Organization Overview

Founded in 2012 by Liesel and Ian Simmons, Blue Haven Initiative (BHI) is a single-family office managing diversified a global investment portfolio. As one of the first family offices created with impact investing as its core mission, BHI seeks market rate return on its investments as well as maximum social and environmental impact. BHI recognizes not all solutions are a good fit for commercial investment and supports nonprofit and civic work through its philanthropy.  We leverage our flexible role as a private family office to deploy different capital types and use our voice to inform the growth of the impact investing field.

The entire BHI team is composed of 12 full-time employees across four departments: Civics, Initiatives, Operations, and Ventures.

Team Overview 

While markets can scale many solutions, they cannot (and should not) do everything. A signature focus of Blue Haven is the in-house philanthropic portfolio, Initiatives. The Initiatives team closely collaborates with ecosystem partners to identify social and environmental challenges best served by grant capital, concessionary investment, or charitable donor collaborative projects.

The team deploys $3M to $5M annually in grants and philanthropic investments to nonprofits and early-stage companies with clear impact objectives, managing a vibrant portfolio of about 15 partners. The Initiatives strategy has supported impact investing and climate change field-building activities, as well as human capital and leadership development interventions.  The portfolio is geographically concentrated in the US and Sub-Saharan Africa. Partners include: Tipping Point Fund, ImpactAssets, VC Include, Boardroom Africa, Apolitical Academy, Prime Coalition, Energy for Growth, Ampersand, and Third Derivative. 

Position Summary

Reporting directly to the Initiatives’ Manager and Blue Haven’s Co-Founder, the Strategic Analyst will help drive the team’s entire grantmaking process, from pipeline-building to due diligence and portfolio management. We believe there are significant growth opportunities for the Analyst to expand their skillset, begin serving as a key contributor to portfolio strategy, and gain exposure to a range of leaders in impact investing and international development, including foundations, accelerators, and think tanks.

The role is a full-time, remote position with an expected start of May or June. Applicants must be authorized to work in the U.S. While the individual can live outside ET time zone, we require they work at least 6-hours per day overlapping with East Coast business hours (8 AM – 5 PM). The office is headquartered in Cambridge, MA with employees across the US. BHI operates as a remote workplace, offering location flexibility during and post-pandemic. Once travel becomes safe again, this individual can expect to travel 25% of the time, primarily in the US and East Africa. A detailed description of the position is included below:

• Pipeline and due diligence
  • Coordinate and participate in introductory calls with new organizations seeking funding
  • Review grant proposals and prepare initial grant screens and memos to assess impact and viability
  • Present key findings, opportunities, and risks to Co-Founder, Manager, and external Advisor
• Grant and philanthropic investment management
  • Support processing of grants, investments, and consulting contracts from a donor-advised fund
  • Lead quarterly outreach to grantees and gather portfolio impact and financial reporting
  • Update team budget and document meeting notes in Salesforce
  • Streamline and improve grantmaking processes on an ongoing basis
• Relationship management
  • Serve as a point of contact for business partners, grantees, consultants, and co-funders
  • Convene and facilitate relationship-building opportunities between BHI and the ecosystem
  • Develop and maintain effective, cross-organizational relationships with different BHI teams (Civics, Operations, Ventures)
• Strategy development
  • Conduct data-driven research on complex social and environmental challenges
  • Participate in brainstorming to inform portfolio strategy and impact hypotheses
  • Build high-quality deliverables to capture portfolio strategy (e.g., PPT presentations, reports)
• Special projects
  • Help lead Catalytic capital investment portfolio alongside our Ventures Senior Associate
  • Serve as project manager when team launches new initiatives or partnerships (i.e., HR Leadership course, cash management strategy, employee donations, donor collaboratives, etc.)
  • Support Founder with Chief of Staff responsibilities, including panel and meeting preparation
  • Assist with knowledge capture and drafting of internal and publicly shared lessons learned

We’ve listed illustrative projects the Analyst may be involved in, as examples of daily activities:

• Preparing a comprehensive impact report to capture critical portfolio-wide updates
• Processing a philanthropic investment into an e-mobility startup
• Supporting project management of a course focused on talent management for African startups
• Drafting a blog on emerging business models and nonprofits focused on gig economy
• Writing grant memos to assess a cleantech accelerator or new research on catalytic capital use cases

Qualifications

Our ideal candidate will have these attributes:

Skills and Abilities

• Creative problem-solver with a curiosity to unpack complex social and environmental challenges
• Quick and resourceful learner with capability to build processes and strategies from scratch
• Self-directed and comfortable independently managing multiple tasks and responsibilities
• Ability to analyze data, conduct research, and distill takeaways into a meaningful strategy
• Good judgement and integrity when handling sensitive responsibilities associated with philanthropy
• Detail-oriented with excellent written and verbal communication
• Highly collaborative and inclusive team player

These qualifications would be great to have, but are not necessary to apply:

• Mission-alignment and demonstrated interest in social impact, philanthropy, or impact investing
• 1–4 years work experience in international development, consulting, philanthropy, nonprofits, entrepreneurship, or private sector
• Familiarity with basic project management, finance, accounting, and budgeting principles
• Experience with Microsoft suite of products (Excel, PPT, and Word) and Salesforce

We believe that university degrees are not accessible to everyone. Therefore, this role does not require a university education. At Blue Haven Initiative, we believe that generating social impact starts with diverse teams and partners. This means cultivating an equitable workplace that encourages collaboration and creativity, and we actively recruit and empower diverse people who represent the next generation of leadership. Applicants will never be disqualified nor discriminated against by race, class, religion, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, age, veteran or disability status, criminal history, or educational attainment.

Benefits and Compensation

BHI will provide compensation commensurate with work experience, the salary range for this role is: $70K – $85K. Benefits include healthcare, paid parental leave, retirement, generous philanthropic matching program, flexible vacation, and remote work expense budget.