Child Welfare Strategic Initiatives Lead for Permanency and Adoption

ICF is seeking a Child Welfare Strategic Initiatives Lead for Permanency and Adoption.  The Child Welfare Strategic Initiatives Lead will use his/her subject matter expertise to lead, coordinate, and oversee initiatives within Child Welfare Information Gateway to support the Children’s Bureau in topical areas related to permanency and adoption, including National Adoption Month.

The Child Welfare Strategic Initiatives Lead provides content leadership and visioning for assigned content areas by identifying research, resources, service delivery trends, national issues, and stakeholder experts and organizations related to the topic. He/She works collaboratively with other subject matter experts, program managers, project staff and national partners, as well as federal staff to identify products, tools, web content, and publications that are aligned with the vision of the Children’s Bureau and the child welfare profession.

The ideal candidate will have broad knowledge of child welfare policy and practice issues related to permanency, including adoption, permanency planning, diligent recruitment, older youth/youth engagement. The candidate will also have experience applying a racial equity lens to policy and practice issues and understand how to integrate diverse representative youth and family voice and expertise.

Key Responsibilities:

• Responsible for identifying, prioritizing, and communicating permanency and adoption trends in child welfare across the projects products and services. Identifies gaps in Gateway’s resources and supports development of products to resolve those gaps.
• Serve as internal content expert on adoption and permanency-related child welfare practices and policies for customer service, product development, web content, marketing and outreach, and library teams with an emphasis on infusing a racial equity lens and the voices of people with lived experience.
• Oversee all aspects of National Adoption Month initiative; work with all Gateway partners, CB clients, and other stakeholders to ensure the development of appropriate products, web content, and related media are developed and launched on time and within budget.
• Partner with the product development team to identify, write, review, and consult on products that synthesize complex information into useful web and/or print publications for professionals based on knowledge of topical area.
• Build and maintain strong connections to the field through partnering with national organizations, attend and present at conferences on behalf of Information Gateway, and work collaboratively with the Children’s Bureau’s Capacity Building Centers.
• Contribute to Child Welfare Information Gateway reporting and support activities related to data collection and continuous quality improvement efforts
• Interface with project staff, Children’s Bureau staff, and other partners, at interagency meetings and national conferences, regarding permanency related topics.

Basic Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in social work, public administration, or human services field
• A minimum of 8 years professional work experience
• A minimum of 5 years of experience in providing training/technical assistance in a human services field, preferably child welfare
• Ability to build and maintain strong stakeholder relationships for capacity building projects.
• Strong written and verbal presentation skills, including an ability to synthesize and write about complex child welfare issues.
• Working knowledge of federal and state laws that apply to child welfare, Child and Family Services Plans, title IV-E waiver demonstration authority, and related fields, services and systems.

Preferred Skills:

• Experience working in a public child welfare agency setting and with national child welfare organizations.
• In-depth knowledge of the child welfare system, particularly in permanency and adoption practice
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills with a customer service focus
• Ability to work across and within teams to accomplish goals
• Proven project management, supervision, and organizational skills
• Knowledge of and experience using websites and internet databases to find information

Professional Skills:

• Solid team builder, leader and team player with proven ability to manage competing priorities, perspectives, and stakeholder needs
• Exceptional project management skills with a focus on technical assistance project management
• Strong analytical, problem-solving, and decision-making capabilities
• Ability to multi-task and maintain high-quality results in a fast-paced environment
• Demonstrated, outstanding level of professionalism in providing administr