The American economy is broken. Today 53 million working adults–nearly half of the U.S. workforce–do not earn a living wage. And these workers have few options to advance: college is too long and expensive, full-time bootcamp programs don’t offer the flexibility they need, and online courses don’t have the structure or support to translate learning into a new job. This catch-22 perpetuates a cycle of poverty–talented workers stuck in low-wage roles, with no way to advance their ambition for themselves and their families. 

Merit America creates a pathway to family-sustaining careers for Americans without 4-year degrees.

Our combination of online learning and best-in-class coaching prepares learners for entry level jobs in IT support, java development, and data analytics that usually offer twice what they were earning before the program. Merit works with companies to identify jobs that will be a great fit for our learners, and provides students with 12 weeks of job placement coaching and support to ensure they get the roles they will excel in.

At Merit America, we are on a mission to generate $1b of wage gains by 2024, connecting talented learners to in-demand career paths at scale. To date, Merit America has served over 2000 students, on a path to reach 100,000 students per year.

To drive these results, Merit America is looking for a Director of Growth. This role will work to recruit talented learners to Merit America across paid and partnership channels to reach our aggressive impact goals. 

The Opportunity

The primary mission of the Director of Growth is to ensure Merit America finds and recruits talented learners to our program, managing the journey from initial awareness to program start. As the Director of Growth at Merit America, you will work to identify needs, build programs, drive applications, and measure effectiveness with the ultimate goal of meeting our recruitment targets. The Director of Growth is critical to Merit America’s ability to scale our organization and support thousands of learners to move into the middle class each year. 

The Director of Growth will report directly toAnne Keenan, VP of Brand and Marketing. 

Job Responsibilities

The responsibilities of the Director of Growth will include, but are not limited to, the following:

Strategy

• Develop Merit America’s cross-channel growth strategy, encompassing our work with partners, paid media, owned channels, and events, building from our successful acquisition program.
• Build a multi-channel attribution model to efficiently direct budget across channels, with the ability to dial up or down applications as needed 

Testing & Experimentation

• Partner with colleagues across the Product, Program, and Brand teams, run, track and measure cross-functional experiments to make data-driven recommendations for changes that will allow us to meet our goals
• Identify new approaches or opportunities to reach, attract, and recruit learners at scale

Management

• Manage the budget, team of three to five, and external partners to implement our paid media, partnership, and events programs, driving applications to meet our application and CAC targets
• Collaborate with leaders in our Product, Program, and Admissions teams to ensure Merit America applicants have a smooth journey into the program and are well-positioned for success

Skills and Competencies

At Merit America, we believe that if you can excel in the job, you should get the job - so we hire for skills, instead of specific years of experience or higher education requirements. Below are the skills that are relevant for thriving in this role:

Required

• Proven expertise in cross-channel acquisition or growth programs, including management of digital paid media programs
• Demonstrated skill in creating experiments and analyzing data to identify trends and make recommendations
• Superior ability to motivate, mobilize, and achieve results from cross-department teams
• Ability to envision, create, and operationalize new, organization-wide systems / processes for fast-scaling organizations

Preferred

• Proven ability to operationalize in-channel campaigns for Google Search, Facebook, or TikTok
• Demonstrated strength with offline acquisition, including partnerships, events, and direct mail
• Deep knowledge of creative testing, content briefing, and influencer content creation
• Ability to manage competing priorities in a fast-paced environment
• Keen interest in acting as an ambassador for Merit America
• Ability to work with data to drive decisions
• Demonstrated passion for our organizational mission and impact
• Strong interest in working across a range of diverse team members and stakeholders
• Committed to driving diversity, equity, and inclusion
• Energized by our organizational mission and impact
• Proven history of living within our values
• Sense of deep personal responsibility for our collective success

We know that women and people of color are often less likely to apply to a position if they don’t match 100% of the job qualifications. Don’t let that be the reason you miss out on this opportunity! We encourage you to apply if you can demonstrate many of these skills and competencies.

Compensation, Benefits and Start Date

This position is full time

Salary: $112,350

Location: Remote

Career Development Opportunities: You’ll have an annual personal development stipend and education reimbursement plan to use towards workshops, books, or traditional classes.

Benefits: You’ll enjoy best-in-class benefits.

• 4-day work week
• Unlimited vacation time 
• Flexible remote work policy
• Office closure during 10 federally recognized holidays
• Two-week office closure at the end of the year / start of the new year, inclusive of the Christmas and New Year’s holidays
• Health, dental, vision, life, short-term and long-term disability
• 4 months paid parental leave
• 401(k) retirement plan 
• Flexible Spending Account – pre-tax health & dependent care
• Health Reimbursement Account employer-funded Benefit Card

Start Date: Preferred 07/15/2022

To apply

To learn more and apply, visit https://www.meritamerica.org/join-our-team. Include a thoughtful cover letter with your application. Candidates must be fully authorized to work in the US.Merit America does not offer employment visa sponsorship. Due to the high volume of candidates for every role, we unfortunately can only respond to candidates who move onto the next steps in the process.

What to expect in our process:

1. Submit resume for the role
2. 30 minute video interview with 2 team members, including our co-CEO and VP of Brand and Marketing
3. Simulation exercise & work samples
4. 60 minute video interview with members of our Brand & Marketing team
5. 30 minute call with our co-founder and co-CEO 
6. Reference checks (we will not check references until we are ready to move forward)
7. Offer

Building for Equity 

Building an inclusive, high-performing team that is diverse across lines of personal identity is integral to our success and we are proud to be an equal opportunity employer.

This means we do not discriminate against any job applicant or employee because of their race, ethnicity, color, religion, national origin, sex, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, age or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws. This applies to all terms and conditions of employment.

We actively strive and evolve to develop and maintain workspaces that are fully inclusive. We encourage candidates from underrepresented groups to apply.

Still excited about our work? You can learn more about our work in this video we made with our founding partner, Google.