Director - Strategic Partnerships (North Carolina—major employers HQd in North Carolina, Econom

Director
- Strategic Partnerships (North Carolina—major employers HQd in North Carolina, Economic Development organizations)
Please see Special Instructions for more details.

Working Title Director
- Strategic Partnerships (North Carolina—major employers HQd in North Carolina, Economic Development organizations)

Appointment Type

Appointment Type EHRA Non-Faculty

Position Number

Position Number

Vacancy

Vacancy

Full Time/Part Time

Full Time/Part Time Full-Time Permanent

FTE

FTE 1

Hours per week 40

Position Location

Position Location North Carolina, US

Hiring Range

Hiring Range Dependent on experience and qualifications

One of the best college towns and best places to live in the United States, Chapel Hill has diverse social, cultural, recreation and professional opportunities that span the campus and community.

University employees can choose from a wide range of professional training opportunities for career growth, skill development and lifelong learning and enjoy exclusive perks for numerous retail, restaurant and performing arts discounts, savings on local child care centers and special rates on select campus events. UNC
-Chapel Hill offers full-time employees a comprehensive benefits package , paid leave, and a variety of health, life and retirement plans and additional programs that support a healthy work/life balance.

Primary Purpose of Organizational Unit

The Office of Strategic Partnerships, powered by Innovate Carolina within the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Economic Development ( IEED ), is Carolina’s single front door for industry. For 230+ years Carolina has advanced its mission through partnership with the state, federal government, and industry; this Office exists to make that partnership easy, fast, and strategic. Carolina is rich in activity but fragmented 674 corporate partners and 929 active agreements spread across roughly 25 units, with no one ‘selling the firm.’

The Office runs a hub-and-spoke, concierge model: one coordinated front door that handles intake, triage, escalation, and orchestration while the right campus experts schools, faculty, research offices, and development remain in the lead on delivery. Its operating principles are simple: one front door; move at the partner’s pace, or faster; communicate exceptionally well; lead with ‘how can we help,’ never with an ask;

and go big, not broad 1-5 strategic, institution-level partnerships rather than dozens of pilots. The Office has the concierge ability to understand the full range of university capabilities that can help partners now and to imagine and build new capabilities for what comes next.

Position Summary

Bottom line: you will make Carolina the best university partner for North Carolina’s major employers and economic-development organizations, and help build the next chapter of Carolina’s excellence. Reporting directly to the Vice Chancellor for Innovation, Entrepreneurship & Economic Development, the Director owns this vertical end to end. You own your vertical and you will work shoulder-to-shoulder with the other Directors of Strategic Partnerships, individual academic units (schools, institutes, and faculty), and the Partnership Success Managers who steward each relationship through the life of the partnership.

This role demands deep industry knowledge and contacts. Table stakes on day one is the ability to pick up the phone and call the leaders of five major firms in your domain for example, the largest employers headquartered in North Carolina, and the leaders of the state’s economic-development organizations understand what they actually need, and map those needs to Carolina’s research capabilities, faculty expertise, talent pipeline, and innovation infrastructure then add in what makes Carolina unique.

You will run the full partnership cycle: identify the right organizations, open the door (often through Carolina’s 330,000-strong alumni network), discover the partner’s real needs, match them to Carolina’s capabilities, and close institutional-scale agreements. Once signed, you remain the executive relationship anchor for renewal and expansion while Partnership Success Managers drive…