United Working Families

Senior Organizer

Based in Chicago, IL
(hybrid)

 

United Working Families is an independent political organization by and for the many.  Funded by working-class people and their organizations—labor unions, community groups, and individuals—UWF represents over 100,000 working people across Illinois. UWF combines the experience, resources, and mass base of organized labor with the energy and innovation of the grassroots to recruit, train, and run candidates, and to build durable, year-round, volunteer political organization. UWF member organizations include: Action Center on Race and the Economy, Chicago Teachers Union, Cook County College Teachers Union, Grassroots Illinois Action, Illinois Nurses Association,  Northside Action for Justice, SEIU Healthcare Illinois & Indiana, SEIU Local 73, United Electrical Workers Western Region, United Neighbors of the 35th Ward, Warehouse Worker Action, Workers United Chicago Midwest Regional Joint Board, and 22nd Ward IPO, 33rd Ward Working Families.

Senior Organizer
United Working Families seeks a Senior Organizer to lead our work to build regionally-based member organizing formations (IPO’s, chapters, and/or organizing committees) that are actively advancing local power fights and/or electoral campaigns. The Senior Organizer will be responsible for engaging rank-and-file members of UWF affiliates in this local work, and in driving a distributed organizing model that puts members in charge of their own organizing.

The ideal candidate will be an experienced community and/or labor organizer with a track record of building member-led organizing committees, particularly with BIPOC members and leaders, and an enthusiasm for experimentation and innovation. This is an organizing position in a collaborative, fast-paced, and innovative environment; the work will require travel, weeknight, and weekend hours. This position is full-time, hybrid, based in Chicago.

Responsibilities:
Deepening member organizing engagement and growth strategies to build our power including:

• Running the Movement Leader Fellowship: to train 10 Black and Latinx activists in advanced grassroots organizing skills.
• Organizing Popular Education Sessions: UWF will organize regional meetings and virtual sessions to help our membership make meaning of the current moment, and take action from the learning sessions.
• Engaging in non-partisan voter engagement
• Running a non-partisan paid canvass program in key geographies aimed at fortifying our organizing committees across the city, identifying new members, and connecting them to existing corporate campaigns, popular education and other member development work.  
• Organize community activation teams in key geographies as we grow our local organizing committees that can participate in co-governance.
• Leveraging our voter file (VAN) to run canvasses, phonebanks, and other forms of non-partisan voter outreach (e.g. digital ads, text banks, etc.) in support of pro-worker campaigns.
• Build regional member formations (IPO’s, chapters, and/or organizing committees) that are actively advancing local power fights and/or electoral campaigns through a wide range of tactics, including but not limited to precinct captain programs, house parties, canvassing, and direct actions.
• Create and implement political and popular education trainings/ workshops to increase capacity and support UWF’s members, IPOs, and labor unions.
• Identify, recruit, and develop individual members through one-on-one’s, meetings, trainings, and collective action, with a focus on people currently and historically marginalized from left political spaces.

Skills and Qualifications

Please read this description of UWF’s Core Competencies. These are the most important practices we will be looking for as part of this hiring process.

• Experience with community and/or labor organizing
• Experience with leadership development
• Experience with organizations with a culture of democracy and debate
• Preference for candidates who are fluent in Spanish and candidates who share lived experiences with our majority poor, working-class, and BIPOC membership.

Salary and Benefits: The starting salary for this position would begin at $64,000 and will be adjusted upwards based on our “Thriving Payscale” model, which accounts for the lived and professional experiences of our employees; most starting salaries will land between $65,000-$72,000 under this model. United Working Families is dedicated to workers' rights and offers health benefits and paid time off to its employees.

To Apply:
Please send résumé and cover letter to jobs@unitedworkingfamilies.org. Résumés received by January 17th will be given priority consideration.