Narrative Strategist

Rural People’s Voices (RPV) seeks a Narrative Strategist to develop the narrative power of our working people’s movement and expand RPV’s capacity to connect with our people through communications and media. Now in our third year and second full year of programming, RPV is in an exciting moment of growing our staff, infrastructure, and operating model. We are purposefully growing our base and engaging voters through deep organizing, narrative leadership development, winning elections, and seizing policy opportunities. We are committed to building a sustaining, multi-racial base of working- and middle-class power, one that can advance the leaders, actions, and policies our rural communities need.

The Narrative Strategist will come out charging: establishing our communications plan and calendar and immediately competing for hearts and minds in rural Washington. They’ll join our team as we imagine and iterate on narrative strategy, working with RPV leadership to develop the infrastructure we need to learn, create, broadcast and immerse our narrative in a sequenced and integrated way. The Strategist will take the lead in rolling out projects that map to these long-term shifts in the rural narrative landscape, including bringing narrative campaigns to full fruition. In running a great communications game for RPV, they will embody the practice of organizing through our communications and narrative work, looking for narrative leverage points and ways to bring more people together at the intersection of issues and our shared values. 

The Narrative Strategist will have rock-solid skills in basic communication tools, including social media, email design, and website development “101”. They will thrive with the task of organizing a project and seeing it through from beginning to end. They will have high acumen around the forces driving our rural narrative, and real ambition for the work to reclaim the story of rural Washington for everyday working families. 

This position reports to one of RPV’s Co-Executive Directors.

About Rural People’s Voice

Rural People’s Voice (RPV) started in 2021, and working people are our fabric. We are business owners, community organizers, teachers, social workers, electricians, city council members, young people, nurses and so much more. We are rural North Central Washington. We envision a North Central Washington economy that works for all of us: jobs that support a family, housing and healthcare we can afford, great schools for every student, health land and water for generations to come, and a rural region where all our people have a fair shot. Together as Rural People’s Voice, we’re calling for real living-wage jobs and an economic future where every person has enough, in the community they call home. 

Calling on the best thinking from across the state and country, Rural People’s Voice invests in four core strategies:

1. Build the people’s government our communities need and deserve
2. Advance key policies and initiatives that support working people and families
3. Reclaim the rural narrative of who we are, where we come from, and what a better future for all of us looks like
4. Organize with our neighbors for a multi-racial working- and middle-class majority

Narrative Strategist Responsibilities

• Think and Plan Great Strategy: Co-design with program directors and staff the short and long-term strategy plans that help us shift the dominant narrative, re-define “common sense” in rural Washington, and position RPV to show up nimbly across the media landscape
• Manage Powerful Narrative Campaigns: Support narrative campaign design and oversee implementation (network contractors, assist in design and some content creation, manage roll-out), including multiple time-bound, issue-specific narrative campaigns and ongoing “Holding the Line” narrative campaign
• Map and Plan Overall Communications: Build general communications plan, metrics, and calendar to meet organizational goals; become an expert on the full spectrum of rural media, identifying across time high priorities and high opportunities marks that get us press and get our story out 
• Iterate and Evolve Narrative and Comms Programs: Together with staff and members, regularly reflect to learn, innovate and improve on narrative and communication work
• Build the Multi-Racial RPV Base: Engage and grow our working- and middle-class base across narrative and communications programs: use digital tools to get feedback and input from members; deploy digital organizing practices as part of “Ladder of Engagement” with this work; get invitations, information, and events to our base; capture interconnections, engagement, participation, and popularity of events through CRM database
• Run a Great Comms Game: 
• Social media: Maintain steady and reliable presence in social media; reflect the stories, overarching narrative, and brand of RPV in posts and online engagement 
• Website: Keep websites up-to-date; coordinate with designers and staff to align sites with annual objectives and evolution work and strategies
• Emails: Develop consistent, interactive & dynamic emails with content developed by team
• Organize Around Rural Narrative: Participate in and support narrative trainings designed by Training Director; invite people into action through public narrative work
• Grow Organizational Alignment: Support us in communicating with discipline and clarity about the work in writing and public speaking to an array of audiences including members, funders, decision-makers, or coalition partners
• Embody RPV Values: Model and help root the inclusive values, hope, deep joy, and accountable culture of RPV 

Required Qualifications

• At least 3 years of relevant experience in communications and narrative, preferably in the context of grassroots organizing, labor organizing, and/or electoral politics
• Acute political savvy and excellent analytical skills, sophisticated read on the current political/economic landscape, and a desire to do work with a clear short and long-term strategy
• Demonstrated ability to plan, manage, and execute media projects
• High acumen for social media and communication practices
• Love for learning and research around the media landscape and narrative orientation of communities
• Strong commitment to racial, social, economic, and gender justice and to building working-class power guided by strategy
• Able to see the “high-level” while owning to the day-to-day details
• Strong self-awareness, can recognize when you need support and can receive feedback as part of growth
• Ability to work independently, set and meet person goals, and work collaboratively as part of a team – both in a leadership team and as an accountable, respectful and manager
• Strong written, verbal, and interpersonal communication skills
• High confidence with excel, google docs, and word programs
• Experience or comfort with conflict management and confidential/sensitive issues
• A personal and shared stake: you know why you want to win and why we need to build power together to win!
• Experience working with power-building grassroots organizations, including organizations doing 501(c)(4) electoral work
• Experience with running or leading within a full communications program 
• Experience with narrative development, analysis, and deployment
• Design, video, photo skills
• Familiarity with worker, housing, immigrant rights, climate and environmental issues
• Experience working on communications for political campaigns or candidates

Desired Qualifications

• Bilingual, Spanish and English
• Experience working with power-building grassroots organizations, including organizations doing 501(c)(4) electoral work
• Experience with running or leading within a full communications program 
• Experience with narrative development, analysis, and deployment
• Design, video, photo skills
• Familiarity with worker, housing, immigrant rights, climate and environmental issues
• Experience working on communications for political campaigns or candidates

Additional Details

• Location: Approximately 1/2 of this position may be carried out virtually via email, phone, and video conference; however, this position requires weekly, regular in-person work in or near Wenatchee or Omak.
• Schedule: This is a full-time (32 hours/week) salaried, exempt position supervised by a Co-Executive Director. This position requires very limited weeknight and weekend hours for RPV events. Exact start-date is negotiable, but we seek to start this position as soon as possible.
• Travel: This position will occasionally (rarely) require driving for events, logistics and coordination, meetings and events. This position must own or have full time access to a car as a licensed, insured driver. We cover mileage reimbursements. We also provide per diem and lodging for all required overnight travel. Where possible, we carpool and encourage the use of public transit.
• Employer: This position is split between Rural People’s Voice, a 501(c)(4), and Rural People’s Platform, a 501(c)(3).
• Salary and Benefits: This is a non-exempt, salaried position with a starting salary of $64,000 at .8 FTE, with opportunities for raises/advancement over time. We offer an ICHRA health insurance stipend, generous paid time off, holidays and sick time, and a retirement account with matching employer contributions. RPV values a healthy workplace, worker rights, and worker respect, as well as family and kid-friendly work options.

How to Apply

Please submit a cover letter and resume to the form linked here. If you have questions, contact andria@ruralpeoplesvoice.org, Operations Manager.

We strongly encourage applications from those who live, work, and contribute to rural North Central Washington. We invite people of color; immigrant, bilingual, and multicultural individuals; d/Deaf people and people with disabilities; members of LGBTQIA+ and gender non-conforming communities; and people with other diverse backgrounds and lived experiences to apply.