Description

ABOUT ROCKY MOUNTAIN PUBLIC MEDIA
Rocky Mountain Public Media (RMPM) is the largest membership organization in Colorado, engaging communities across multiple brands and experiences including Rocky Mountain PBS, KUVO Jazz, and THE DROP. Together, our mission is to strengthen the civic fabric of Colorado through the reinvention of public media as a vehicle for friendship and belonging. This is all in service to our vision of a Colorado where everyone feels seen and heard.

RMPM is not your typical public media organization. Over the last five years, we’ve nearly doubled our annual operating revenues and tripled our audiences across platforms because we can meet audiences where they are to respond to needs and opportunities with community-centered design and experiences that create and deepen friendships. 

Our theory of change stipulates that for public media to thrive, RMPM must move from creating media for vaguely defined broad audiences to having shared ownership of public media alongside communities that may otherwise be unheard. 

ABOUT THE JOB
RMPM is seeking our first-ever Chief Experience Officer (CXO) to support our organization’s continued evolution. This CXO, who should be a demonstrated leader in audience-centered, cross-platform content strategy, will oversee our high performing team of brand managers, including those who lead Journalism, Civic Engagement, Radio, and Programming. 

The CXO is responsible for our unified content strategy and implementation across radio, television and streaming platforms, to ensure every audience journey is intentional, seamless and rooted in the values of RMPM.

Each of our content brands reach different audiences in distinct, meaningful ways that contribute to our overall relevance and trust with communities and support our overall financial sustainability, which is centered on a growing membership business model. What we aren’t yet able to do easily is see beyond our individual brands to deliver robust, seamless audience experiences that deepen relationships and impact across any real or perceived silos.

The most important skill sets for a successful CXO include emotional intelligence to navigate complex partnerships and build trust within and outside of the organization ; and expertise in connecting dots through strategy and operational workflows that ensure seamless audience journeys,leading to deeper relationships and support for our membership program.

An average day for the CXO could include content brainstorming conversations with brand managers to help them envision strategy that supports a contiguous friendship journey; the creation of new or improved processes to break down silos across brands and departments; a meeting with our Revenue leaders to discuss underwriting placements within content products; and, an examination of research to help further define intended audiences that help us better align our content strategies with intention.

A successful CXO must be comfortable navigating complexity, be an excellent communicator and collaborator willing to put in the time to build shared understanding and priorities across diverse brands and teams, and have the ability not just to envision something, but to put it into action through ongoing experimentation and learning. A desire to innovate, comfort with change, and the self-awareness and humility to constantly learn and grow alongside others are required traits in all executive leaders at RMPM.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities
Strategy & Vision

• Oversee the audience journey across content brands and products to deepen friendships and build connection amongst communities who share similar needs, values and interests.
• Define and champion a unified content strategy that delivers on our individual brand promises to meet explicit community needs and build bridges across seeming divides to foster connection and understanding.
• Develop and track Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that connect audience experiences with business outcomes.
• Stay ahead of evolving audience needs and media trends to evolve and iterate upon our content strategies and priorities.
• Utilize a high level of cultural competency to deeply understand and serve diverse audiences through meaningful content journeys
• Build and manage a budget that makes best use of available resources while planning ahead to articulate future needs to grow the team.
• Work alongside members of the executive team to shape the future of RMPM and share what we’re learning with others inside and outside RMPM who want to work together to create best practices and share learnings.

Content & Editorial 

• Introduce the systems and structure that reduces congestion, confusion and missed opportunities amongst our brands.
• Amplify the work of each brand while highlighting connections to outside partners and communities.
• Oversee the audience journey across content brands and products to deepen friendships and build connection amongst communities who share similar needs, values and interests and seek opportunities to connect audiences across bridges of seeming divides.
• Lead the planning, curation, and distribution of original and partner content across television, radio and streaming platforms.
• Partner with the Digital Transformation Team on digital and social media strategies and content.
• Utilize human-centered design, community listening, and market research to inform content experiences that are responsive, relevant and forward-looking.
• Maintain and evolve a comprehensive editorial calendar and workflows across brand teams that prioritize audience experience and impact.
• Create and implement best practices in human-centered content development and audience journey development and implementation.
• Partner with the Digital Transformation Team to develop and implement product strategies that reach core and emerging audiences where they are with experiences that surprise and delight.
• Partner with the Friends, Marketing and Membership (FaMM) and Revenue (Corporate Partnerships and Philanthropy) Teams to design and connect content journeys with membership experiences that meet the needs of our audiences and support the financial sustainability of RMPM. 

Cross-Functional Collaboration & Product Partnership

• Serve as a connective leader across brand teams who report to you and across departments who do not directly report to you, requiring the use of both direct and indirect power and persuasion.
• Help break down silos between content, technology, product, marketing, and operations to ensure alignment on audience-centric goals.
• Guide brand teams toward shared priorities and a common vision for success that includes directly improving the lives of our audiences through real friendship and connection.
• Leverage audience data, community feedback, and behavioral insights to continuously improve audience experiences and better understand those we seek to serve.

Leadership, Culture & Talent Development

• Lead and support a diverse, cross-platform, cross-brand team of producers, journalists, on-air talent, editors, technologists, and community connectors with four direct reports and 36 indirect reports.
• Direct reports include Sr. Directors of Journalism, Programming and Civic Engagement and the VP, Radio.
• Foster a collaborative, inclusive, and high-performing culture that reflects RMPM’s core values.
• Foster a collaborative, inclusive, and high-performing culture that reflects RMPM’s core values.
• Develop, coach, and retain top talent while building leadership capacity within teams.
• Model the values of RMPM as a member of RMPM’s executive leadership team.
• Foster interest across the organization in our content and experiences, building shared understanding across RMPM of our strategies and priorities.
• Model continuous learning and experimentation for others by not demanding perfection as a priority; seeking professional development opportunities to continue your own learning and evolution; and, sharing your own mistakes and lessons learned with teams as opportunities arise for collective growth.
• Work to maintain appropriate boundaries between rest and work to protect capacity for innovation and creativity. Manage and support your teams (and others) through discomfort with change as needed, connecting conversations back to RMPM’s values and desire to be a continuous learning environment.

Community Engagement & External Representation

• Serve as a public ambassador for RMPM’s mission, vision, values and strategies.
• Intentionally connect with diverse communities to build trust and support models for user-centered content design.
• Build, manage and support strategic partnerships and community relationships that enhance trust and help RMPM achieve its goals and objectives.
• Deeply value community listening and support the creation of a statewide infrastructure to engage trust-brokers across Colorado to inform a stronger information eco-system in the state.
• Oversee the Civic Engagement team to test new innovations in public media service and impact and reinvent RMPM’s political coverage with a focus on in-person engagement.

Requirements

Key Attributes

• A strategic thinker who thrives in a roll-up-your-sleeves environment.
• Adept at translating big-picture strategies into actionable tactical plans that produce measurable results.
• Able to see and integrate nuance into complex brands and strategies that meet audience needs and deliver meaningful content journeys.
• Audience-centered decision-maker and process-builder.
• Embraces radical collaboration inside and outside RMPM to achieve ambitious collective impact.
• Demonstrates a high level of cultural competency with an emphasis on trust-building.
• Clear communicator able to build alignment around explicit expectations, strategies, processes and priorities.
• Desire to work in an environment where we hold ourselves accountable to our values. 

Experience and Qualifications

• 10+ years of progressive leadership in multiplatform media, content strategy, and/or audience development.
• Proven track record designing audience-centered content strategies across broadcast and digital platforms to meet specific audience needs.
• Experience translating community insight into editorial and product direction and working closely with engineering/product teams.
• Experience in Marketing and/or Audience Development, including the identification of specific intended audiences.
• Excellent stakeholder management and cross-functional collaboration skills.
• Experience with audience research, analytics, CMS-driven workflows, and cross-platform programming is a plus.
• History of building and supporting diverse teams and community-driven initiatives.