ICF's Disaster Management Division seeks a Director, Emergency Preparedness to lead high-impact emergency management programs, strengthen client readiness, and help communities prepare for and navigate complex disasters. This Remote U.S. role combines technical preparedness leadership, portfolio delivery, client partnership, and business growth, with nationwide travel up to 50%.
The Director will lead all-hazards planning, continuity, training and exercises, capability assessment, stakeholder coordination, and emergency operations support. The role also oversees multiple clients and teams, advances delivery quality and financial performance, and serves as a subject matter expert for strategic pursuits and proposals.
Key Responsibilities
Emergency Planning and Preparedness
- Lead the development and maintenance of all-hazards Emergency Operations Plans, Emergency Support Function and hazard-specific annexes, continuity plans, crisis communications plans, EOC procedures, SOPs, field guides, and job aids.
- Ensure plans align with federal, state, and local requirements and recognized guidance, including FEMA CPG 101, NIMS, and ICS.
- Conduct hazard, vulnerability, risk, and capability assessments, and coordinate planning across public, private, nonprofit, and community partners.
Training, Exercises, and Continuous Improvement
- Lead integrated, multi-year preparedness, training, and HSEEP-aligned exercise programs, including seminars, workshops, drills, tabletop, functional, and full-scale exercises.
- Oversee exercise design, conduct, and evaluation, including objectives, scenarios, plans, manuals, MSELs, evaluation guides, briefings, and supporting materials.
- Facilitate hotwashes and after-action meetings; deliver After-Action Reports and Improvement Plans; and track corrective actions through completion.
Portfolio and Delivery Oversight
- Own portfolio performance across delivery quality, staffing, utilization, schedules, contracts, budgets, compliance, client satisfaction, and risk.
- Oversee on-call and task-order engagements, manage Project Managers and multidisciplinary teams, and establish clear standards, controls, reporting, and accountability.
- Identify and address delivery, compliance, staffing, financial, and client-retention risks while maintaining applicable FEMA, grant, contract, quality, and audit requirements.
Emergency Response Leadership
- Serve in a leadership or advisory role during EOC activations and incident response operations.
- Apply ICS and NIMS to support situational awareness, resource management, action planning, documentation, executive briefings, and interagency coordination.
- Provide timely recommendations to executive leadership on preparedness, response, continuity, and recovery priorities.
Business Development and Growth
- Grow the portfolio through existing-client expansion, add-on task orders, recompetes, and target-market pursuits.
- Build senior relationships with emergency management agencies, Public Assistance grant recipients, and preparedness and resilience stakeholders.
- Gather market and competitive intelligence and collaborate with portfolio, service line, capture, and technical leaders to advance growth objectives.
Proposal and Capture Leadership
- Lead or oversee proposal development and submission for assigned pursuits and support go/no-go decisions as required.
- Serve as a subject matter expert, solution architect, reviewer, and technical contributor on major emergency management and preparedness pursuits.
- Partner with capture and growth teams on win strategy, competitive positioning, staffing, proof points, pricing inputs, compliance, and proposal quality.
REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS:
Attached resumes should be concise to clearly indicate your match to the qualifications and experience indicated.
- Bachelor's degree in Emergency Management, Public Administration, Homeland Security, Public Health, Environmental Science, Business, or a related field.
- 7+ years of combined emergency management and FEMA-related experience, including 3+ years in a leadership or client-facing capacity.
- 3+ years of direct experience managing multiple clients, projects, Project Managers, or multidisciplinary teams.
- 3+ years of direct experience developing, updating, implementing, or validating Emergency Operations Plans, continuity plans, annexes, procedures, or emergency management programs.
- 3+ years of direct experience in emergency planning, preparedness, Emergency Operations Center activations, incident management, training, or exercises.
- 3+ years of experience managing project or program budgets, schedules, staffing, contracts, client relationships, and delivery risks.
- Willing and able to travel, both flight and vehicle, with anticipated travel up to 50%.
- Must have a valid current U.S. driver’s license and can successfully pass a Motor Vehicle Records (MVR) check.
PREFERRED SKILLS/EXPERIENCE:
These qualifications may provide additional preference beyond the required criteria.
- Master's degree in a related field.
- Certification as an Emergency Manager (CEM)
- Leadership of comprehensive, all-hazards preparedness programs and multi-year Integrated Preparedness Planning activities.
- Advanced knowledge of FEMA CPG 101 and experience with EOPs, ESF and hazard-specific annexes, COOP/COG plans, crisis communications plans, SOPs, EOC procedures, and field or position guides.
- Advanced experience managing the full HSEEP exercise cycle, including program management, design, conduct, evaluation, improvement planning, hotwashes, and corrective-action programs.
- Experience training exercise planners, facilitators, controllers, evaluators, EOC staff, or partner agencies.
- Experience managing preparedness grants, grant-funded initiatives, accreditation requirements, audit readiness, or compliance activities.
- Experience delivering work through on-call, indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity, master services, or task-order contract structures.
- Demonstrated success managing a portfolio with multiple concurrent clients, project teams, and delivery priorities.
- Experience developing client relationships and supporting capture, proposal, recompete, and account-growth activities.
- Existing relationships with the Florida Division of Emergency Management, Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency, or other Region 4 state and local emergency management organizations.
- Experience presenting to executive leaders, elected or appointed officials, boards, regulators, community partners, or public-sector clients.
Preferred Training
- Incident management: ICS-100, ICS-200, ICS-300, ICS-400; IS-700 and IS-800.
- Exercises: FEMA HSEEP training, including K/L0146 or current equivalent.
- Continuity: Continuity Excellence Series Level I or Level II.
- Program management: Project Management Professional (PMP).
- Foundational FEMA training: FEMA Professional Development Series or equivalent coursework.
PROFESSIONAL SKILLS
You will bring these with you day one.
- Strategic leadership across preparedness, continuity, response, recovery, mitigation, and resilience.
- Strong analytical, problem-solving, decision-making, facilitation, negotiation, writing, and presentation capabilities.
- Ability to lead multidisciplinary teams, manage competing priorities, address risks early, and deliver high-quality work under deadlines in a remote, highly collaborative environment across time zones.
- Executive-level communication and relationship management with public-sector clients, partners, technical teams, and operational stakeholders.
- Working knowledge of FEMA programs and emergency management frameworks, including the Stafford Act, 44 CFR Part 206, FEMA Public Assistance policy, NIMS, and ICS, as applicable to assigned work.
- Proficiency in portfolio, project, budget, contract, staffing, utilization, grant, quality, and compliance management.
- Business development, account growth, capture strategy, proposal development, and competitive intelligence capabilities.
