Summary
Description
See full job description at www.nocokidsthrive.org/jobs.
Overview of Northern Colorado Kids Thrive:
Northern Colorado Kids Thrive (NoCo Kids Thrive) is an independent nonprofit organization that rallies support, resources, and awareness to ensure every young child in our community has quality early childhood experiences so they thrive from day one. Through systems-building, partnership, and strategic public investment, we work to create a sustainable early childhood ecosystem that delivers measurable results for children, families, and our region.
As stewards of significant public and private investments, NoCo Kids Thrive is committed to operational excellence, strong partnerships, and responsive, equity-centered service delivery that strengthens the entire early childhood system.
Position Summary:
At NoCo Kids Thrive, we are a close-knit team of professionals who value passion, innovation, adaptability and a sense of humor. As a key member of the organization’s executive team, the Chief Impact Officer (CIO) plays a central role in shaping and advancing our long-term vision by building and stewarding a cohesive story of impact rooted in both compelling storytelling and rigorous data.
The CIO oversees the Communications and Evaluation teams, ensuring strong leadership, clear priorities, and seamless coordination across functions. This role is responsible for integrating data, research, lived experience, and narrative into a clear, persuasive, and mission-driven account of our work.
This leader will design and implement an organization-wide impact framework that demonstrates outcomes, informs decision-making, strengthens partnerships, and builds public trust. The CIO also ensures cross-team coordination for community outreach, engagement, and input, so that families, educators, providers, and partners are not only reflected in our storytelling but actively inform our continuous improvement efforts.The CIO ensures that evaluation informs strategy, communication amplifies impact, and community voice meaningfully shapes both.
This position is essential to creating the necessary runway for reauthorization of the early care and education sales tax in the next 20 years and to supporting the organization’s next phase of growth. The CIO is both a strategist and an executor—an externally oriented leader who understands how data drives credibility, how storytelling drives engagement, and how both are required to sustain public investment and systems-level change.
ESSENTIAL DUTIES & RESPONSIBILITIES
Executive Leadership
- Serve as a key member of the Executive Team, contributing to organizational strategy, long-range planning, and policy development.
- Lead the development of a multi-year impact and communications strategy aligned with organizational goals and future public investment milestones.
- Foster strong, cohesive partnerships across departments to ensure impact, programmatic outcomes, financial strategy, and communications are fully aligned.
- Support and inspire communications and evaluation staff, ensuring clarity of roles, high performance, and professional growth.
- Model and reinforce a culture of learning, inquiry, accountability, and continuous improvement across the organization.
- Participate in budget development and ensure responsible stewardship of evaluation and communications resources.
Impact and Evaluation
- Design and implement an organization-wide impact framework that integrates qualitative and quantitative metrics aligned with strategic goals and public accountability commitments.
- Oversee data systems staff and provide strategic direction for the design, implementation, and continuous improvement of data systems that support community access, program delivery, workforce investments, and public reporting.
- Ensure data systems are structured to:
- Support efficient family and provider experiences
- Capture accurate and timely programmatic and financial data
- Enable performance tracking and outcome measurement
- Produce transparent, meaningful reporting for leadership, Board, funders, and taxpayers
- Oversee the development of dashboards, scorecards, and reports that inform executive decision-making, board of directors governance, funder reporting, and public transparency.
- Partner with program leadership to define clear measures of success, track performance, and use data to refine and strengthen strategies.
- Stay apprised of emerging research, best practices, and policy developments in early childhood systems, public investment accountability, and evaluation methodologies.
- Ensure evaluation practices are culturally responsive, equity-informed, and reflective of community voice and lived experience.
- Develop systems for gathering community input—including educators, families, providers, voters, and partners—and integrate that input into organizational learning and strategy.
Communications and Storytelling
- Oversee the development and execution of a strategic internal and external communications plan that advances the organization’s mission and strengthens public trust.
- Supervise communications staff and ensure coordinated execution of messaging, branding, media relations, public reporting, digital content, and stakeholder communications.
- Translate complex systems-level work, data findings, and policy impact into accessible, compelling narratives tailored to diverse audiences.
- Ensure strong cross-team coordination for community outreach and engagement efforts, aligning messaging, listening strategies, feedback loops, and public-facing materials.
- Elevate stories of impact that reflect the transformative power of early childhood systems-building and the responsible stewardship of public dollars.
- Support long-term narrative strategy necessary for sustained public investment, including reauthorization of the early care and education sales tax.
- Alongside the strategy team, develop and maintain clear channels for community input and ensure that outreach efforts inform both storytelling and programmatic refinement.
- Ensure that communications reflect organizational values, illuminate equity-centered work, and reinforce credibility and transparency.
- Elevate stories of impact that reflect the transformative power of early childhood systems-building and the responsible stewardship of public dollars.
Public Investment and Long-Term Sustainability
- Develop and steward a long-term narrative and accountability framework that builds confidence in public investment over time.
- Partner with executive leadership to proactively communicate outcomes, lessons learned, and return on investment to policymakers, community leaders, and voters.
- Anticipate future accountability requirements and design systems that position NoCo Kids Thrive for continued success and public trust over the next two decades.
- Support external presentations, reports, thought-leadership pieces, and public-facing materials that position the organization as a trusted authority in early childhood systems.
WHAT DOES SUCCESS LOOK LIKE IN THIS ROLE?
Northern Colorado Kids Thrive is committed to delivering high-quality, responsive work so that all young children can thrive from day one. Success in this role means consistently embodying our five core values in daily leadership and decision-making.
- Collaboration: Builds strong, respectful partnerships across teams and with diverse community stakeholders. Actively seeks input and works across differences to advance shared goals.
- Recognition: Values the contributions of others, seeks feedback, and fosters a culture of appreciation and continuous growth. Strengthens the organization’s reputation as a trusted community partner.
- Accountability: Takes ownership of outcomes, follows through on commitments, and connects daily work to the organization’s mission, vision, and public responsibilities. Demonstrates a commitment to ongoing learning, including growth in diversity, equity, and inclusion.
- Excellence: Leads with integrity, embraces learning, and strives for high-quality results. Balances ambition with sustainability and models healthy boundaries and professional standards.
- Joy: Finds purpose in the work and creates space for celebration, connection, and meaning within the team and the broader community.
