Director of Programs

Location: Globally remote, preferably based in a
  Global Majority country

Location type: Remote

Reporting to:        Co-Executive Directors

Annual salary:      $80K USD, with potential cost-of-living adjustments of up to 20% dependent on location.

Contract type: Permanent

Working hours: Full-time

Candidate level: Director

Closing date: Monday 19^th January 2026, 9:00 am CET

Background

The Youth Climate Justice Fund (YCJF) supports youth-led socio-environmental and climate justice movements worldwide through participatory grant making and capacity strengthening to build trust and bridge gaps between funders and young leaders. The YCJF was publicly launched in September 2023 and is led by a global team of young professionals from diverse backgrounds. We support a community of 115 grantee partners in 50+ countries globally.

Purpose of role
The Director of Programs will play a key strategic and connective leadership role at YCJF. They will steward our programmatic vision, rooted in participatory grant making and movement-centred capacity strengthening, ensuring it remains bold, coherent, and responsive to evolving global and local contexts. This role sits at the intersection of strategy, learning, and movement alignment, connecting grant making, capacity strengthening, and field insights into a unified program that advances YCJF’s mission of shifting power and resources to youth-led climate justice movements.

As part of the Senior Leadership Team, the Director of Programs will provide cross-cutting strategic insights, contribute to YCJF’s long-term strategic direction, foster a culture of care and reflection, and ensure that the Fund’s programs are both visionary and operationally sound. They will support two core programs:

Our grant-making approach combines participatory decision-making from advisors and young leaders across the world, helping us identify and accompany locally rooted, youth-led climate justice solutions. We also use trust-based approaches to resource regional and international climate and cross-movement groups.
Our capacity strengthening work supports grantee partners through tailored coaching, one-on-one accompaniment, and in-person convenings designed to meet their needs and strengthen their leadership.

Given YCJF’s identity as a youth-led fund, this position is ideal for someone who has been working closely with youth movements and is looking to work in close peer collaboration with youth movement leaders globally, helping create the conditions for programs to have the greatest possible impact through increased scope and scale.

Primary responsibilities

The job holder will have the following key responsibilities:

Strategic program leadership

Support the grants and capacity strengthening teams to provide guidance, reflection, and maintain a balance between agility and strategic focus.
Steward coherence and alignment across YCJF’s core program areas to function as a connected and strategic whole.
Act as a thought partner to the Co-Executive Directors (Co-EDs) and governance of the YCJF in designing and reviewing long-term strategies by offering big-picture analysis, foresight, and reflection on emerging opportunities, risks, and shifts in the youth movement and climate justice ecosystem.
Strengthen YCJF’s ability to clearly articulate its programmatic vision to donors, partners, and youth movements.
Play a key role in contributing to building an organisational culture that values shared leadership, experimentation, and collective care.

Support grants & capacity strengthening core programs

Provide accompaniment and strategic support to the grants and capacity strengthening teams, helping to align daily implementation and participatory processes with YCJF’s values and global strategy.
Work closely with the capacity strengthening team to identify emerging needs and new opportunities to deepen support for our grantee partners and play a key role in ensuring that grant renewal decisions remain grounded in the Fund’s values and principles while staying strategic in an ever-evolving context.
Provide timely insights to both teams that help anticipate sector shifts, risks, and opportunities.
Support a specific portfolio of strategic grantee partners working regionally and internationally, accompanying their work, strengthening relationships, and ensuring they have the resources and guidance needed to advance their missions effectively.
Ensure that learning from grantee partners and capacity programs is documented and contributes to organisational reflection and strategy.
Encourage ethical, partner-centred use of data, technology, and storytelling tools to deepen understanding and amplify the impact of youth movements.

Cross-movement & sectoral insights

Foster collaboration that extends YCJF’s reach and deepens our collective impact, while staying closely connected with youth movements, allies, and intermediaries across climate, feminist, Indigenous, and social justice spaces to ensure our work is grounded in rich, intersectional insights and centred on youth leadership.
Identify trends, needs, and opportunities emerging from the field that can inform YCJF’s strategy and strengthen its role as a trusted movement ally and intermediary fund.
Represent the organisation externally in spaces aligned with our mission, helping to shape wider conversations on youth climate leadership, equitable funding, and systemic change
Contribute to YCJF’s thought leadership that elevates youth-led insights and shifts narratives across the sector.

Governance & long-term strategy

Collaborate closely with the Co-EDs and governance bodies to shape YCJF’s long-term program strategy.
Provide clarity and structure in governance discussions around program design, impact, and future direction.
Ensure programmatic strategies remain accountable to youth leadership, equity, and care-centred principles.
Contribute to the ongoing refinement of YCJF’s participatory grant making model, ensuring it evolves with the realities and wisdom of grassroots youth movements.

Learning & alignment

Partner with the Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) Team to embed reflection, learning, and adaptation across YCJF’s grant making and capacity strengthening programs.
Champion a culture of collective learning, ensuring that insights from youth partners, grantees, and internal reflections shape the Fund’s strategy and communications.
Encourage evidence-based, yet values-driven decision making, balancing data with lived experience and community knowledge.
Help ensure YCJF’s program strategies are living documents, regularly adapted based on evidence, context, and feedback from youth movements.
Foster a culture of reflection, care, and continuous improvement across program teams.

Candidate profile

The following offers an aspirational view of our ideal candidate profile; however, we encourage applications from candidates with a wide range of experiences and backgrounds, especially those from underrepresented groups.

Essential

At least 7 years of experience in program leadership, grant making, or capacity strengthening within philanthropy, social justice, or climate justice fields.
Proven ability to provide strategic insights and connect programmatic work to long-term vision.
Strong project and timeline management skills, with a structured, detail-oriented approach that supports clear planning, smooth coordination, and timely delivery across the team.
Experience supporting teams rather than directing them; working in accompaniment and partnership.
Strong understanding of participatory governance, cross-movement organising, and youth-led initiatives.
Commitment to climate justice, equity, and centring Global Majority movements and marginalised perspectives.
Excellent communication, facilitation, and strategic thinking skills.

Desirable

Experience working with intermediary funds, fiscal sponsors, or youth-led funds.
Familiarity with cross-movement organising (feminist, Indigenous, LGBTQ2S+, frontline, etc.).
Lived experience in or close connection to Global Majority or frontline communities.
Comfort in engaging with governance bodies, boards, and committees.

Terms and conditions

This role reports to the Co-Executive Directors and works in close partnership with the grants and capacity strengthening teams. The Director of Programs does not replace or duplicate their leadership but provides strategic support to strengthen their impact. The role also collaborates with the MEL and Development teams and participates actively in YCJF’s governance structures.
We offer competitive compensation aligned with our values of equity and global parity, meaningful opportunities to shape an evolving organisation, and the ability to work autonomously while contributing to an ambitious mission. YCJF provides four weeks of annual leave, an additional two-week organisation-wide end-of-year break, all locally recognized public holidays, cost-of-living adjustments, and flexible working arrangements, including allowances for remote-work costs.
Our benefits package includes comprehensive health insurance (medical, vision, and dental) with coverage for dependents, life insurance, bereavement leave, and policies designed to support staff wellbeing and the emotional realities of climate justice work.

If you have any questions about the role or organisation ahead of submitting a formal application, please reach out to McAra at mcara@upsallinternational.com. To note: in order to keep your application safe and ensure your data is GDPR compliant, applications will not be accepted via email.

∙ The deadline for applications is Monday 19^th January, 9:00 am CET ∙

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Upsall International actively promotes equality, diversity, and inclusion. In recruiting candidates, we seek candidates with the proven skills required, irrespective of race, gender, religion or belief, age, disability, or sexual orientation.