Position Location: 1000 Independence Ave SW, Washington D.C. 20585
Work Environment: Hybrid
Travel Required: 10%
Salary: $130,000 - $160,000
Position Summary:The Strategic Advisor will support the Department of Energy (DOE), Office of State and Community
Energy Programs (SCEP), providing direct support to the Pillar Manager responsible for the State Energy
Program (SEP) and the Home Energy Rebates (HER) program.
The State Energy Program provides funding and technical assistance to 56 grantees, comprising the states,
territories, and the District of Columbia, to enhance energy security, advance state-led energy initiatives,
and increase energy affordability, with each State Energy Office determining how to allocate funds across
eligible activities to meet its own energy priorities. The Home Energy Rebates program lowers household
energy costs through whole-home efficiency retrofits and upgrades to high-efficiency appliances and
equipment, delivered through both formula and competitive awards to states, territories, and Indian
Tribes. Together the two programs constitute a pillar with two distinct federal teams, two recipient bases,
and two funding structures.
The purpose of this position is to create capacity for the Pillar Manager to look up and out. The Strategic
Advisor absorbs the coordination, follow-through, and day-to-day operating load that otherwise consumes
a program leader's attention, so that the Pillar Manager can concentrate on strategy, external engagement,
and the direction of the two programs. The role operates in three directions: laterally across SCEP's
program and functional areas, downward into the SEP and HER teams to drive initiatives to completion,
and upward to the SCEP Director and Front Office on taskings, reporting, and information flow.
This is a full-spectrum role. The Strategic Advisor is expected to frame a strategic question and staff it to
a recommendation, and equally to run the calendar, correspondence, and meeting mechanics that keep a
two-program pillar moving. The position requires the judgment to move between those registers without
friction, discretion in handling sensitive matters, the ability to operate with limited direction, and enough
command of both programs to represent the Pillar Manager's priorities accurately. All work is performed
in an advisory and support capacity, does not include the performance of inherently governmental
functions, and does not include the supervision or direction of Federal staff.
Requirements
Specific requirements and responsibilities include:- Serve as the senior support resource to the Pillar Manager across both SEP and HER, maintaining current awareness of status, risks, and open issues in both programs and providing analysis, options, and recommended courses of action.
- Identify matters that require the Pillar Manager's attention and matters that do not, and route, staff, or resolve the latter so that the Pillar Manager's time is spent on direction-setting and external engagement.
- Frame strategic questions facing the pillar, assemble the analysis needed to answer them, and deliver a written recommendation with options and trade-offs.
- Prepare the Pillar Manager for internal and external engagements, including sessions with SCEP and DOE leadership, other Federal offices, State Energy Offices, Tribal recipients, and program stakeholders.
- Prepare, review, and quality-check decision memos, briefings, talking points, read-aheads, and correspondence moving to and from the Pillar Manager.
- Drive pillar initiatives through the SEP and HER teams, translating the Pillar Manager's direction into defined workstreams with owners, milestones, and due dates, and tracking them to completion.
- Track commitments, taskers, and action items across both teams and follow through on them, ensuring nothing assigned is lost between the two programs.
- Identify where the two programs can share approaches, tools, templates, or lessons learned, and coordinate adoption across both teams.
- Surface dependencies, risks, and resourcing gaps that span the pillar, and coordinate the technical, grants, budget, and communications input needed to resolve them.
- Develop and maintain consolidated pillar-level status reporting, giving the Pillar Manager an integrated view of obligation and expenditure rates, recipient performance, milestones, deliverables, and staffing across both programs.
- Coordinate across SCEP program and functional areas on issues, recipients, and requirements that touch more than one program area.
- Serve as the pillar's point of coordination with the SCEP Front Office on taskings from higher offices and on information requested from the pillar, ensuring requests arrive with sufficient context and responses are complete, accurate, and on time.
- Support responses to data calls and oversight inquiries concerning either program from SCEP leadership, DOE leadership, other Federal offices, and external oversight bodies.
- Support pillar planning activities, including annual operating planning, performance goals, milestone tracking, and recurring internal reporting, and carry leadership direction through into the pillar's plans.
- Draft and maintain pillar guidance, standard operating procedures, and internal reference materials, and support their review and clearance.
- Own the Pillar Manager's meeting cadence across both programs, including scheduling, agenda development, materials preparation, facilitation support, notes, and action item tracking through to closure.
- Manage calendar and scheduling logistics for the Pillar Manager, including prioritizing competing requests, sequencing engagements, and protecting time for strategic work.
- Support correspondence and inbox management for the Pillar Manager, including triaging incoming items, tracking items requiring response, preparing draft responses for review and release by federal staff, and following up on outstanding replies.
- Plan and coordinate pillar meetings, working sessions, offsites, and stakeholder convenings, including requirements definition, logistics, invitations, materials, and follow-up.
- Maintain pillar records, distribution lists, trackers, and shared file structures so that information is current, organized, and retrievable.
- Coordinate with SCEP support functions, including budget, procurement, human capital, communications, and information technology, on behalf of the Pillar Manager.
- Support onboarding and orientation for staff joining either program, including access, systems, and program background.
- Manage multiple, highly sensitive or complex tasks at the same time and work cross-functionally to resolve problems and implement changes.
Minimum Required Qualifications:- Bachelor of Science or Bachelor of Arts in engineering, business administration, public administration, or a related discipline. Four (4) years of relevant experience may substitute for the Bachelor's degree; candidates substituting for the degree require sixteen (16) years of relevant experience.
- Minimum of twelve (12) years of relevant experience. A Master's degree may substitute for two (2) years.
- Considerable working knowledge of the principles, practices, and standards of public sector project and program management.
- Considerable working knowledge of research techniques and report writing, and command of business English.
- Considerable working knowledge of State and Federal labor laws and regulations.
- Considerable working knowledge of analytical techniques applied to project and program management, and of obtaining, verifying, and evaluating general and statistical information.
- Considerable working knowledge of computer software utilized in project and program data collection and analysis.
Preferred Qualifications:- Master's degree in a related discipline.
- Experience supporting SCEP or the Department of Energy.
- Experience supporting the State Energy Program or the Home Energy Rebates program.
- Experience managing Federal financial assistance programs, grants, and cooperative agreements.
- Experience with both formula-allocated and competitively awarded Federal financial assistance.
- Experience working with State Energy Offices, Tribal recipients, or State and local government partners.
- Experience supporting a Federal program office through a period of rapid growth or high external visibility.
- Project Management Professional (PMP) certification.
- Familiarity with DOE systems.
