Senior Associate (Climate Solutions)

About the Organization

CEA Consulting is an environmental consultancy based in San Francisco, CA. For over four decades, CEA Consulting has partnered with a wide range of philanthropies, nonprofits, businesses, and government agencies in effectively tackling urgent environmental challenges—from climate change to ocean conservation to sustainable food systems. By combining rigorous analysis with deep sector expertise, we help our clients develop focused strategies, build and execute effective programs, and assess and amplify their impact.

With approximately 30 employees across the firm, CEA strives to create a collaborative and inclusive work environment where all consultants are supported in doing the work they are most passionate about, developing their skills, and bringing their whole selves to work. We believe that a wide array of perspectives, backgrounds, and experiences promotes innovation and makes our team more creative, flexible, and productive. For a more in-depth description of our approach to work, please see our Vision, Mission, and Guiding Principles. For a more in-depth description of our services and examples of past work, please see our website.

CEA’s Work

CEA supports environmental foundations, nonprofits, private-sector businesses, government agencies, trade associations, and impact investors. We pride ourselves on being client-oriented, insightful, and responsive. Our work encompasses a broad range of environmental topics ranging from conservation to climate solutions on land and in the water, with many of our projects having an international scope. The majority of our work serves the philanthropic and non-profit sectors and relates to marine conservation and/or climate change. We also work regularly on climate resilience and adaptation, climate-smart agriculture, land use and conservation, freshwater management, equity and justice in climate and conservation, transportation, wildlife protection, pollution, and urban sustainability. We often work at the intersection of these issues. Our primary offerings include:

• Strategy, including grantmaking strategies, organizational- or initiative-level program strategies, field- or sector-level landscaping and analysis, and opportunity assessments.
• Facilitation, including meeting and workshop design, insight generation, and synthesis; funder collaborative and NGO group facilitation.
• Operational Support, including initiative incubation, grant sourcing and diligence, designing and launching funder collaboratives, and board development and management.
• Analysis and Thought-Leadership, including sector-level climate mitigation analysis, roadmaps or frameworks for collective action, grant database creation and analysis, and field-level state-of-play assessments.
• Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning, including design and implementation of multi-year MEL programs, logic models and theory of change development, learning session facilitation, research to support learning agendas, third-party evaluations.
• Recruiting and Organizational Design, including executive search and transition planning, staff recruitment and hiring support, strategic talent acquisition partnership, board member recruitment, and executive compensation analysis.

About the Role

We are seeking a Senior Associate who will play a key role in supporting CEA’s climate-related engagements that may include: supporting mitigation- and adaptation-related strategy development and grantmaking, facilitating funder collaboratives focused on climate solutions across key sectors (e.g., energy transition, hard-to-abate sectors, natural climate solutions), and helping leading NGOs operationalize their programming, and helping to advance growth of CEA’s climate-focused project portfolio.

This position interacts with leaders in the philanthropic field on work spanning a wide range of climate and environmental issues. Senior Associates manage day-to-day consulting engagements with environmental and climate-focused foundations, family offices, NGOs, impact investors, and bilateral and multilateral agencies.

Our work environment is collaborative and intense. It requires intellectual rigor; excellent interpersonal and communication skills; strong research, analysis, and writing capacity; the ability to synthesize findings from a range of sources; superb project management skills; attention to detail; and a passion for climate solutions and environmental issues.

We are interested in candidates with climate expertise coming from a range of professional backgrounds, including consulting, nonprofits, academia, finance/impact investing, private sector or corporate ESG, government agencies, foundations, and think tanks.

Given the requirements of this position, we are highly interested in prior experience in climate philanthropy, climate philanthropy advising and/or candidates with strong consulting backgrounds from top generalist firms or social-sector specific organizations that might not have equivalent experience in the targeted climate-related fields described above.

The Senior Associate cohort at CEA includes varied backgrounds and subject matter expertise. Senior Associates may range from professionals with five+ years of experience ready to lead projects, seasoned professionals with advanced credentials and 15+ years of experience who prefer not to assume further management responsibilities, or experienced professionals new to consulting who are preparing for Director-level roles. Each of these profiles have succeeded as a Senior Associate at CEA.

About You

You are a voracious learner and a diligent, proactive project manager who is committed to working on climate and environmental issues. You are at your best when handed a challenging assignment in a climate-related area that will stretch your expertise.

You have proven ability to manage complex projects on time and on budget, with a track record of leading high-functioning multi-person teams. You are undaunted by ambiguity. You create structure and order to keep yourself and your team moving forward. You are adept at toggling each day between big-picture thinking and problem solving, granular analysis, and management of complex project and logistical details. You can seamlessly transition between projects over the course of the day.

You believe individual and team success are fundamentally connected. You support your teammates and leadership in creating a collegial, inclusive, and healthy work environment. You enjoy helping colleagues grow through collaboration, and through sharing your expertise and infectious curiosity about the climate field.

Primary Duties and Responsibilities

• Serve as an engagement manager for projects, acting as the primary client contact, leading project design and execution, managing teams, ensuring quality deliverables, updating workplans, managing budgets, and facilitating meetings
• Lead climate-related projects with light support from senior team members, including climate policy analysis, grantmaking strategies, sourcing and diligence for philanthropic climate funders, philanthropic field and sectoral analyses, NGO strategy development, and operationalizing climate strategies
• Manage teams in executing multiple assignments for different clients
• Co-design and execute projects, including:
  • Formulate and test hypotheses via research, modeling, expert interviews, and data analyses
  • Facilitate group problem-solving and brainstorming to generate novel solutions
  • Synthesize disparate information (e.g., quantitative data, expert interviews, literature review) into findings and recommendations for clients
  • Deliver clear, compelling reports, presentations, and briefs
  • Ensure quality and rigor of all work products
• Support Directors in business development: contribute to proposals, develop your professional network in the climate field, and source new project opportunities
• Participate in CEA’s ongoing journey to become a more diverse, inclusive, and equitable organization.

Desired Content Knowledge and Experience

• Robust understanding of the wider climate landscape, and nuanced appreciation of the interrelationships between sectors, communities, politics, economics, ecosystems, and earth systems; able to draw insight from the wider context to shed light on challenges and opportunities in clean energy and climate action.
• Deep knowledge of climate change and decarbonization of the major energy sectors, particularly the industry and power sectors, in the U.S. and/or internationally. Content area expertise could include electrification technologies, energy policy, renewable energy deployment, and/or grid modernization.
• Alternatively, successful candidates may have lighter climate-specific expertise if they bring to the role deep experience in management/strategy consulting, with demonstrated ability to manage and execute projects through the entire life cycle alongside senior management. Exceptional client relationship skills and ability to be effective and impactful without topic-specific expertise.

Desired Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree and five+ years’ work experience; advanced degree (e.g., MBA, MS, Ph.D.) a plus
• Consulting experience preferred, particularly in senior roles advising philanthropic entities or leading grantmakers
• Experience developing and leading projects from start to finish, including scoping, budgeting, workplanning, and owning critical project deliverables
• Ability to manage multiple workstreams, meet tight deadlines and adapt to evolving client needs
• Exceptional writing skills across mediums and audiences
• Excellent verbal and interpersonal communication, including effective internal and external communication and ability to deliver compelling presentations
• Discretion in handling sensitive matters and diplomacy with stakeholders
• Two+ years’ experience managing and coaching direct reports; experience managing remote and hybrid teams is a plus
• Experience with philanthropy and grantmaking, including creating strategies and theories of change, pipeline development, due diligence, and writing grant memos
• Proficiency in qualitative research methods (e.g., interviews, case studies) and analytical tools (e.g., qualitative data analysis software)
• Proficiency in quantitative research methods and data analysis (e.g., Excel modeling, statistical analysis, data management, data visualization)
• Advanced proficiency in LLM’s (e.g., Claude, ChatGPT) and Microsoft Office Suite, especially Excel and PowerPoint; additional analytical tools (e.g., Tableau) a plus
• Professional proficiency in Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese, Mandarin, or Korean language with demonstrated cultural competency a plus

Work Location

CEA’s office is located in San Francisco, and about half of the team works remotely on a permanent basis. We strongly prefer that this position be based in our San Francisco office, but remote candidates will be considered. This position requires some travel.

Compensation and Benefits

We offer competitive salaries, excellent health benefits, additional benefits for those working in the SF office (e.g., commuter benefits and weekly lunches), and a supportive working environment. Salary will be commensurate with skills and experience. The base salary range for Senior Associates at CEA is $100,000 - $140,000. Additionally, CEA offers an annual performance bonus, revenue sharing, and the opportunity to earn additional bonuses thrice a year when work exceeds billable hour targets. CEA also typically provides raises for all staff annually, usually above COLA. Therefore, altogether, the target total compensation for this role is in the mid-to-high $100,000s.

To Apply

Please use the application link to submit your materials through our online form. Priority will be given to applications submitted by October 12th, 2026.

Each application is personally reviewed by our hiring team. Although CEA uses and encourages thoughtful use of generative AI in our work, for this application, we ask that you not use generative AI to draft your written responses, as these materials are intended to help us understand your own thinking, communication style, and perspective. Applications that appear to rely primarily on AI-generated responses may not be considered.

We typically contact candidates selected to advance in our process within two to three weeks after the priority deadline. Only candidates selected to advance will be contacted before the search is completed. All applicants will be notified when the search has closed.

We anticipate the interview process will include:

• Resume review
• Initial video interview
• Two panel interviews
• Reference and background checks

For questions about completing the application form or technical concerns, you may contact tamara@ceaconsulting.com. Due to the high volume of applications we receive, we are unable to provide individual status updates or feedback to candidates who do not advance to interviews. To ensure your application is reviewed and you receive process notifications, please only submit application materials through the career portal.

CEA is an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to our legal and ethical obligations to protect job applicants and employees from employment discrimination, harassment, and unfair treatment due to race, color, ancestry, national origin, religion, sex (including pregnancy, gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation), age, disability, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, military status, or veteran status.

We offer competitive salaries, excellent health benefits, additional benefits for those working in the SF office (e.g., commuter benefits and weekly lunches), and a supportive working environment.