX)
Team: Innovation
Location: In-Person in Chicago (IL)
Employment Type: Full-time
Start Date: May 2025
Braven is a national nonprofit that prepares promising young people—many of whom are people of color, from low-income backgrounds, and the first in their families to attend college—to secure a strong first opportunity after college graduation through a career-accelerating program.
We work with higher education and employer partners to offer a life-changing experience that begins with a semester-long course for college students followed by support that lasts through graduation.
Together, we are helping to open up access to the American Promise, empowering a generation of leaders who mirror the diversity of our country.
To learn more, take a look at Braven’s Jobs Report.
In order to achieve its ambition of serving 80,000-100,000 Fellows over the next decade, Braven is hiring a Program Manager, Recruitment & Workforce Strategy (PMRW) who will grow the BravenX program and accelerate Braven’s national impact. BravenX is the program offered in partnership with other nonprofits across the country (vs. in partnership with higher education institutions in our core model.) As a member of the Innovation Team, you will be responsible for recruiting ~500 students per semester into Braven’s Leadership and Career Accelerator course. You will also be responsible for supporting students who have already completed the Accelerator (“Post-Accelerator Fellows” or “PAFs”) in subsequent semesters towards strong post-career outcomes. The balance between Student Recruitment and Workforce Strategy responsibilities may vary depending on lighter or heavier seasons for each workstream, with the possibility of shifting over time as business needs evolve.
This role is on the Innovation team and reports directly to the Managing Director, BravenX.
Student Recruitment (50%)
Workforce Strategy (50%)
Requirements
Preferred Qualifications
Please know that no one ever meets 100% of the preferred qualifications. If much of this describes you, we encourage you to apply.
Work Demands
Additional Requirements
Application & Interview Process
While the interview process may vary slightly, the general process will be:
Benefits
The salary for this position, which depends on prior work experience and our assessment of your demonstrated fit for the role, will likely be between $51,500-$64,400 in Chicago. This is a full-time regular, exempt, and benefits eligible position where you will be working at 100% capacity. Braven offers competitive base salaries based on the midpoint of the market among not-for-profit organizations of similar size, with opportunities for salary growth over time. We believe in compensating staff members fairly in relation to each other, their qualifications, and their impact on behalf of the organization, and take internal and external equity seriously. Given our commitment to equity, Braven does not negotiate salary offers; instead each salary offer is determined carefully using external and internal benchmarking. You will have an opportunity to discuss salary in more detail after you begin the application process.
Braven also provides competitive, comprehensive benefits, recognition, and career development. While Braven reserves the right to change benefits at any time, current benefits include:
Location
We gather in the office 3 days a week (Tuesday through Thursday) and work remotely 2 days a week (Monday and Friday).Therefore, this role requires teammates to live within commuting distance of New York City. We believe in the magic, connection, and collaboration that happens when people work together face-to-face and we believe in giving people flexibility to focus, balance personal priorities, and save themselves two commutes per week.
Braven is an equal opportunity employer and considers qualified applicants for employment without regard to race, color, creed, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, age, disability, veteran status, or any other protected factor. We encourage talented individuals of all backgrounds to apply.
The ProblemBefore the pandemic, only 30% of the 1.3 million low-income or first-generation college students who enrolled each year graduated and secured a strong first job or entered graduate school. That’s more than 900,000 students every single year who weren’t on the path to the American Dream. Now, the number of students whose dreams have been deferred is even greater.Our MissionThe mission of Braven is to empower promising, underrepresented young people—first-generation college students, students from low-income backgrounds, and students of color—with the skills, confidence, experiences and networks necessary to transition from college to strong first jobs, which lead to meaningful careers and lives of impact.By partnering with large public universities who are working to innovate, Braven: Builds cutting-edge career education into the undergraduate experience for low-income and first-generation college students Provides students, who often feel disconnected from campus, with a network of supporters and sense of belonging Becomes a systemic solution within and across universities to fuel a generation of leaders as diverse as our future demands Our ImpactBraven Fellows are persisting in college and achieving exciting levels of job attainment. Our community of 3300 is seeing exciting success beyond graduation, and before that, on the path to college graduation and career.Read our SY 2021-2022 IMPACT REPORT and JOBS REPORT.Application & Interview ProcessWhile the interview process vary slightly by role, the general process will be: Phone screen with Talent Team member Performance Task Interview with Hiring Manager Panel Interview with Key Partners Reference Checks
Understand the required skills and qualifications, anticipate the questions you may be asked, and study well-prepared answers using our sample responses.
Program Manager Q&A's