Director of Day One and Product Innovation

The Opportunity

The Federation of American Scientists (FAS) is seeking an inaugural Director of Day One & Product Innovation to spearhead FAS’s product strategy and oversee The Day One Project. Through a suite of policy entrepreneurship tools, FAS and The Day One Project seeks to drive policy change by crowdsourcing actionable policy solutions, curating diverse subject matter experts across academia, industry and government and engaging across a wide swath of science, technology and innovation topical areas. Since 2020, Day One has helped a growing community of contributors develop promising policy ideas, a large number of which have become policy. Together, we have inspired over $2.6 billion in federal investment across key science and technology priorities, cross-cutting federal initiatives, executive actions, and more.

The Director of Day One and Product Innovation will lead this initiative into a new chapter, building out the Day One products and community to drive impact in key policy areas. Serving as an organizational leader, the ideal candidate will build out a clear operating model and product roadmaps across key products including policy sprints, policy accelerators and idea challenges and develop clear mechanisms to sustain, strengthen and empower a growing policy entrepreneurship community. This role will oversee the product strategy for FAS, continually building, refining and strengthening a distinct product suite and their implementation across portfolios at FAS as well as exploring new product offerings that can meaningfully drive policy entrepreneurship across science, technology and innovation policy. The ideal candidate will have experience in the science & technology policy ecosystem, have a product mindset and be able to toggle between strategy and successful execution.

About FAS

At the Federation of American Scientists, we believe in embracing a growth oriented and entrepreneurial mindset to drive impact. As the Director of Day One and Product Innovation, you’ll lead a dynamic team, shaping strategies that contribute to groundbreaking federal policy initiatives and inspire change within an evolving landscape.

What you’ll do (Core responsibilities)

• Oversee and implement the Day One 2025 agenda crowdsourcing top science, technology and innovation policy recommendations for the next presidential administration
• Serve as an internal partner to FAS portfolio leads strategically deploying product offerings across portfolios
• Build and deliver on product road maps for core FAS and Day One product offerings including challenges, sprints, and accelerators
• Lead the Product Innovation team, continually focusing on improving internal and external processes and creating opportunities for professional development 
• Cultivate, manage and strengthen the Day One community by building and implementing an ongoing engagement strategy
• Continually hone and improve the policy memo process to generate effective policy memos for internal and external authors
• Identify, assess and explore new product offerings and work to embed a product strategy mentality across the organization
• Articulate and implement a clear Day One community engagement strategy working in complement with internal and external stakeholders
• Serve as a member of the FAS leadership team 

Skills and Experience (Requirements)

• 10+ years of experience in building and leading policy change initiatives, demonstrating a clear understanding in how policy change happens across legislative and executive branches of government
• Acumen in building, maintaining, and supporting a network or ecosystem of partners
• Experience in building out standard product offerings including go to market strategies
• Strong people management skills
• Demonstrated business development skills
• Strong verbal and written communication skills with experience in policy writing
• Ability to work across a wide range of internal and external stakeholders to successfully drive work forward
• An understanding of federal policy and how it works including knowledge of policy levers

Work Environment 

This position will be a hybrid role based in Washington DC, meaning that both remote and in-person work can be accommodated, generally two to three days per week in the DC office, and two to three days per week remote.

Salary Range

• $150,000 – $200,000 

Hiring Statement

Don’t check off every box? Apply anyway! Studies have shown that women and people of color are less likely to apply for jobs unless they meet every listed qualification. At FAS we are dedicated to building a diverse and inclusive workplace, and developing new voices. If you’re excited about this role but your past experience doesn’t align perfectly, we encourage you to apply anyway – you might just be the right candidate.

The Federation of American Scientists is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender identity or expression, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, marital status, amnesty, or status as a covered veteran in accordance with applicable federal, state and local laws. The Federation of American Scientists  prohibits discriminating against employees and job applicants who inquire about, discuss, or disclose the compensation of the employee or applicant or another employee or applicant.