Feminist Systems Change Independent Contractor Opportunity – Executive Project Lead
Executive Project Lead
Feminist Systems Change
Independent Contractor Opportunity
Contract Period
April 1, 2026 – March 31, 2027
Location
Remote, based in British Columbia
Battered Women’s Support Services (BWSS) is seeking an experienced and thoughtful contractor to serve as Executive Project Lead- Feminist Systems Change. The role works directly with the Executive Director to support the advancement of BWSS’s policy leadership and systems-change work addressing gender-based violence and structural gender inequality.
Established in 1979, BWSS works to end gender-based violence through systemic change, survivor-centred advocacy, and intersectional feminist leadership. The organization advances gender equality by addressing the structural, legal, and social conditions that shape violence against women, girls, and gender-diverse people. Through policy development, partnerships, research, and public education, BWSS contributes to local, provincial, and national conversations on justice reform, survivor-centred public safety, and structural inequality.
Purpose of the Role
The Executive Project Lead plays a central role in advancing BWSS’s vision for systemic change by coordinating research, writing, and collaborative initiatives that strengthen feminist leadership and policy impact. Working closely with the Executive Director, the contractor ensures that major initiatives move forward in a coordinated and strategic way across the organization and the broader movement addressing gender-based violence. The role connects internal organizational development with external policy engagement so that BWSS’s work strengthens collective feminist capacity and contributes to systems change at municipal, provincial, and national levels.
The Executive Project Lead coordinates complex initiatives across multiple projects and partners. This includes managing timelines, coordinating consultants and collaborators, and ensuring that key milestones and deliverables move forward in alignment with organizational priorities.
In partnership with the Executive Director, the Executive Project Lead is responsible for coordinating timelines, deliverables, and project integration across BWSS’s provincial, municipal, and national systems-change initiatives. The role ensures that consultants, collaborators, and project teams remain aligned with agreed priorities, milestones, and deliverables so that complex initiatives advance in a timely, coherent, and strategically integrated manner.
Internal Organizational Work
Within the organization, the Executive Project Lead supports the development and implementation of systems that strengthen BWSS’s capacity to lead complex policy and collaboration initiatives. This includes contributing to the development of planning processes, documentation systems, evaluation approaches, and project coordination practices that enable the organization to sustain long-term systems-change work. The role involves coordinating consultants and collaborators, maintaining clear documentation of project development, and contributing to written materials that translate research and frontline experience into policy insight and organizational learning.
External Policy and Collaboration Work
The Executive Project Lead contributes to work that connects frontline knowledge, feminist analysis, and public policy. This includes research, writing, and coordination that support collaboration with organizations across British Columbia and Canada working to advance gender equality and address gender-based violence. The contractor assists in preparing policy materials, discussion papers, and briefing documents that contribute to shared analysis and collective strategy across the movement.
Provincial Systems Change
A significant component of the work involves supporting the development of a renewed Provincial Feminist Plan and the establishment of a coordinating coalition bringing together organizations and movements across British Columbia. This work responds to a context in which gender-based violence is increasing while services and policy responses remain fragmented and under-resourced. Many organizations are carrying out critical work yet often without shared infrastructure or coordinated platforms for collective action. BWSS is working to help rebuild the collaborative foundations required for sustained feminist policy development and systems change. Through convenings, consultations, documentation, and collaborative writing, the Executive Project Lead supports the development of a shared feminist policy agenda addressing gender-based violence alongside housing, child care, health care, economic justice, and Indigenous sovereignty.
Municipal Public Safety Work
At the municipal level the role supports BWSS initiatives that challenge the historic division between violence in the home and public safety policy. Through the organization’s #DesignedWithSurvivors initiative BWSS is advancing the principle that safety must be designed with survivors in mind and that municipalities play a critical role in shaping responses to gender-based violence through housing policy, policing, public safety planning, and community services. The Executive Project Lead contributes to research, documentation, and coordination that connect this municipal work with broader policy conversations.
National Policy Engagement
At the national level the role supports BWSS participation in policy discussions and collaborative initiatives addressing gender equality and gender-based violence across Canada. Through research, writing, and relationship coordination, the Executive Project Lead helps ensure that insights from frontline work in British Columbia contribute to national dialogue and policy development. This work recognizes that effective responses to gender-based violence require alignment between local realities and national policy frameworks.
Research and Writing
The contractor contributes to research and writing that translate frontline experience and feminist analysis into accessible policy insight. This includes preparing briefing materials, summarizing consultations, drafting discussion papers, and supporting collaborative documents that help organizations work together toward shared goals. The role requires the ability to synthesize complex information and contribute thoughtful written analysis that informs collaboration and decision-making.
Qualifications
BWSS is seeking a contractor with strong research and writing skills, sound judgment, and experience coordinating complex policy or systems-change initiatives in policy, community, or advocacy environments. The ideal candidate will have a strong understanding of gender-based violence, intersectional feminist analysis, and the social and institutional systems that shape safety and inequality. The role requires the ability to work independently while collaborating closely with leadership and partners and the ability to contribute thoughtfully to work that bridges research, policy development, and movement-building.
This contract provides an opportunity to contribute to work that aims to strengthen feminist infrastructure and advance survivor-centred public safety at a critical moment. Across Canada gender-based violence remains a persistent and systemic challenge, and organizations working to address it are navigating increasing pressures as social conditions shift and policy responses evolve. BWSS is investing in the organizational and collaborative infrastructure required to ensure that feminist leadership continues to shape how governments, institutions, and communities respond to violence and inequality.
The work requires the ability to operate with initiative and sound judgment in complex environments where priorities evolve quickly and not all decisions follow predetermined processes.
The role requires the ability to synthesize policy, research, and frontline experience while coordinating complex initiatives and supporting leadership in advancing strategic priorities in rapidly evolving political and institutional environments.
Compensation for Services
The contractor will be compensated at a rate of $55 per hour, invoiced monthly. The expected workload will range between 32 and 40 hours per week depending on project priorities, timelines, and organizational needs. As an independent contractor the individual will determine their own work schedule while ensuring that agreed-upon deliverables and timelines are met.
The maximum contract value will not exceed $110,000 CAD inclusive of GST for the contract period based on an estimated full-time workload over the twelve-month term.
Monthly invoices will reflect the actual hours worked within the agreed range. For planning purposes, a monthly amount of approximately $7,626.67 corresponds to an average workload of 32 hours per week and approximately $9,533.33 corresponds to an average workload of 40 hours per week.
Payment will be issued upon receipt and approval of monthly invoices.
Applications
Interested individuals are invited to submit a brief letter of interest and curriculum vitae outlining relevant experience and availability.
Interested individuals are invited to submit:
- A brief letter of interest
- A curriculum vitae outlining relevant experience and availability
Applications should be sent to:
endingviolence@bwss.org
