IIIF Consortium Hiring a Managing Director

The International Image Interoperability Framework Consortium seeks a Managing Director to foster the continued success and growth of IIIF, lead delivery of the IIIF strategic plan, and supervise the work of other IIIF-C staff members (currently two full time staff). They will work in concert with the diverse and growing international community of IIIF users to increase adoption, advance the capabilities of IIIF-compatible specifications and software, and bring the increased benefits of interoperability to the research and cultural heritage sectors.

The Managing Director will bring community- and organizational-savvy to the role. They will oversee coordination of IIIF’s distributed community, committees and working groups, supporting a healthy, international, diverse, and inclusive culture. Working with experts from many stakeholder groups, they will provide vision and high-level strategy for IIIF’s ongoing advances, including membership, grant and financial development. They will provide project management and direction in supporting IIIF-C staff in their roles of communication, community, and technical coordination.

Reporting Lines: The Managing Director reports to the IIIF-C Executive Committee, working closely with a sub-group of elected officers. The Managing Director serves as an ex officio, non-voting member of the Executive Committee. The Executive Committee provides overall direction to the Managing Director. Organizationally, the Managing Director can be an employee of or in a contract position with CLIR (Council on Library and Information Resources), which serves as the IIIF Consortium’s fiscal host. CLIR provides the Managing Director and IIIF-C staff with an extended network of supportive colleagues, as well as administrative, financial, and human resources support.

Specific duties include:

A. Coordinate efforts among the IIIF community

• Work with the IIIF-C Executive Committee, IIIF-C members, the principal committees of the IIIF community (Coordinating Committee, Editorial Committee, various Community Groups, event program committees, etc.), and the IIIF community at large, to foster synergy among the various formal and informal aspects of the IIIF;
• Work to ensure a healthy community dynamic, including a respectful, diverse, equitable and inclusive environment from many different countries;
• Oversee effective communications to and among IIIF’s diverse stakeholders, including both current and prospective adopters, to enable continued development and success;
• Plan and manage IIIF conferences, workshops, and other meetings, working with IIIF-C staff, committees, and volunteers in local arrangements and programs;
• Consult on IIIF strategies and standards for grants and projects seeking to become interoperable (including possibly being written into grants and projects).

B. Grow the IIIF Consortium

• Working with the Executive Committee and others, identify and help drive progress on IIIF’s strategic goals on a multi-year cadence;
• Manage and maintain strong relationships to IIIF-C current members, ensuring continued support from the organizations that help resource the initiative;
• Actively recruit new institutional members of the IIIF-C among the various categories of membership (non-commercial and commercial members of all sizes) worldwide; work with related organizations to recruit new members;
• Develop new services and value propositions to retain and grow members;
• Evolve IIIF-C’s membership model and structure to grow membership, increase funding, add resilience, and strengthen the IIIF community internationally.

C. Establish and manage relationships with other organizations

• Represent IIIF internationally, serving as a spokesperson, ambassador and advocate for interoperability and IIIF;
• Identify and do outreach to organizations and efforts (non-profit, government, funder, commercial, standards groups, etc.) with complementary missions to cultivate adoption, membership, and/or other benefits (functional, financial, etc.);
• Outreach and communication to standards, industry and trade groups with a IIIF interest (including possible vendors with products or content that might be made IIIF-compatible).

D. Manage staff and budgets for IIIF-C

• Manage IIIF-C staff, including conducting searches and hiring when needed and with positions approved by the IIIF-C Executive Committee;
• Assist and support IIIF-C staff in defining and attaining career goals; works with CLIR’s Chief Operating Officer on HR policies, procedures, and relationships;.
• Prepare budget reports and proposals for IIIF-C Executive Committee coordinating with the Chief Operating Officer of CLIR, IIIF-C’s fiscal host;
• Manage IIIF-C’s budget, within the parameters and direction set by the IIIF-C Executive Committee;
• Ensure timely and clear invoicing of IIIF-C members and timely payment;
• Identify and pursue additional revenue opportunities via grants, sponsorship and other avenues consistent with IIIF’s mission and composition, conditional on IIIF-C Executive Committee approval.

Relevant Skills & Experience

The elements listed below are provided to indicate the directional expectations for the role and the needs of the Consortium – we don’t anticipate that any single candidate will have deep expertise in all components. Likewise, we expect that this role will evolve as the community and the Consortium grow as well.

The ideal candidate:

1. will understand and be excited by the benefits of IIIF and interoperability for research and cultural heritage sectors; previous experience with IIIF is not required;

2. will be self-directed and highly organized as well as capable of working with and for a membership organization;

3. will demonstrate effective management and advocacy skills;

4. will be a highly effective communicator in multiple forms: oral, written, and presentation;

5. will be able to work effectively with IIIF-C committees, community members, and volunteers with a wide variety of technical abilities; software engineering experience are not required, though sufficient technical acumen to gain conceptual understanding of IIIF and its component specifications and technologies;

6. will have previous experience in research, libraries, archives or museums; in open source, open data and/or open community efforts;

7. will be comfortable and thrive in an open community with an elected board; structured committees, and respect for both aspects of structure and openness;

8. will have experience successfully obtaining grant funding and managing grant-funded projects;

9. will be at adept fostering contributions and participation from a growing member and adopter base internationally.

International travel is required.

This is a full-time, remote position and can be based anywhere with a reliable Internet connection and the legal right to work. To ensure effective coordination and communication with IIIF-C staff, the Executive Committee and other community members, the Managing Director must be available for regular meetings with stakeholders from the west coast of North America (-8 UTC) to central Europe (+1 UTC), and ad hoc meetings with others.

U.S. benefits are available via CLIR to employees; alternative employment approaches (via contracting) are possible. Minimum salary for this role will be USD$100,000 or local equivalent.

This posting will be open through January 16, 2024. The search committee will only consider applications with cover letters.