Assistant Director, Communications & MarComm Operations

About AAM: The American Alliance of Museums (AAM) supports all museums across the United States, including aquariums, zoos, historic sites, parks, and gardens. Serving over 30,000 members, including museums, museum professionals, and companies that support the sector, the Alliance is the largest national museum organization in the U.S. The Alliance serves its membership and the museum community through four pillar programs:
Learning, Community, Advocacy, and Museum Practice. Maintaining an annual operating budget of $10M with 35 staff members, we are a 501(c)3 nonprofit headquartered in Arlington, VA and an equal opportunity employer.

The Assistant Director of Communications plays a key role in advancing AAM’s communications strategy and strengthening the effectiveness of its Marketing & Communications team. Reporting to the AVP of Marketing & Digital Experience, and working closely with the Director, Marketing & Digital, the Assistant Director leads and executes communications strategies and campaigns that demonstrate AAM’s value, elevate the voices and stories of the museum field, and advance key organizational priorities.

This role combines communications strategy, writing, storytelling, media relations, and campaign leadership with strong organization and coordination skills. Approximately 70% of the role focuses on communications strategy and campaign leadership, with 30% focused on department-wide planning, coordination, and performance.

• Working in close partnership with the Director of Marketing, you will help shape how AAM communicates its work and engages its audiences. While the Director of Marketing leads marketing strategy for core revenue programs and oversees brand as well as optimization and performance across AAM’s marketing channels, you will lead AAM’s communications, editorial, and storytelling strategy, creating communications campaigns across social media, email, web, media relations, and other channels.

• Your portfolio will include Museum Practice, Advocacy, Community, and other organizational storytelling priorities. You will serve as a strategic communications partner to teams across AAM, helping translate goals into compelling communications strategies, stories, and content and coordinating execution across channels.

• Serve as the strategic communications partner to AAM’s Museum Practice team, including the Continuum of Excellence, Museum Assessment Program, and Accreditation, advising communications strategy, crafting messaging and storytelling, and coordinating execution across AAM’s communications channels.

• Provide strategic communications leadership for AAM’s advocacy portfolio, including Museums Advocacy Day, Invite Congress to Visit Your Museum, advocacy actions and alerts, and other priority initiatives, working with the Communications Manager on content development and execution.

• Lead communications strategy and storytelling for AAM’s community and connection initiatives, developing compelling stories that showcase museum professionals, member experiences, award recipients, and the value and impact of the AAM community.

• Lead day-to-day media relations, including responding to press inquiries, cultivating media relationships, identifying proactive earned-media opportunities, and overseeing the development of press releases, pitches, and other media materials. Partner with the AVP on sensitive, high-profile, or crisis communications.

• Develop and execute communications materials for AAM’s executive leadership in partnership with the AVP, including identifying thought-leadership, op-ed, media, and speaking opportunities and overseeing executive content across channels.

• Identi…