This position is responsible for optimizing our real estate portfolio, enhancing operational effectiveness, and ensuring our physical assets support the organization's long-term growth, financial performance, and evolving business objectives. The successful candidate will play a key role in creating strategic value across the enterprise while strengthening our ability to meet future business demands. The Vice President, Real Estate & Property Management is a senior enterprise leader responsible for setting and executing the long term strategy for the organization’s real estate and property portfolio, including facilities and security functions RESPONSIBILITY LEVEL: The Vice President, Real Estate & Property Management is a senior enterprise leader responsible for setting and executing the long term strategy for the organization’s real estate and property portfolio, including facilities and security functions. This role provides strategic oversight of a complex real estate and property portfolio, ensuring assets are optimized to support business growth, operational efficiency, risk mitigation, and adaptability to evolving market and business conditions. The Vice President leads through a team of experienced Directors who manage day to day operations and execution, and partners closely with an external real estate services firm to deliver portfolio planning, transaction execution, property management, and performance insights. This role is highly collaborative, working across the enterprise to ensure facilities and real estate decisions align with organizational priorities and stakeholder needs, serving as a trusted advisor who translates organizational strategy into scalable solutions. Sets long-term strategic vision (10+ years) and oversees planning for Real Estate and Property Management, including facilities and asset protection and is involved in setting organizational strategy and vision. Continually aligns financial and operational performance to create economic value and reports to the Executive Team on any and all aspects of division. Typically focuses on projects and initiatives that span 5-10 years, evaluates and monitors market trends.
PRINCIPAL DUTIES:
Enterprise Real Estate & Property Management Strategy 1. Develop and own the enterprise real estate and property management strategy, ensuring alignment with long term business objectives, growth plans, and financial targets. 2. Position the real estate portfolio to support flexibility, scalability, and adaptability in response to changing market conditions and business needs. 3. Establish clear strategic priorities, governance, and success measures for real estate, facilities, and asset protection functions. Real Estate Portfolio Optimization & Asset Management 4. Provide executive oversight of the organization’s real estate portfolio, with a focus on maximizing asset value, optimizing utilization, and minimizing financial, operational, and compliance risk. 5. Lead regular, ongoing assessments of asset performance, including cost, utilization, condition, risk exposure, and strategic fit. 6. Drive decisions related to portfolio optimization, including acquisitions, dispositions, consolidations, relocations, and lease strategies. External Partner Leadership & Property Management Oversight 7. Manage and hold accountable the external real estate partner supporting real estate pipeline development, lease negotiations, portfolio planning, property management, and performance reporting. 8. Oversee the end‑to‑end property management process through the external partner, ensuring service quality, cost effectiveness, risk management, and compliance with enterprise standards. 9. Use portfolio insights and reporting to inform executive decision‑making and continuous improvement. Facilities & Asset Protection Governance 10. Provide executive level accountability for the successful delivery of real estate, construction, and facility projects against approved scope, budget, timeline, quality, decision authority, and escalation requirements. 11. Ensure facilities and asset protection strategies are integrated with real estate planning and aligned to enterprise risk management objectives. 12. Establish policies, standards, and governance frameworks that enable safe, secure, and well‑maintained facilities across the organization. Stakeholder Engagement & Enterprise Collaboration 13. Partner with executive leaders, business unit leaders, finance, legal, HR, and operations to ensure real estate, property management and facilities decisions reflect enterprise priorities and stakeholder needs. 14. Serve as a trusted advisor to senior leadership on real estate, property management, and facilities implications of business strategy, growth initiatives, and organizational change. 15. Balance enterprise consistency with local business needs through thoughtful stakeholder engagement and influence. 16. Leading and Developing Talent: Directs organizational design for multiple departments, and oversees development and training of staff. Ensures ongoing succession planning and development within and outside of unit. Actively networks and sources for positions throughout the organization. 17. Project and Change Management: Establishes project priority and timing, articulates vision for organizational changes. Authorizes use of organizational time, talent and financial resources to support projects and improvement initiatives. Manages change through effective communication and coaching throughout the organization. Builds and participates in leadership coalition supporting and implementing the change and frequently serves as Project Sponsor for major initiatives. 18. Community Engagement: Demonstrated leadership presence in the community through serving on volunteer boards, steering committees or other community committees that align with our intended impact. 19. Board of Director meetings: provides updates on financials, operations and progress towards goals for area/s of responsibility. 20. Responsible for completing all other duties/responsibilities as assigned.
REQUIREMENTS:
1. Bachelor’s Degree required and a minimum of 10 years’ experience. 2. Experience with business continuity planning, risk management as well as contract and vendor negotiation. 3. Demonstrated experience navigating complex real estate markets, including site selection, zoning, permitting, municipal approvals, construction, and community stakeholder engagement. Experience within Chicago or comparable metropolitan markets strongly preferred. 4. Strong understanding of regulatory and compliance requirements impacting real estate, property management, facilities, and enterprise risk management, with demonstrated experience providing strategic oversight, establishing governance, and ensuring compliance through effective partnerships and accountability structures. 5. Proven ability to translate business strategy into actionable real estate, property management and facilities solutions.
LEADERSHIP COMPETENCIES:
1. Strategic Mindset: Develops and integrates organizational strategies to achieve and sustain competitive advantage. Explores future scenarios and leverages organizations differentiators to develop viable long term strategy. Adjusts business strategies in response to changing market dynamics and business need. 2. Drives Vision and Purpose: Demonstrates and a commitment to the organizations purpose and vision and ensures clarity around mission, vision and the guiding principles. Articulates with energy and optimism a compelling vision of the positive impact the organization. 3. Business Insight: Demonstrates thorough business/industry knowledge and can synthesize business information and respond to changing market dynamics effectively. Proactively monitors external factors and policies that may affect the organization. Uses knowledge to plan work and guide decision making. 4. Courage: Fosters a culture that supports people taking well-reasoned risks, regardless of outcome and appropriately advocates for decisions that are for the good of the organization. Confronts actions that are inconsistent with the Guiding Principles and demonstrates the ability to provide leadership through high-stakes situations, crises, or conditions of uncertainty. PHYSICAL/SENSORY DEMANDS: Job requires the following: remain stationary for sustained periods of time; ability to move about to accomplish tasks; must be able to operate a computer or similar technology, which typically involves substantial motions of wrist, hands and/or fingers; visual acuity to perform activities such as preparing data, operating equipment or review thoroughness of work; ability to communicate with others and exchange information. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. When determining placement within the salary range for this position Goodwill Greater Milwaukee & Chicago considers education, experience, internal equity, market demands and other qualifying criteria. It is not typical for individuals to be hired at or near the top of the rage for their role and compensation decisions are dependent on facts and circumstances of each case. Certain roles are eligible to participate in an incentive plan. Participation in this plan does not guarantee an incentive payment and is subject to the terms and conditions of the plan, which are subject to change. In addition to compensation, we offer a competitive benefit program that may include medical, dental, vision, short and long-term disability, life insurance, retirement plan, paid time off (PTO) and more. The specifics of each benefit package will vary depending on factors such as full or part time jobs, contracted, temporary, or other job categories. Equal Opportunity Employer (SEW)
