Special Assistant, Executive Office job in New York, New York

Position description

JOB SUMMARY

The Special Assistant is a key member of the Executive Office, reporting to the Chief of Staff and working closely with the President & CEO and members of the Executive Leadership Team (ELT).
This is not a traditional Executive Assistant role. It is a fast-paced, high-trust position combining executive support, project coordination, communications, international travel, ELT and Board support, and special projects. It offers an unusual opportunity for an ambitious, early-career professional to learn how a complex global organization is led while taking on increasing responsibility.
The Special Assistant helps ensure that the CEO's time, information, travel, communications, and engagements are aligned with Orbis's highest priorities. The role also supports the Chief of Staff in ensuring that the ELT operates effectively, decisions translate into action, and important organizational priorities move forward.
Sitting at the center of a complex global organization, the Special Assistant will have visibility across Orbis's programs, regions, functions, Board, and external partnerships. The individual will move easily between strategic and practical work: coordinating a multi-country CEO program visit; working with colleagues to prepare a briefing for a government meeting; attending an ELT meeting and coordinating follow-up; preparing CEO talking points; supporting a Board engagement; drafting an internal communication or social media post; or helping manage a special project that cuts across the organization.
We are looking for someone who is intellectually curious, flexible, highly responsive, calm under pressure, exceptionally organized, and eager to learn. The successful candidate will anticipate needs rather than wait to be asked, ask good questions, absorb new information quickly, and become increasingly comfortable connecting dots across the organization. They will know when to act independently, when to seek guidance, and when to engage the Chief of Staff or CEO.

LOCATION, TRAVEL & WORKING STYLE

Work style: Flexible/global
Work location: This role is hybrid and requires the Assistant to work for our NYC offices about 30% of the year. Orbis is a global organization. Candidates should be willing and able to commute or travel quarterly to New York City and work effectively with colleagues across global time zones.
Working hours: Given the global nature of Orbis and the Executive Office, this is not always a conventional 9-to-5 role. International travel, changing CEO schedules, and engagements across time zones will require flexibility outside traditional working hours.
Growth opportunities: In return, the role provides exceptional exposure to the day-to-day leadership of Orbis International and an opportunity to learn from colleagues, partners, and leaders across a truly global organization.
Travel: Regular domestic and international travel required
Compensation: $90,000-110,000 USD/year for candidates working within the United States

REPORTING & WORKING RELATIONSHIPS

The President & CEO, Chief of Staff, and Special Assistant operate as a closely coordinated three-person team, with distinct but complementary responsibilities.
The President & CEO sets organizational direction, makes key decisions, leads the organization internally and externally, and manages Orbis's most important institutional relationships.
The Chief of Staff serves as the CEO's strategic partner and organizational integrator—helping translate CEO priorities into action, orchestrating the Executive Leadership Team, driving cross-organizational priorities, managing sensitive and emerging issues, and helping ensure the CEO's attention is focused where it can have the greatest impact.
The Special Assistant provides critical coordination, preparation, and follow-through that enables the CEO and Chief of Staff to operate effectively. The Special Assistant helps ensure the CEO is prepared; scheduling, travel, and engagements run smoothly; ELT decisions and commitments are tracked and advanced; communications and Board engagements are supported; and special projects move forward. Working closely with both the CEO and Chief of Staff, the Special Assistant will have the opportunity to take increasing ownership as they develop in the role.
The three roles work in close partnership, with frequent communication, high trust, discretion, and a shared commitment to ensuring that the Executive Office enables the broader organization to succeed.

ESSENTIAL JOB FUNCTIONS / KEY AREAS OF RESPONSIBILITY

Strategic Scheduling & CEO Support

Manage the CEO's complex global calendar as a strategic tool, working closely with the Chief of Staff to ensure the CEO's time reflects Orbis's priorities.
Understand the purpose and desired outcome of meetings—not simply when and where they occur—and help ensure the right participants, preparation, and sequencing are in place.
Proactively identify scheduling conflicts, competing priorities, insufficient preparation time, and opportunities to make the CEO's schedule more effective.
Coordinate meetings involving ELT members, Country Directors, Board members, donors, government officials, partners, peer organizations, and other senior stakeholders.
Protect appropriate time for preparation, follow-up, staff engagement, strategic thinking, and travel.
Anticipate changes and resolve routine scheduling issues independently, escalating where judgment or prioritization is required.
Operate confidently across multiple global time zones and frequently changing priorities.

International Travel & Program Visits

Coordinate detailed planning for the CEO's frequent international and domestic travel, including complex multi-country itineraries, visas, transportation, accommodations, security considerations, and contingency planning.
Work with Orbis country, regional, program, development, and communications teams to develop substantive CEO program visit itineraries.
Help ensure visits appropriately balance program learning, staff engagement, government and partner meetings, donor opportunities, communications, and other strategic objectives.
Work with the Chief of Staff and relevant teams to establish clear objectives for visits and ensure itineraries and engagements support those objectives.
Develop comprehensive travel materials providing the CEO with a clear source for schedules, logistics, contacts, meeting objectives, background information, briefings, and talking points.
Anticipate disruptions and adjust plans quickly and calmly when circumstances change.
Travel with the CEO when appropriate to provide on-the-ground Executive Office support.

CEO Briefings, Communications & Meeting Preparation

Help ensure the CEO has the right information, at the right level of detail, at the right time for day-to-day meetings and major engagements.
Maintain a forward-looking view of the CEO's schedule so preparation begins sufficiently in advance.
Identify and engage the appropriate focal points across Orbis responsible for developing substantive briefing materials.
Coordinate and review meeting memos, briefing notes, background materials, talking points, speeches, presentations, and other CEO content.
Review materials for clarity, completeness, timeliness, and usefulness, working with the appropriate focal points and Chief of Staff to strengthen them where needed.
Conduct targeted research and synthesize information when additional context is required.
Draft and edit selected CEO correspondence, internal messages, meeting follow-ups, talking points, short remarks, presentations, and other communications.
Develop familiarity with the CEO's voice and help ensure communications are concise, authentic, and consistent.
Support the CEO's social media presence, particularly LinkedIn, in close coordination with Orbis's Communications team.
Identify opportunities to translate program visits, partnerships, organizational milestones, external engagements, and Orbis's work into relevant CEO-level content.
Develop a strong working understanding of Orbis's programs, countries, strategy, partnerships, donors, governance, and the broader global eye health environment.

Executive Leadership Team & Board Support

Serve as a core support to the Chief of Staff in enabling an effective and well-coordinated Executive Leadership Team.
Attend regular ELT meetings and selected leadership working sessions.
Support development of ELT agendas and coordination of meeting materials.
Listen actively and capture decisions, actions, owners, deadlines, and unresolved issues, rather than simply producing traditional meeting minutes.
Maintain ELT decision and action trackers and proactively follow up with ELT members and colleagues on commitments.
Help ensure issues requiring further discussion, escalation, or CEO/Chief of Staff attention are surfaced promptly.
Support preparation and coordination for ELT retreats, strategy sessions, planning processes, and other leadership forums.
Help translate ELT decisions into clear actions, milestones, responsibilities, and timelines.
Support the CEO and Chief of Staff in maintaining strong engagement with the Orbis International Board of Directors.
Coordinate CEO preparation for Board and committee meetings, including briefings, talking points, presentations, and other materials.
Support preparation for individual Board member conversations and engagement between formal meetings.
Track CEO and management commitments arising from Board discussions and help ensure timely follow-through.
Coordinate closely with colleagues responsible for formal governance and Board administration, complementing rather than duplicating those functions.

Special Projects & Project Management

Serve as a flexible special projects resource to the CEO and Chief of Staff, supporting priorities that require focused attention, coordination, research, or rapid execution.
With guidance from the Chief of Staff, take ambiguous assignments and help create structure—clarifying the objective, gathering information, identifying stakeholders, developing a workplan, and moving the work toward a clear outcome.
Lead or support discrete projects that cut across functions, regions, or traditional organizational ownership, with the level of responsibility increasing as experience in the role grows.
Conduct research, synthesize information, develop options, and prepare concise materials to support CEO and Chief of Staff decision-making.
Develop and maintain project plans, milestones, owners, and timelines and help drive consistent follow-through.
Support priorities during periods of organizational change, strategic initiatives, leadership transitions, Board priorities, or significant external opportunities.
Build effective working relationships across functions and geographies and learn to move work forward through collaboration and influence.
Maintain flexibility regarding the nature of assignments; special projects will evolve based on the CEO's and organization's priorities.

Executive Office Coordination & Follow-Through

Serve as a central point of coordination across CEO, Chief of Staff, ELT, and Executive Office priorities.
Maintain visibility across CEO and Chief of Staff commitments and ensure important actions and decisions do not get lost.
Build strong working relationships with ELT members and their teams, Country Directors, regional and functional leaders, and colleagues throughout Orbis.
Help develop and continuously improve simple, effective systems for Executive Office scheduling, briefings, travel, ELT actions, decision tracking, special projects, and follow-through.
Handle highly sensitive and confidential information with exceptional judgment and discretion.
Be willing to step into whatever is required to enable the CEO, Chief of Staff, ELT, and Executive Office to operate effectively.

Candidate Profile

We are looking for an ambitious, highly organized operator, communicator, and problem-solver who is excited by the opportunity to learn while working at the center of a fast-moving global organization.
This role is particularly well suited to someone in the earlier stages of their career who has already demonstrated strong performance and increasing responsibility and is now looking for broader exposure to executive leadership, organizational strategy, global programs, and decision-making.

QUALIFICATIONS & EXPERIENCE

Typically 3–5 years of relevant professional experience. We are open to candidates from a range of backgrounds and particularly interested in individuals who have demonstrated rapid growth, increasing responsibility, intellectual curiosity, and exceptional execution early in their careers.
Experience in an executive office, international NGO, consulting, government, foundation, global health organization, project or program management role, or similarly complex environment is helpful but not required.
Demonstrated ability to manage multiple priorities simultaneously and reliably follow work through to completion.
Exceptional organizational skills and attention to detail, combined with an interest in understanding the larger objective behind the work.
Excellent written communication, editing, synthesis, and note-taking skills.
Ability to take complex discussions or large amounts of information and distill them into clear actions, priorities, and concise materials.
Strong project coordination skills and the ability to create structure around multiple moving pieces.
Sound judgment and discretion, including comfort handling confidential and sensitive information.
Strong interpersonal skills and the maturity to interact professionally with senior executives, Board members, government officials, donors, partners, and colleagues across cultures and levels of seniority.
Ability to build relationships and work collaboratively across teams and geographies.
Comfort working across multiple time zones and with globally distributed teams.
Willingness and ability to travel internationally.
High proficiency with Microsoft 365 and contemporary collaboration and productivity tools.
Excellent spoken and written English; additional languages are an advantage.
Experience in international development, global health, an international NGO, government, philanthropy, or another international organization is advantageous but not essential. More important are learning agility, judgment, exceptional execution, curiosity, and a demonstrated ability to take on increasing responsibility.

Qualifications

Personal Attributes

Unflappable. Plans change. Flights are delayed. Meetings move. Priorities shift. You remain calm, resourceful, and focused on finding a solution.
Intellectually curious. You want to understand the substance behind the schedule and learn about Orbis's programs, countries, partners, people, and mission.
Eager to learn. You don't expect to know everything on day one. You ask good questions, absorb new information quickly, seek and respond well to feedback, and are excited to take on increasing responsibility as you develop.
Proactive. You anticipate what will be needed, identify gaps, and act without waiting for detailed instructions—while knowing when to ask for guidance.
Fast and flexible. You can move from an ELT meeting to a Board briefing to an international itinerary to a CEO communication without losing quality or momentum.
A strong finisher. You close loops. You remember commitments, follow up, and keep work moving until it is completed.
Low ego and highly collaborative. You are comfortable operating behind the scenes, involving the right people, and helping others succeed.
Globally minded. You are culturally sensitive, comfortable working across borders and time zones, and energized by the complexity of an international organization.
Mission driven. You are motivated by Orbis's mission and the opportunity to contribute to an organization working to prevent and treat avoidable blindness and vision loss around the world.

What Success Looks Like

Success in this role means:

The CEO's calendar and preparation increasingly reflect strategic priorities rather than simply meeting demand.
The CEO enters important engagements knowing why the meeting matters, what she needs to know, what outcome Orbis wants, and what decisions or messages are required.
International travel and program visits are thoughtfully designed, exceptionally organized, and resilient when circumstances change.
Briefings and talking points are concise, timely, accurate, and useful.
ELT meetings result in clear decisions, owners, deadlines, and follow-through—not simply notes.
The Chief of Staff has reliable visibility into ELT commitments and cross-organizational priorities.
Special projects are well organized and move consistently from assignment to completion.
CEO communications are timely, authentic, and connected to Orbis's broader priorities.
Board engagements are well prepared and commitments are followed through.
The Special Assistant grows in their understanding of Orbis and their ability to anticipate needs, exercise judgment, take ownership, and solve problems with increasing independence.

ORBIS VALUES & COMPETENCIES

At Orbis, our values and competencies are central to how we work and grow, both as individuals and as a global organization. These expectations apply to all employees and help ensure that we are aligned in our mission and impact.

Our Values in Action: We are guided by five values: Accountability, Commitment, Innovation, Integrity, and Equity. These values reflect how we engage with our colleagues, partners, and the communities we serve. We expect everyone at Orbis to model these values in daily decisions and behaviors.

Our Competencies in Action: These describe the key skills and behaviors needed to succeed at Orbis. They are used in performance discussions and to support career development across roles.

Orbis is an Equal Opportunity Employer. We are committed to providing equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants, regardless of race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, disability, veteran status, or any other protected characteristic.

We encourage applications from qualified individuals of all backgrounds, cultures, and communities, particularly those underrepresented in the international nonprofit sector. Orbis is proud to foster an environment where everyone can contribute meaningfully and thrive.

Application instructions

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