Southwest Strategies Group is seeking a full-time Vice President and Transportation Business Line Lead to join our Southern California team. As a senior leader, this role is instrumental in guiding client strategy, advancing business development efforts, and shaping the firm’s transportation vision. This position requires a strategic thinker with deep expertise in public outreach, infrastructure communications, and strong relationships across the transportation industry. The role leads high-profile client initiatives, develops communication strategies, and serves as a trusted advisor to executives and policymakers. Internally, this leader will support business growth, mentor team members, and forge strategic partnerships to position the firm for major opportunities. The ideal candidate is a results-driven leader with a proven track record in fast-paced, high-stakes environments.
Southwest Strategies Group is focused on building leaders in our industry and community. Our group of companies is comprised of award-winning institutions across the state: BergDavis Public Affairs, ColLAborate, Katz & Associates, and Southwest Strategies. With nearly 100 professionals with diverse backgrounds and experience and offices across the state, our team is uniquely positioned to meet stakeholders where they are. We approach every project as a trusted partner, leveraging our decades of expertise to provide custom strategies that help our clients get results.
Position:
Location and Travel: Roles hired in San Diego operate on a hybrid schedule, with 3 days onsite in the San Diego Headquarters. Roles outside of San Diego are primarily remote with varying expectations of visits to satellite offices and clients. Travel is required up to 20-30% of the time. Additional travel may arise to accommodate project demands and conference participation. This role will include early mornings, evenings, and weekends as required.
Salary Range: $140,000 - $180,000 (dependent on experience)
Essential Functions/Responsibilities
Forecast staffing needs for all transportation business line projects and contracts, regularly reporting fluctuations in staffing needs to the SVP, Client Excellence, Chief People Officer and VP of Finance.
Support key company initiatives and promote company positions and needs with junior staff.
Manage all budgeting and invoicing for transportation business line clients as well as forecast costs for proposed strategies.
Present strong project management skills, which is defined as the ability to oversee all aspects of a project at a detailed level and leading client interactions independently, without requiring additional oversight from senior leadership (SVP and above).
Build and maintain meaningful relationships with targeted, high-level external audiences, contributing to the company’s overall engagement and business development efforts in various industries and markets.
Serve as a positive role model who actively coaches junior staff by providing constructive feedback and coaching discussions.
Coach supervisorial staff (Managers and Directors) towards maximizing performance, and ensure they have the resources needed to provide the best possible product to the client. This includes coaching staff towards internal utilization targets.
Maintain an understanding of current transportation industry-related public outreach, public affairs, engagements and communications best practices, tactics and tools to provide strategic direction to clients.
Work closely with Executive Committee members to develop and drive strategic direction in order to meet organizational communications goals.
Develop and manage a team towards execution of strategic communication programs that could include community relations, public outreach, public affairs, social media, media relations, CEO positioning, etc.
Oversee a mix of small to large-scale communication-related projects, managing deliverables, budgets, timelines and teams to ensure expected outcomes are delivered on time and on budget.
Review collateral such as fact sheets, maps, eblasts, press releases, etc. and ensure the best product is being put forth to the client.
Experience managing and supporting transportation industry communications and public outreach across all phases of an infrastructure project – planning, design, environmental review, construction, and operations.
Deep understanding of key policy issues in the transportation industry and ability to translate highly technical jargon into 3rd grade comprehension level.
Familiarity with construction outreach management and demonstrated experience collaborating with contractors and other third-party organizations to support transportation project development.
Experience managing complex, multilingual public outreach campaigns and understanding of how to reach traditionally underserved populations through culturally conscious strategies and tactics.
Develop and manage all transportation business line proposals, leading all stages of the process. This may include qualifications, strategy and approach development, proposal planning, interview preparations and execution and more.
Actively search for business opportunities by attending networking and community events, participating in professional associations and meeting informally with government contacts and other potential referral sources.
Must actively manage personnel. This includes regular coaching and feedback through 121s, quarterly and annual review cycles, and ad-hoc coaching conversations.
Contribute to companywide professional development efforts, including, but not limited to leading internal development courses, working one on one with staff on coaching scenarios and feedback, encouraging junior staff to shadow meetings for learning purposes, and more.
Work across all SWS Group brands and actively advocate/search for opportunities for further integration in client work across the brands.
Additional responsibilities as assigned.
Qualifications
15+ years of relevant experience in transportation public outreach/public affairs or a related field
10+ years of agency experience OR 5+ years of agency experience and 10+ of in-house experience with a local or state transportation agency
Bachelor's degree in a related field
Proven ability to manage large projects as well as small teams on one or more sizable accounts
Continued management of an account for a minimum of 3 years
Experience managing both retainer and hourly billable projects
Southwest Strategies is one of the most experienced and successful public outreach firms in the West. For decades, we have helped clients in government and the private sector achieve their goals through innovative outreach strategies that educate, motivate and shape the future of our communities.
