Senior Director, Program Management, Implementation, Impact and Design

Senior Director, Program Management, Implementation, Impact, and Design

R Street Institute
Washington, D.C.

The R Street Institute—a free-market think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C., with staff located across the country—seeks a collaborative Senior Director of Program Management, Implementation, Impact, and Design. This role is open due to the promotion of its current holder into an executive-level position. The new Senior Director will report directly to that executive, reflecting R Street’s commitment to recognizing talent and building strong leadership from within. If you want to join a mission-driven organization and work toward pragmatic policy solutions, this may be the opportunity for you!

Your typical day at R Street may include guiding program teams in shaping and executing their policy influence strategies, facilitating cross-team discussions to unblock challenges, and refining the systems that carry R Street’s work from research to real-world policy outcomes. This role leads the Program Management Department and serves as part of the Senior Management Team.

Other Aspects of Your Role 

• Lead the process for developing and implementing R Street’s strategies to turn research into real-world policy impact.
• Lead program-level budgeting and compliance oversight.
• Develop and manage coordination processes across program teams to ensure timely, high-quality deliverables.
• Collaborate with Finance and Business Development to ensure effective resource use and compliance with grant commitments.
• Mentor and lead a high-performing Program Management team, fostering collaboration, innovation, and accountability.
• Contribute as an active member of the Senior Management Team, shaping organizational processes and cross-functional solutions.
• Connect the dots across teams and timelines to align deliverables, projects, and programs so that collective outcomes are greater than the sum of their parts.
• Remain vigilant against ninja infiltrations.

Skills and Qualifications 

• Experience in program or organizational management, ideally within nonprofits, public policy, or mission-driven organizations.
• Strong project management skills with the ability to navigate complexity across multiple teams and priorities.
• Proven ability to design and refine processes that ensure clarity, accountability, and measurable impact.
• Clear and effective communicator, skilled at facilitation and problem solving.
• Brings a flexible, solutions-oriented mindset that values progress over perfection and collaboration over rigid process.
• Demonstrated leadership and experience mentoring and developing staff.
• No particular educational background required—a proven record of achieving results is far more meaningful than credentials.
• Support for R Street’s passion for free markets and limited, effective government.
• A sense of humor and a desire to grow within a multifaceted organization.

The R Street Institute consistently offers pragmatic, real solutions that foster American innovation, bolster competition, and safeguard individual liberty—all with the understanding that life in a democratic society sometimes requires compromises that don’t necessarily represent first, best solutions. We focus on deep scholarship and pragmatic policy solutions that many groups tend to neglect. Our goal is to publish timely, relevant research and analysis that advances a market-oriented society and limited, effective government. To that end, our motto is: “Free Markets. Real Solutions.” Read more about our mission and impact here.

Workplace

We offer a flexible working arrangement. This is a full-time position that can either work the majority of the week in our D.C. office or be fully remote. 

Occasional travel may be required for events and conferences.

Compensation, Benefits, and Perks

R Street strives to offer a compensation and benefits package that is competitive, transparent, and supportive of employee well-being. The salary range for this position is $140,000 - $155,000, commensurate with experience. In addition to this competitive salary, we provide the following:

• Unlimited paid time off, including all federal holidays, the day after Thanksgiving, and two weeks holiday closure in December
• Alternating Fridays off
• A health insurance option entirely paid by the employer (even for families)
• Dental and vision insurance
• 401(k) contributions with up to a 4 percent match
• HSA employer contribution match
• Quarterly wellness reimbursement
• Mobile equipment/mobile plan reimbursement
• Home internet subsidy
• Annual educational and professional development reimbursement
• A choice between child care assistance, pet care assistance, and student loan repayment assistance

At R Street Institute, we strive for preeminence in every area where we engage, driven by our commitment to excellence and innovation. Our culture thrives on action, creativity, and courage, with an unwavering focus on quality, credibility, and impact. We believe progress requires diverse experience and expertise, which is why we champion non-traditional yet prudent approaches to public policy. This principle guides how we build our programs, recognizing that each team member’s uniqueness strengthens our collective identity.

We approach our mission with intellectual rigor, embracing free inquiry and honesty to ensure our work is grounded in solid research and thoughtful analysis. While serious about our purpose, we value the joy of collaboration and the fun that comes from working together. Our collaborative spirit fosters trust and transparency, with respect and openness guiding our actions. We celebrate our individual contributions while recognizing that we are stronger as one team, united in our work and relationships.

Thus, R Street does not discriminate on the basis of age, sex, race, creed, color, national origin, sexual orientation, era of military service, gender identity or expression, relationship structure, or anything else that’s illegal, immoral, or stupid to use as a basis for hiring.

We plan to accept applications for this job until filled. We will contact qualified individuals for telephone screenings and conduct them on a rolling basis. Interviews take place virtually via Zoom. 

To apply, please copy and paste your cover letter into the text box and upload your resume as a Microsoft Word document or PDF. If generative artificial intelligence is used during the application process, it must be disclosed. 

The R Street Institute stands for free markets, limited, effective government and pragmatic solutions to difficult problems. We envision:

A free society, where public policy begins with freedom as its initial premise and governments exist primarily as guardians of inherent, inalienable rights.

An inclusive society that provides a place, a voice, and equal opportunity for all.

A just society that holds everyone accountable to the same laws.

Our Values

The following values are the principles that guide how R Street fulfills its mission and operates. Our organization believes in these values and we live them:

Always be better

We want to achieve preeminence in every area where we work. We encourage a bias for action, innovation, creativity, and courage in everything that we do. We measure ourselves by the quality, credibility and impact we achieve as a result.

Different is good.

We believe that great minds think differently and building broad coalitions has made us who we are. Making progress on policy requires that we operate outside of the echo chamber and take non-traditional approaches to policy making. We apply this same principle to the way we operate and how we build our teams: with a focus on diversity and inclusion. We are all unique but belong to the same team.

Serious(ly)

We’re serious about our work, but don’t take ourselves too seriously. We believe in the intellectual rigor, free inquiry and honesty, that is required to achieve our mission, but having fun doing it is equally as important.

One Team

We all work together and work with humility. We strive to cultivate trust and transparency at all levels, between ourselves as individuals and as an organization, with our stakeholders, and in our work. We demonstrate respect and openness in our actions at all times. We are all unique but belong to the same team.