Data and Analytics Director (1-year term)

About The Wilderness Society

The Wilderness Society is a national conservation organization dedicated to protecting America’s wild places since 1935. Our mission is to unite people to protect America’s wild places. Through science, advocacy and partnerships with communities and policymakers, we champion the protection of wilderness, national parks, forests, and other public lands that provide clean air and water, wildlife habitat and the freedom to connect with nature. For more information, visit www.wilderness.org.

Position Overview

Reporting to the Senior Director of Membership and Strategic Operations, the Director of Data and Analytics sets the strategy for The Wilderness Society’s CRM ecosystem and data infrastructure and leads analytics for fundraising and advocacy across TWS and its sister organization, The Wilderness Society Action Fund, 501(c4). The Director will lead TWS's data systems, providing strategic direction for our fundraising and advocacy efforts, while overseeing the management of day-to-day database administration. The Director develops the organization-wide data strategy and governance framework and operates as a collaborative service shop—working closely with the Membership, Giving & Impact, and Advocacy teams to perform analysis and identify opportunities for growth—translating data into audience segmentation, performance analysis, testing agendas, and compelling reporting that drive strategic decision-making. The Director is also TWS’s lead on applied artificial intelligence for fundraising and advocacy—building and governing a centralized data warehouse and introducing AI agents and automation into the TWS platform to expand what a small team can deliver, with clear judgment about where these tools add value and where they do not. Strong technical project management skills and a background in data management or data science are key.

This position plays a critical role in fostering an organizational culture where people feel respected, included, and accountable to shared goals and outcomes. TWS has made it a priority to ensure that our public lands work reflects fairness, representation, and accessibility. This leader will carry those commitments into our Membership and Strategic Operations program—expanding partnerships, strengthening community connections, and ensuring our work is responsive to a broad range of perspectives and needs. Across our team, we aspire to be campaign-oriented, collaborative, innovative, transparent, and supportive of staff – our greatest asset.

Essential Duties & Responsibilities

• Set the long-term strategy and roadmap for TWS’s CRM ecosystem and data infrastructure, leading ongoing assessment and optimization and sponsoring major system implementations, integrations, and migrations.
• Lead the design, build, and adoption of a centralized data warehouse that unifies CRM, email, SMS, digital advertising, web, advocacy action, and offline data into a single source of truth—including data pipelines, identity resolution across systems, and a documented, governed reporting layer that program teams can use directly.
• Identify, prioritize, and deploy AI agents and automation within the TWS data and CRM platform—such as natural-language reporting assistants, automated campaign performance summaries, segmentation and list-pull automation, member and donor service triage—evaluating each use case for impact, feasibility, cost, and risk, and measuring results after launch.
• Establish and maintain TWS’s framework for responsible AI use with constituent data, covering acceptable use, donor and member privacy, vendor and model evaluation, human review and quality-control requirements, disclosure, and documentation, in coordination with IT, Legal, Membership Operations, and the TWS Action Fund.
• Develop and champion a CRM data strategy and data governance framework across all TWS entities, setting the standards for data quality, security, privacy, and regulatory compliance—including applicable data privacy laws—that the Database Systems Manager implements and enforces, in close coordination with the Membership Operations team.
• Lead analytics for fundraising and advocacy across TWS and TWS Action Fund, including trend analysis, post-campaign evaluation, and ongoing performance monitoring; establish testing metrics and foster a culture of rigorous, ongoing testing to continuously improve program performance.
• Build integrated, cross-channel measurement—including multi-touch attribution, media mix analysis, and incrementality or holdout testing—so leadership can evaluate true return across fundraising and advocacy channels rather than platform-reported results alone.
• Develop advocacy analytics that connect action-taking to giving—measuring activation, ladder-of-engagement progression, action-to-donor and donor-to-advocate conversion, and campaign outcomes—and deliver geographic reporting by state, congressional district, and public lands unit to support government relations, field, and campaign teams.
• Design audience segmentation and targeting strategies using behavioral, demographic, and engagement data to optimize campaign and outreach performance.
• Develop predictive models and donor lifecycle analyses—including retention, reactivation, upgrade, and lifetime value—to strengthen annual giving, major gifts, and advocacy pipelines.
• Maintain ongoing file health monitoring across the TWS and TWS Action Fund files—acquisition, retention, sustainer growth and churn (including passive churn), average gift, and cohort value—with forecasts and early-warning indicators that inform revenue planning.
• Create compelling data visualizations and reports for executive leadership, the board, donors, and stakeholders to communicate organizational impact and success metrics.
• Guide the evaluation, selection, and onboarding of data-related vendors, platforms, and services, making build/buy/partner recommendations informed by emerging industry trends, tools, and best practices (including AI and automation), with day-to-day vendor management executed by the Database Systems Manager and Membership Operations team.
• Support budgeting, forecasting, and investment decisions with data insights, identifying opportunities to scale high-performing programs and flag under-optimized investments in partnership with program leads and forecasting vendors.
• Partner with the IT team to ensure alignment between TWS data architecture and identified cybersecurity best practices.
• Adhere to and ensure compliance with all TWS policies and procedures (including finance, human resources, and legal), holding staff accountable for adhering to these standards to promote an ethical, compliant, and efficient workplace.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

QUALIFICATIONS

The ideal candidate will possess most or all of the following qualifications:

• Minimum 10 years of progressively complex professional experience in data management, data analytics, and/or complex CRM management, migration, or restructuring, with a college degree or equivalent qualifications.
• Demonstrated experience managing, developing, and mentoring managers and technical staff, and providing strategic direction to an operations team.
• In-depth understanding of database structure principles and data governance frameworks, with a proven ability to set standards and drive adoption across an organization.
• Strong analytical skills, including audience segmentation, campaign performance measurement, and testing design, with the ability to develop models and metrics that facilitate interpretation of data.
• Ability to leverage CRMs, SQL or similar query languages, and reporting or visualization tools (e.g., Tableau) to support report development, metrics tracking, dashboards, and automations; familiarity with ROI, EveryAction, Sprout, or Hustle is a plus.
• Demonstrated hands-on experience applying AI in a production environment—including building, deploying, or directing the deployment of AI agents, automations, or LLM-based tools integrated with a CRM, data warehouse, or other business systems—rather than ad hoc use of consumer AI tools alone; plus the ability to analyze in-house and comparative data through large-volume ingestion and analysis.
• Experience designing or leading the build of a data warehouse or modern data platform (e.g., Snowflake, BigQuery, Redshift, Databricks, or comparable), including ETL/ELT pipelines, data modeling, and integration of CRM, digital, and third-party data sources; familiarity with Python or dbt is a plus.
• Sound judgment about where AI does and does not add value, with working knowledge of responsible-AI practices for constituent data—privacy and PII handling, human review, accuracy validation, bias monitoring, and vendor and model evaluation.
• Strong technical project management skills, with the ability to envision a process, build the infrastructure necessary, and communicate the new process clearly through written and verbal instructions.
• Experience leading or sponsoring CRM or data system implementations, migrations, or restructuring projects, including evaluating vendors and platforms.
• Experience with advocacy, organizing, or issue-campaign data—including action-taker engagement, activation, and geographic or legislative-district reporting—and with the data-use requirements of affiliated 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) organizations, is a plus

This job description is intended to convey information essential to understanding the scope of this position and it is not intended to be an exhaustive list of experience, skills, efforts, duties, responsibilities or working conditions associated with the position.

This is a 1-year term position and can be done remotely or TWS office (where applicable) in the following states: AK, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DC, ID, IL, MD, ME, MI, MN, MT, NC, NM, NV, NY, OH, OR, PA, SC, TN, TX, UT, VA, WA, WI, and WY. The ​salary range for this position is $112,000-$131,000 depending on location & experience. ​To apply, please submit resume and ​cover ​letter by September 20th.

The Wilderness Society offers a competitive salary and benefits package, including health, dental, vision, life and disability insurance, and pet insurance; sick and vacation leave; a sabbatical program; and a retirement plan with employer contribution subject to certain limits and requirements. TWS is an equal opportunity employer and actively works to ensure fair treatment of our employees and constituents across culture, socioeconomic status, race, marital or family situation, gender, age, ethnicity, religious beliefs, physical ability, veteran status or sexual orientation.

As an organization, we aspire to being inclusive in the work that we do, and in the kind of organization we are. Internally, this means working as a team that listens to different points of view, recognizes the contributions of every employee and empowers each employee to bring their whole selves to work every day. Externally, this means ensuring that public lands are inclusive and welcoming, so that our shared wildlands can help people and nature to thrive.We are committed to equity throughout our work, which we define as our commitment to realizing the promise of our public lands and ensuring that all can share in their universal benefits.

To learn more about our commitment, please see http://wilderness.org/our-commitment-diversity-equity-and-inclusion-wilderness-society

Pursuant to applicable fair chance laws, TWS will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

TWS complies with federal and state disability laws and is committed to providing reasonable accommodation for individuals with disabilities. If you require accommodation to complete the application process or to perform the essential functions of the position, please contact careers@tws.org. TWS only accepts resumes submitted for positions that are currently open. Unsolicited resumes or resumes for posted positions that are not submitted via the online application process (where applicable), will not be reviewed or retained.