Chief Of Economic Recovery Strategy

Department Information

Colorado Governor Jared Polis is committed to building a Colorado For All, a place where everyone has an opportunity to succeed and live the Colorado way of life. Governor Polis is focused on lowering health care costs for hardworking Coloradans, transitioning the state to renewable energy sources, ensuring every Colorado child gets a quality education, and building an economy that works for everyone. The Governor's staff includes offices for budgeting, communications and outreach, legal counsel, legislative liaison, operations, policy and research, and scheduling.

Description of Job

Help the Polis administration to “focus like a laser beam on the economy” and achieve the Governor’s Wildly Important Goal (WIG) for Colorado to remain in the top 5 economies in the country through June 2022 (including sub goals for jobs/unemployment, business environment, and growth).

Key roles: Lead a 6-12 month response, involving representatives from the public and private sectors, to address the economic challenges resulting from COVID-19. Ensure that Colorado is creating and implementing economic policies and programs that enable a fast and robust recovery. This may include convening thought leaders, researching and developing policies, modeling various outcomes, and building consensus.
Develop a strategy to achieve the WIG and ensure progress toward its achievement. Requires assessing sufficiency/insufficiency of department strategies, identifying gaps and risks, and proposing non-agency strategies, tools, and resources. Requires leading the Administration in breaking out of silos and agency thinking to achieve a bold result.

Other responsibilities:

• Coordinates economic policy advice for the Governor, resolving conflicting advice from agencies, and streamlining the Governor’s economic briefings to key information
• Ensures that policy decisions are consistent with the Governor's economic goals

• Analyzes progress achieved against the Governor's economic goals, proposing changes as needed during this highly uncertain time

Desired attributes:

Economist (or related field) willing to take 6-12 mos. leave from a position at a university, business, government agency, research organization, or think-tank.

Strategic thinker, with policy expertise in economic recovery.

Works well with the numerous high level executives and decision makers, including Cabinet members and advisers whose policy jurisdictions impact the state's economy, i.e., someone who will lead and coordinate efforts without stifling voices.

Excellent research skills. The position does not have a dedicated staff, but will draw from resources in the Governor’s Office and Departments, including staff economists in OSPB, policy analysts, and Department SMEs in health, business, labor, agriculture, energy, finance, fiscal policy, and healthcare.
Strong written and verbal presentation skills are needed, representing the Governor in interagency meetings and engagement with external stakeholders. Many perspectives, from inside and outside of government, must be given voice, ensuring that the Governor has informed advice in a timely and efficient way.
What the Chief of Economic Analysis is Not Responsible for: In defining a new role, it is helpful to identify what is out of scope for this position. The Chief is not responsible for the following:

• Managing agency performance to achieve the WIG (responsibility of Operations)
• Engaging with business stakeholders on near-term decisions (responsibility of COVID Econ team, including OEDIT, CDLE, and DOLA working with Policy)
• Revenue forecasts (responsibility of OSPB)
• Leading Economic Resiliency Council (responsibility of Policy)

How is the work different from existing Departments and Offices with economic responsibilities? Here is an illustrative example from the National Economic Council (NEC): If the president sought an analysis of why young adult females are dropping out of the labor force, that analysis would likely be authored by the Council of Economic Advisors or the Department of Labor, submitted through a process led by NEC. If on the other hand the president wished to develop a policy to increase labor force participation, NEC would lead that process with the CEA chair and DOL Secretary as participants.

Minimum Qualifications, Substitutions, Conditions of Employment & Appeal Rights

See Above

Supplemental InformationA cover letter and resume must be submitted with the application for consideration. Your cover letter and resume must provide sufficient detail about your background and experience to allow the screening panel to properly assess your experience in the required elements, including your experience and achievements.

We offer a generous benefits package including:

• Annual leave accrued at 13.33 hours per month
• Sick leave accrued at 6.66 hours a month
• 10 paid holidays per year
• Medical and dental plans
• State paid life insurance policy of $50,000
• Choice of 2 retirement plans
• 401K and 457 plans
• State paid Short Term Disability coverage
• Additional optional life and disability plans
• Credit Union Membership
• RTD pass
• Training and professional development

To learn more about State of Colorado benefits visit: https://www.colorado.gov/dhr/benefits.

ADAAA Accommodations: Any person with a disability as defined by the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 (ADAAA) may be provided a reasonable accommodation upon request to enable the person to complete an employment assessment. To request an accommodation, please contact Michelle Hunter by phone (303) 866-6309 or email michelle.m.hunter@state.co.us at least five business days before the assessment date to allow us to evaluate your request and prepare for the accommodation. You may be asked to provide additional information, including medical documentation, regarding functional limitations and type of accommodation needed. Please ensure that you have this information available well in advance of the assessment date.