We’re Hiring! Now seeking an Operations & Building Manager.

Beacon Hill Friends House seeks a community-minded Operations and Building Manager to lead ongoing care and maintenance of our beloved building and provide other operational support to the nonprofit organization and residential community that operate within it. 

To apply, email search@bhfh.org following the instructions at the bottom of this page, AND submit the required staff application for residency. Applications received by Sunday April 3 will be given priority consideration.

OVERVIEW
Beacon Hill Friends House is a Quaker nonprofit organization and a residential community based in a large historic house in downtown Boston. Our organization’s mission statement charges us “to embody the Quaker principles of faith, simplicity, integrity, community and social responsibility in order to nurture and call forth the Light in all of us.” We are a multigenerational, cooperative community grounded in Quaker principles but open to adults of all faith and non-faith traditions. We frequently host public online and in-person educational events, and provide hospitality through rental of our public gathering spaces and two overnight guest rooms.

The Operations and Building Manager position combines administrative, project-management, and people skills in support of the Beacon Hill Friends House as a building, an organization, and a community. 

POSITION DETAILS
Schedule: Full-time weekdays, with occasional evening or weekend meetings or events.

Expected Start Date: May 2022

Compensation: Room and board at the Friends House (a non-taxable benefit valued at $15,600/year), plus salary commensurate with experience and above a minimum of $27,000. Robust benefits include employer-paid health insurance, generous and flexible vacation policy, and retirement contributions equivalent to 10% of salary starting after one year of work. 

Residency: We intend this role as a residential position, meaning that the Operations and Building Manager will live at the Friends House as a member of our residential community and will receive room and board as part of their compensation. The room and board benefit includes housing in a single room, full use of a fully-stocked kitchen, five chef-prepared dinners each week, all utilities, and basic household supplies, as well as use of our many shared indoor and outdoor spaces, all a 2-minute walk from the largest park in downtown Boston and a 6-minute walk from transit hubs. More information about residency at BHFH can be found on our website (www.bhfh.org/residency) and in the required staff application for residency. 

POSITION DESCRIPTION
The Operations and Building Manager (OBM) will hold primary responsibility for leading the care and ongoing physical maintenance, repairs, and renovation of the Beacon Hill Friends House (BHFH). The OBM will also support some other areas of the daily administrative life of BHFH as an organization and a residential community. The OBM will work closely with the Executive Director, Program Director, and Kitchen & Hospitality Manager to ensure smooth operations and healthy functioning of the resident community and of the organization as a whole.

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Identify, prioritize, and take action to address maintenance and repair needs, including one-time issues and recurring or scheduled maintenance.
• Identify, screen, and supervise outside contractors and service providers.
• Identify capital repair and improvement needs and develop priorities in consultation with the Executive Director and the Board’s Building Stewardship Committee
• Oversee maintenance, repairs, and capital project improvements.
• Maintain maintenance records and other appropriate building-related documentation for fiscal, legal and operational needs.
• Track and monitor expenses for repairs, maintenance and capital improvements in line with approved budgets
• Support other organizational operations as assigned and often in collaboration with other staff. Examples may include fielding general phone and email inquiries, coordinating the resident admissions process, updating organizational systems and internal community resources, managing physical and virtual files, and otherwise contributing to the smooth functioning of the office and of BHFH as an organization.
• Residency: The Operations and Building Manager will also be a resident of the Friends House and is subject to all the responsibilities and benefits of BHFH residency as described in the BHFH Resident Handbook. 

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS AND SKILLS

• Excellent organizational and time-management skills.
• Experience and ability to work independently, take ownership, and keep multiple collaborative projects moving forward with minimal direct supervision.
• Knowledge of buildings and building systems, and/or a willingness and ability to learn quickly and gain expertise in new areas as needed. 
• Willingness to work collaboratively and flexibly as a team with other staff to support the healthy functioning of the organization. 
• Willingness to reside at the Beacon Hill Friends House and actively participate in its intentional community.
• Alignment with the mission and values of the Beacon Hill Friends House.
• Willingness to work alongside diverse personalities, backgrounds, and identities.
• Strong computer skills; we make extensive use of Google Docs, Sheets, Drive, and other applications.

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS

• Experience with maintenance, renovations, and/or repairs of historic buildings.
• Experience managing outside contractors.
• Experience managing volunteers and collaborating with groups or committees
• Experience living in community
• Familiarity and sympathy with the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and its values and practices

About the organizational structure
Beacon Hill Friends House has four staff positions: the Operations & Building Manager, the Kitchen & Hospitality Manager, the Program Director, and the Executive Director, who supervises the other three staff. All staff typically reside at the house, although currently the Executive Director lives offsite nearby. BHFH staff work closely as a team to ensure healthy administration of this small but dynamic organization, where flexibility and cooperation are essential. Beacon Hill Friends House is a nonprofit organization governed by a Board of Managers, the committees of which play an active role in supporting the work of the institution. In addition to residencies, public programs, facility use, and overnight accommodations, BHFH serves as the physical home of Beacon Hill Friends Meeting, a Quaker congregation community that hosts Sunday Quaker Meeting for Worship and occasional other events.

About the community

Beacon Hill Friends House operates a cooperative residence for people interested in community living. Since 1957, between 18 and 22 adults at a time have made a home here based on Quaker principles of faith, simplicity, integrity, community, and social responsibility. Residents work together to maintain the House, serve meals, and plan events. Mutual respect, honest communication, and enlivened engagement with our differences are hallmarks of our community. 

There is no one word or phrase that neatly describes the people who live at the House. Some are students, some are full-time working people, and some are retired. Residents come from a range of backgrounds, identities, and spiritual and non-spiritual traditions, but have a common commitment to living together according to Quaker principles (although most are not Quakers).

About the building 

Beacon Hill Friends House is housed in a beautiful, aging building in the historic Beacon Hill neighborhood, a two-minute walk from the Boston Common park in downtown Boston. It sits on the unceded land of the Massachusett people.

The Friends House consists of two side-by-side brick rowhouses built in 1804 and designed by Charles Bulfinch (the architect of the Massachusetts State House and the dome of the US Capitol building). The houses were combined into a single residence in 1920 by the family that then owned them; this family donated the building in 1957 to become the Beacon Hill Friends House, a nonprofit organization set up to operate a community residence and center for learning grounded in Quaker values and principles. With nearly nearly 14,000 square feet of floor area, the house is five stories high and has a single-story rear extension that is topped by a roofdeck and flanked by two courtyards. 

Prior building preservation planning efforts include a Historic Structures Report completed in 2000, an exterior and structural physical conditions assessment completed in 2021, and an in-progress long-term historic preservation and building adaptation master planning process. The person hired for the OBM position will play a key role in the management of this design, construction, historic preservation, and grant administration project. 

HOW TO APPLY

If you think you’d be a good fit for this position, we would love to hear from you. To apply, please write to us at search@bhfh.org telling us how you are qualified and why you are interested in the Operations & Building Manager position, and attach a current resume. Please also fill out the required staff application for residency in our community. Applications will be reviewed as received. Priority will be given to applications received by Sunday, April 3.

Beacon Hill Friends House is an equal opportunity employer. We strongly encourage and seek applications from women and non-binary individuals and from people of color including bilingual and bicultural individuals. Applicants will not be discriminated against because of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, ethnicity, age, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by law.