• Indigenous Australians are highly encouraged to apply.
• Full time, negotiable - 1 FTE.
• location (flexible within Australia).

About Our Common Place

Our mission is simple - we support communities to make their places healthier - but our agenda is ambitious. We use enterprise and fundraising to create change, an Australia in which thriving First Nations communities lead care for their culture, land and sea as an essential part of our fabric.

Our Common Place is a small, experienced team working alongside First Nations ranger groups and organisations to support strong planning, practical systems, and learning that lasts. We focus on thoughtful facilitation, disciplined thinking, and respectful collaboration—helping communities turn priorities into action without losing sight of culture, Country, or people. This is our first recruitment as Our Common Place after our change from Conservation Management, and we are looking for people who want to contribute to grounded, meaningful work rather than generic consulting.

We support communities to keep their lands, waters, community and culture healthy, using the Healthy Country Management Framework and range of support resources and services.

We work primarily with First Nations land and sea management communities and organisations, as well as governments, corporations and other organisations seeking to engage respectfully with First Nations organisations. We also work with philanthropic individuals and organisations, environmental social governance funds and nature markets.

We act with integrity, listen deeply, and work collaboratively to achieve enduring impact for communities and landscapes, guided by justice, equity, inclusion, and disciplined, evidence-based practice.

Being an Our Common Place team member means looking for new opportunities, working on existing projects, and helping build Our Common Place and spread its' ethos.

We want all the people who work with us to grow and encourage all Our Common Place staff and contractors to learn from partners and each other. We strive to provide a culturally safe working environment for our people.

The Role

Our Common Place is seeking a ranger program development specialist, who understands what systems and processes a new ranger team needs to establish and thrive and can work with organisations to help them implement those systems and processes.

In this role, you will work alongside First Nations ranger teams and their community organisations to strengthen the practical systems and processes that support day-to-day operations and longer-term program delivery. This includes supporting teams to develop and improve work planning, governance, compliance, human resources and reporting processes that meet legal and organisational requirements while remaining realistic and workable on the ground.

The role involves travelling to remote and regional communities, working directly with ranger teams and coordinators, as well as providing ongoing support through online sessions and follow-up work between visits. You will bring practical experience of how ranger teams operate, helping translate plans and obligations into systems that teams can actually use, adapt and sustain over time.

This role requires considerable travel at times, to meet with groups on their country.

The role will provide great opportunities to work with our network of Indigenous communities across Australia and support the many healthy country projects underway.

DUTIES

1. Do everything required, within the bounds of Our Common Place Beliefs and Values, to successfully secure and deliver projects that build our impact.
2. Facilitate workshops and meetings, including meeting preparation, follow-up, research, and report writing, after action reviews and any other reporting.
3. Relationship management activities, including for the purposes of fundraising, that support the growth of Our Common Place's impact and our employees, contractors, partners and clients to achieve great things.
4. Timely delivery of existing projects and submissions for new projects and funding opportunities.
5. Field work and field work activities, including travel and logistics, in support of projects and teams to enable communication and connection.
6. Comply with all Our Common Place policies, procedures and systems.
7. Support Our Common Places communications including recording and photographing stories relating to projects for use in Social Media and other forums.
8. Manage rest and reflection time as required, in balance with project/role requirements.

Selection Criteria

Essential:

• Demonstrated experience delivering projects with a mix of local, national and international audiences including Indigenous Australians, Government Agencies and Non-government organisations.
• Demonstrated experience delivering operational systems, policies and procedures that support implementation of strategic and land management operational plans and programs .
• Well developed communication skills and practices with experience in Indigenous / community engagement.
• Previous experience working in a 'hands on' capacity supporting teams and projects to work effectively through enabling partnerships, connection and communication.
• Demonstrated strong cross-cultural, interpersonal and verbal communication skills with an ability to liaise, engage and navigate situations of conflict.
• Lived experience or demonstrated understanding of, and interest in, the lived experiences of Indigenous peoples, particularly in colonial contexts.
• Self-motivated, time efficient and capacity to work both independently and as part of the team in any environment.
• Organised, flexible, adaptable and have a positive approach to working with others.

• Apply political and emotional awareness to relationship management.
• High-level skills in the use of typical 'office' and 'business' software particularly in a distributed organisation.

Desirable

• Experience working in the not for profit and / or community development space.
• Knowledge of the Open Standards for the Practice of Conservation and their application.

Employment entitlements

In addition to a competitive salary, Our Common Place is a registered PBI (Public Benevolent Institution), which allows us to offer significant tax benefits through salary packaging.

This role is 1.0 FTE, although we encourage 0.8FTE for work/ life balance, with flexible working arrangements available.