Scaling PBLWorks’ Vision: Julia Chih Steps into the COO Role
Project Based Learning (PBL) has become a gold standard for many over the last 30 years, and no organization is a bigger champion of its merits than PBLWorks. Since 1999, PBLWorks has offered professional development in PBL to teachers and leaders at the school and district levels, with a focus on empowering Black and Brown students to succeed.
As PBLWorks entered its 25th year, the team was seeking a COO with the vision and skills to scale their organization to at least twice the size it was operating at. The organization has a sterling reputation and anticipated a large influx of resumes for the job posting. Having run successful executive searches with Edgility in the past, the team knew we were the right partner to help them source a mission-aligned COO.
An Executive Search for a COO to Scale Their Vision
Edgility Principals, Serena Moy and Nora Maligmat set out immediately to understand PBLWorks’ needs for the role. Having worked together in the past, Serena had built a trusted relationship with their team and had developed a strong understanding of the mission and vision of the organization (in fact, one member of the search committee mentioned how excited they were to finally meet her in person!). With Serena and Nora at the helm and our team’s previous engagements with PBLWorks, our team was able to quickly drill down into the specific qualities the team needed in a COO. In this case, two of the most important considerations to take into account were that the candidate needed to have a robust financial background and the leadership skills, knowledge, and experience for scaling an organization.
Edgility knew from past experience that roles at this organization attract many candidates, so the challenge would not be to find qualified candidates, but rather to effectively and efficiently narrow down the best of the best to create a smooth hiring process. PBLWorks’ search committee praised Serena and Nora for their “brilliant” disqualifying questions that helped the team go from 1000+ applicants to five, highly qualified semi-finalists who were “mission-aligned and well prepared.” As one search committee member put it: “In the finalist round, we had two great candidates and the choice was difficult. This was the best search of my career in getting so many great leaders of color to consider working and leading with us at PBLWorks.”
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From 1000+ Candidates to One Highly Qualified Hire
After a thorough search process and a rewarding final round of interviews, PBLWorks was excited to offer the role to Julia Chih. Julia is a passionate leader with over two decades of experience in education and a fierce commitment to ensuring students succeed. Julia joined PBLWorks with a robust track record for leading organizations through growth and brings a unique blend of senior leadership experience across finance and operations. Throughout her career, Julia has supported organizations in expanding their impact, strengthening operational infrastructure, and driving financial sustainability. Her deep experience, and drive for the mission of PBLWorks made her stand out amongst several highly qualified leaders. And ultimately, made her a perfect fit for the role.
Julia was excited to join the organization at such a pivotal moment, and said, “the organization is poised to significantly expand its impact, by complementing its traditional facilitated services with new digital product offerings. These innovations will enable us to reach and empower more educators and students, equipping them with the tools and experiences needed to transform learning at scale. For me, this role represents a perfect intersection of my professional expertise in organizational growth and my passion for creating equitable access to high-quality education.”
Already, Julia is leveraging her expertise and making moves to grow PBLWorks – including partnering with Edglity to add a Sr. Director of Marketing to the organization (congratulations to Vicky Bender!). What makes Edgility their continued partner? The depth of our understanding of the organization, derived from an extensive intake process during our first engagement, and our decades of experience in the education sector. PBLWorks’ continued choice of Edgility has also allowed us to keep abreast of the changes in their organization, leading to even deeper understanding of their values and goals.
A Partner That Gets to Know You
We lean into two very important aspects of partnership – the vital importance of our clients’ missions and their goals, and our standards of excellence. PBLWorks’ mission is theirs alone and thus the exact blend of candidate qualifications is specific to the needs of their team, and beloved mission. To find the right leader for such an organization, meant that they needed an experienced, empathetic, and knowledgeable search team. We are committed to providing a high level of service to our clients, rooted in a deep partnership that makes their mission and goals ours as well.
We continue to be a trusted partner to PBLWorks, and we are honored to be part of their journey. We look forward to seeing Julia and her team in action!
