State Partnerships Manager (Kansas City, MO)

Location: Kansas City, MO (work from home with frequent in-person meetings with Kansas City officials 3-10 business days per month), plus 1-4 days of travel within Missouri to prisons and parole offices across the state per month

Role Type: Full-time

Compensation: $112,000-$131,000

Visa sponsorship: Not available

Hires remotely in: United States

Experience: 3+ years

Recidiviz is thrilled to be hiring a State Partnerships Manager to join our team! We’re a small, fast-moving group that partners closely with state correctional departments to safely and equitably reduce prison populations. That’s where you come in. You’re someone with a blend of the abilities you might see from exceptional account managers, product managers, and political strategists. You’re able to captivate an audience while telling a story, to use data effectively, and to run good meetings and get things done. Most of all you are someone who brings rigor to their work and levity to their relationships. You don't need to have direct experience with criminal justice reform but care deeply about doing work that matters.

About us

Recidiviz is creating safer, healthier communities by improving outcomes for justice-involved people. We build tech that reduces the number of people in prison and helps criminal justice leaders embrace data-driven decision-making.

Using modern data infrastructure and thoughtful product design, we’ve been able to safely and permanently reduce incarceration and improve outcomes. We work side-by-side with leaders of the criminal justice system, justice-impacted individuals, and ecosystem partners to build a better path forward. In addition to the revenue we earn from state partners, some of the most respected philanthropists and foundations support our work.

People who succeed at Recidiviz lead with kindness and humility, assume good intent, learn from failure, and fix problems when they see them.

About the role

The State Partnerships Manager is responsible for building strong relationships, deploying relationship capital, maximizing impact, and creating value for their partner states. Your job is to partner closely with the leadership teams of state prison agencies. These leaders, your new best friends, are responsible for thousands of staff, tens of thousands of people in prison, and billions of dollars. By clearly articulating the specific needs in your partner state, you’ll define and communicate, internally and externally, how exactly Recidiviz will guide your partner states to safely increase liberty for the populations they influence. This role requires regular in-state travel (you would be expected to be holding in-person meetings with Kansas City officials 3-10 business days per month, with 1-4 days of travel within Missouri to prisons and parole offices across the state.

While Recidiviz employees are based throughout the country, we are looking for someone who lives within commuting distance to Kansas City, MO for this particular role.

Core responsibilities

• Understand, deconstruct and document the needs of key correctional actors and justice involved individuals
• Build deep relationships with key stakeholders by making them feel heard and supported
• Adapt and deploy Recidiviz core product offerings, and ad hoc data analysis capabilities to delight state partners
• Communicate in clear writing what specific steps ought be taken by product managers, user experience designers, data analysts and implementation engineers for Recidiviz to support your state’s objectives
• Drive partnerships towards success in terms of impact and financial sustainability
• Self-regulation skills to effectively navigate high-intensity experiences with incarcerated individuals and correctional line staff in prison facilities and other challenging environments

Minimum Qualifications

• Be a proactive problem solver. We’re looking for someone quick to try to solve new problems they come across, rather than hoping someone else will get it — whether it’s a missing template for a recurring meeting or spilled cereal in the office.
• Have an understanding of how to make progress in challenging environments. You have a successful track record of stakeholder engagement and relationship management. You have a boundless commitment to the combination of creativity and persistence. Former colleagues describe you as the person who makes sure the changes that matter actually get implemented.
• Bring experience working in or with state governments. You’ve worked in or alongside Missouri government agencies, and have existing relationships you can leverage. You're able to hit the ground running and deepen engagement quickly by building on those trusted relationships.
• Be a process leader. Good ideas are nothing without excellent implementation. You’re excited about building replicable, clear processes internally and externally. You’re a clear communicator and documentation wizard with a successful track record of managing cross-functional teams.
• Open-minded, humble, and curious. You are eager to learn and especially capable of active and empathetic listening, particularly with our partners, who are often subject matter experts in their own right.
• Be comfortable with, and excited by, technology: You are eager to supportively guide data analysis and technology products. You’re excited to work with a fast-moving team, helping it bring order and prioritization to complexity, while also respecting—and enjoying—the need to be flexible.
• 3+ years of experience in account management, product management, political strategy / lobbying, business development, policy, or similar role.

Preferred qualifications

• Have a connection to the criminal justice system and/or passion for doing work that matters: You have either lived or working experience with the operations and consequences of America's criminal justice system. You don’t need to know everything about the field, but it is helpful if the design and efficacy of our criminal justice processes feel like issues that you cannot choose to ignore.

Compensation

Compensation is standardized based on roles and responsibilities. This ensures equitable compensation and responsible stewardship of our resources. As such, we do not negotiate compensation offers.

The expected salary range for this role is $112,000-$131,000. Actual pay depends on a combination of demonstrated skills, scope, and relevant experience.

What we offer

• Effective, extremely thoughtful colleagues, working together on a mission that matters
• 90% medical, dental, and vision insurance coverage for you and your dependents
• Flexible time off, including 20 days of PTO and 13 paid holidays
• 12 weeks of paid parental leave
• 401(k) retirement plan with 5% company match and no vesting period
• Complimentary One Medical membership (depending on location)
• Partnership with Carrot to provide employees with inclusive fertility and family-forming benefits, as well as a small but growing number of hormonal health and gender-affirming care benefits
• Monthly ClassPass credit for personal wellness
• Free mental health support via Talkspace
• Well-located offices in Oakland and Manhattan, with the flexibility to work remotely or go into either office as you choose
• An annual company offsite each spring and other ad-hoc gatherings
• All the exhilarating challenges and stretch opportunities of a tech startup, combined with the mission-driven heart of a nonprofit

More about Recidiviz

Recidiviz was an all-volunteer effort until early 2019, when Clementine, Andrew, and Joshua founded the organization. Since then, we’ve built an A-team of software engineers, designers, product managers and domain experts, from companies like Google, Apple, Dropbox, Opower, and Sidewalk Labs. Recidiviz was part of Y-Combinator’s 2019 class and has received support from some of the most respected philanthropists and foundations, including Ford Foundation, Mackenzie Scott, Schmidt Futures, Arnold Ventures, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, and the Mozilla Foundation.

Today, Recidiviz works with (and earns revenue from) over 19 state partners – big and small, red and blue – and covers more than 45% of the US incarcerated population. We have helped to get tens of thousands of people out of the criminal justice system, safely and equitably, and saved states nearly $1 billion. In the next five years, Recidiviz plans to partner with 40 states and help 250,000 people who are stuck in the system to get out and stay out. In addition to partnering with state Departments of Corrections, Recidiviz collaborates with and learns from partners – from organizations like the Correctional Leaders Association (CLA) to community based organizations and justice-impacted individuals, whose perspectives guide our work.

To learn more about how we do what we do, check out our 2024 Year in Review, read some press coverage, or watch our TED Talk. And if you’re really keen to see our work, you can dive into our Github :).

An important note

Lasting change is always built on diversity. Recidiviz recruits, employs, trains, compensates and promotes regardless of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, disability, age, veteran status, ancestry, citizenship, marital status, gender identity and all protected status as required by applicable law. We consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements. If you have a special need that requires accommodation, please let us know in your application. Even if you don't think you meet all the criteria above, drop your resume, and we'll take a look – you might be great for another role or another time!