CommonWealth Kitchen (CWK) is looking for a passionate, energetic senior manager to join our team as Director of Entrepreneurship Programs, overseeing all of CWK’s food business education, training, mentoring and support programs.

About CommonWealth Kitchen

At CommonWealth Kitchen, food is our passion; equity is our mission.  We are an entrepreneurial nonprofit based in Boston’s Dorchester neighborhood, on a mission to build a new food economy grounded in racial, social, and economic justice. We operate Greater Boston’s only non-profit shared-use commercial kitchen, providing hourly rental to 50+ diverse start-up and early-stage food companies annually, over 75% BIPOC-owned. We also operate a small-batch food manufacturing enterprise which provides outsourced processing to help emerging food businesses scale. To complement our kitchens, CWK offers a wide range of business education and training, mentoring, and coordinated market access to more than 200 diverse food companies annually, including food trucks, caterers, bakers, packaged goods companies, and restaurants.

Director of Entrepreneurship Programs

CommonWealth Kitchen uses three main levers of impact –Educational Programs, Market Access, and Kitchen Operations– to achieve our mission. Reporting to the Chief Operating Officer, the Director of Entrepreneurship Programs manages CWK’s food business education programming, 1-on-1 technical assistance services, and network support. The position also oversees recruitment, permitting and start-up of businesses joining our shared kitchen, and collaborates closely with facilities, business development, marketing and fundraising teams.  

The ideal candidate is a dynamic systems thinker and detail-oriented manager, able to design and implement culturally competent, highly effective adult education and business advisory services to meet entrepreneurs where they are and support and empower them along their journey from start-up to established business. The Director is a trusted partner, advocate, advisor, and connector. They operate with empathy, emotional intelligence and diligence in breaking down barriers, dismantling roadblocks, and building pathways that advance CWK’s vision of an equitable, sustainable food economy where all of us can participate and prosper. 

CWK’s continuum of programs includes cohort-based classes and stand-alone workshops that cover topics such as business formation, insurance, sales and marketing, branding, financial management, and HR as well as topics specific to the food industry, including calculating COGs and margins, menu design, food safety, product formulation, recipe scaling, packaging and labeling. In addition, CWK provides peer coaching and mentoring, and manages strategic collaborations and fellowships with multiple industry partners. 

The Director of Entrepreneurship Programs is not expected to be an expert in every aspect of CWK’s work. However, they should have a strong working knowledge of food business operations and finance, and be a strategic thinker, excellent networker, and relentless problem-solver with excellent communication and organizational skills.

Responsibilities

Entrepreneurship Program Management

• Manage the strategy, roadmap, implementation and evaluation of all of CWK’s business education and technical support programs, including classes, events, webinars, workshops, peer learning, business advisory services, and meetings with mentors, coaches and partners. (Note that the majority of these programs are offered virtually.)
• Collaborate with CWK’s program and administrative teams to ensure excellent communication, coordination, support, data collection and evaluation across all program areas and impact levers.
• Regularly assess the technical assistance needs of CWK’s extended community of members, alumni and program graduates. Ensure offerings are effective and responsive to business needs and that efforts are documented (via Salesforce) and evaluated regularly.
• Manage relationships with relevant regulatory agencies to support businesses in navigating the permit process.   
• Manage CWK’s core leadership role in Santander’s Cultivate Small Business program, which provides a mini-MBA for early stage food businesses through a collaboration with Babson College.  For 2023, this program runs in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Miami and Dallas.
• Support businesses in creating definitions of success, developing quantitative and qualitative metrics to measure progress toward that success, creating roadmaps to achieve it and systems to measure, document and evaluate progress.  
• Coordinate with CWK’s fundraising staff to provide data and other materials required for funding and reporting.
• Leverage partnerships with mission-aligned organizations, food companies, mentors, coaches, and other subject matter experts to enhance the scope of support CWK is able to offer through its educational programs.
• Maintain CWK’s virtual Resource Library, which provides templates, checklists, pro formas, and other resources and best practices for CWK’s extended food business community. 
• Cultivate a strong peer network amongst members, graduates and alumni through efforts like CWK’s local food business listserv and informal gatherings.

Recruitment & Business Success

• Develop the strategy and lead recruitment of new businesses to participate in CWK’s educational programs and shared use kitchen.  Consistent with CWK’s mission, ensure that at least 75% of Program participants are entrepreneurs who identify as BIPOC and at least 75% identify as women, transgender, and/or non-binary.
• Collaborate with the Director of Business Development to ensure recruitment strategies and educational programming align with current and future market opportunities, and help coordinate and organize market opportunities as needed. 
• Develop a plan for monitoring and assessing CWK’s extended business community members over time to evaluate impact of programming and network connections beyond specific business success. 
• Assist in the planning and implementation of CWK’s Food Show and similar events.

Community Stewardship: Core to CWK’s strategy is forging deep connections amongst CWK’s shared kitchen members, graduates and program alum, and with CWK’s extended partner and industry networks. 

• Oversee a strategy to connect members, alumni, graduates, and partners to foster a diverse, collaborative, supportive network of values-aligned food entrepreneurs working together toward CWK’s mission of a new food economy grounded in racial, social, and economic justice.
• Develop strategies to engage Community in work planning and program delivery to ensure programming is responsive to business needs.
• Manage CWK’s quarterly Town Hall meetings for shared kitchen members and similar initiatives to build and maintain open, clear communication, strong peer connections and networks for support.

People Management & Business Operations  

• Directly manage a team of up to 2-4 program staff, plus interns and volunteers. Hold regular 1-on-1 meetings, conduct performance reviews, support professional development needs, hire and document performance issues as needed. 
• Maintain key operational materials, including shared kitchen handbook, member orientation materials, and similar documents to ensure consistency with organizational goals.
• With support from the Chief Operating Officer, develop and manage an annual work plan and budget. Ensure all educational programs are completed in alignment with this plan and budget.
• Support fundraising efforts for educational programming and market access work, including CWK’s annual food show, grant applications and reporting.
• Coordinate with COO to ensure accurate and up-to-date Salesforce records and data for all programs. 
•  Participate on CWK’s senior leadership and management teams and similar efforts to ensure strong communication and coordination of all of CWK’s levers of impact.  

Qualifications and Qualities

• 10+ years of work experience in nonprofit program management or equivalent experience in adult education or small business development and operations
• Experience architecting, implementing, and evaluating adult or continuing education programming, and building, managing, and evaluating curriculum.
• Outstanding cross-cultural communication skills and demonstrated experience working in a diverse, multicultural environment. 
• Excellent analytical and organizational skills and attention to detail, as well as data and impact driven.
• Familiarity with issues and challenges facing the food industry and diverse start-up and early stage food businesses.
• Resiliency and ability to manage difficult conversations, express and meet expectations, and navigate multiple deadlines with grace, professionalism –and a sense of humor!
• Previous management experience required.
• Ability to manage up in a complex, fast-paced, entrepreneurial organization
• Enthusiasm for uncertainty and the creativity that unlocks
• Serv-Safe Manager, HACCP and PCQi certification preferred.
• An unwavering personal and professional commitment to social, racial, and economic justice
• Proficiency with cloud-based software tools, ideally including Google Suite, Microsoft Office, Salesforce, Asana, and Slack.

Salary, Benefits, Working Conditions

CommonWealth Kitchen anticipates the salary range to be between $85,000 and $115,000. CWK offers generous paid time off as well as group health insurance.

The selected candidate will need to work a hybrid work schedule, being on site at our Dorchester facility an average of 2-3 days/week, and must have some flexibility for remote evening and/or weekend hours to run classes and workshops, schedule check-ins with business owners, attend events, etc.  

CommonWealth Kitchen is an Equal Opportunity Employer and is committed to integrating diversity, equity, and inclusion into every aspect of our organization.  We firmly believe that a diverse staff makes us a more successful organization.  

To apply 

Please fill in your information and attach your resume and cover letter through the form at the bottom of this page. Please do not email us directly. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis. 

CommonWealth Kitchen (CWK) is looking for a dynamic go-getter to join our team as Entrepreneurship Program Associate.  Under the direction of the Director of Entrepreneurship Programs, this position will provide administrative and program management for support implementation of CWK’s core food business education and market access work. 

About CommonWealth Kitchen

At CommonWealth Kitchen, food is our passion; equity is our mission.  

We are an entrepreneurial nonprofit on a mission to build a new food economy grounded in racial, social, and economic justice. We operate Greater Boston’s only non-profit shared-use commercial kitchen, providing hourly rental to 50+ start-up and early-stage food companies annually, over 75% BIPOC-owned. We also operate a small-batch food manufacturing enterprise which provides outsourced processing to help emerging food businesses scale. To complement our kitchens, CWK offers a wide range of business education programming, reaching more than 250 diverse food companies annually.  We also integrated coordinated market access to help food businesses scale, and advance our mission of building a sustainable  food economy grounded in racial, social and economic justice.

This position reports to the Director of Entrepreneurship Programs and provides day-to-day support for all of CWK’s core food business education and market access work. The Program Associate assists with recruitment and onboarding of businesses to our shared kitchens, and helps organize business education and training programs and events to support our diverse community of food trucks, caterers, bakers, restaurants and product companies.  

Primary Responsibilities 

• Assist the Director of Entrepreneurship Programs to implement core business education programming, including providing administrative and program support for our Virtual Tours and Info Sessions, Ready to Start, Ready to Launch and Cultivate Small Business classes. 
• Support the recruitment, application review, check-ins, data collection and evaluation for all CWK programs. 
• Provide strategic support for core programs including CWK Food Show, Friday Night Bites, and CWK’s role in Santander’s Cultivate Small Business class. 
• Coordinate CWK participation in partner events, including the New England Food Show, NYC Fancy Food Show, and the Minority Business Expo. 
• Other activities as directed by the Director of Entrepreneurship Programs

Qualifications

• 3+ years work experience in nonprofit program management or equivalent experience.
• Strong working knowledge of G Suite (google apps) and MS Office, experience with  Salesforce, Asana and Slack experience preferred 
• Excellent communication and organizational skills, and attention to detail are a must. 
• Ability to work well in an entrepreneurial, collaborative environment, while maintaining a strong sense of ownership and accountability. 
• A self-starter who is not afraid to ask questions, take on challenges, and work both independently and collaboratively. 
• Impact focused, data driven and able to juggle multiple projects.  
• A deep personal commitment to CWK’s mission around racial, social and economic justice.  

Salary, Benefits, Working Conditions

CommonWealth Kitchen anticipates the salary range to be between $50,000 and $65,000. CWK offers generous paid time off as well as group health insurance.

The selected candidate will need to work a hybrid work schedule, being on site at our Dorchester facility an average of 3 days/week, and must have some flexibility for remote evening and/or weekend hours to run classes and workshops, schedule check-ins with business owners, attend events, etc.  

CommonWealth Kitchen is an Equal Opportunity Employer and is committed to integrating diversity, equity, and inclusion into every aspect of our organization.  We firmly believe that a diverse staff makes us a more successful organization.  

To apply

Please fill in your information and attach your resume and cover letter through the form at the bottom of this page. Please do not email us directly. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis.