About this role
THE FUTURE OF RURAL IS HERE. COME BUILD IT WITH US.
Director of Learning Networks
Lead and grow Thriverr, our rural community development network platform.
Reports to: CEO
Status: Full-time, exempt, benefits-eligible
Location: Remote, anywhere in South Dakota or within 100 miles of Renner
Salary: $85,000 to $105,000
Apply by: October 31, 2026, or until filled
Dakota Resources is hiring someone to lead and grow Thriverr, our peer learning network for rural community and economic development leaders. If you have built a community or learning platform that people wanted to belong to, or something like it from a different direction, read on.
THE JOB
• Lead Thriverr, a learning network of rural community and economic development organizations across South Dakota and the region, with daily content, a deep resource library, collaborative learning experiences, and more than 50 virtual and in-person events a year.
• Design and launch a new resource provider network made up of the funders, agencies, and experts rural leaders need.
• Lead the rebuild of a new Thriverr platform with AI that matches leaders to resources and people and helps spark collaboration.
• Own your roles, decisions, and budget, and direct the contractors and developers who build with you.
• Travel to our office in Renner, SD about six times a year for staff meetings and retreats, plus regional travel to board and in-person Thriverr events. Many trips involve overnights, especially if you live far from Renner.
UNCOMMON BENEFITS AND PERKS
• You will build on 30 years of results: over $83 million, hundreds of leadership development events, and tens of thousands of Post-it notes put to work in 150+ rural organizations.
• Live where you want, anywhere in South Dakota or within 100 miles of Renner, and set your own schedule, on a team that puts you ahead of the work.
• Get generous time off: four weeks of paid vacation, 15 paid holidays including your birthday, summer Friday afternoons off, and plenty of paid personal time for what life throws at you.
• Get full individual premiums covered for health, dental, vision, life, and disability insurance, and an annual healthy living allowance for that gym membership, bike, or pair of hiking boots.
• Get 3 percent of your salary put into your 401k before you contribute a dollar, then matched up to another 3 percent.
• Get a professional development budget for courses, conferences, and coaching, plus leadership coaching with a certified coach.
• Get home office equipment and furniture, a monthly work-from-home stipend, and a vehicle during stretches of heavy travel.
• Earn $85,000 to $105,000, depending on your fit, skills, and experience.
HOW YOU’LL LEAD OUR THRIVERR NETWORK
At Dakota Resources, “platform” means two things: the technology members use, and the two-sided network model where rural leaders and resource providers each make the network more valuable for the other.
Make Thriverr worth belonging to. You orchestrate how leaders join, connect, learn from each other, and come back, and you measure whether they find it worth their time and bring their peers.
Grow it one atomic network at a time. You start small, focused networks inside Thriverr for specific groups and purposes, some organized by partner organizations, so each one is valuable from its first day.
Launch the new resource provider side of the network. You recruit the organizations that hold the money, programs, and expertise rural leaders need, and you orchestrate the platform so both sides of the network find value early.
Lead the Thriverr 2 build. You turn the ways leaders and resource providers create value for each other into platform requirements, lead the build with our team and the developers, and make sure AI helps people find each other and collaborate instead of replacing the conversation.
Run the programs and the calendar. With support from our team and contractors, you plan and organize more than 50 events a year, mostly virtual, plus cohort learning programs, courses, and in-person gatherings. Leaders contribute and co-create, and everything is designed to build trusting relationships.
Keep the network active between events. You set the rhythm of conversation and content that makes Thriverr useful daily, and you model the Thriverr agreements: share courageously, lead with curiosity, show your appreciation, and pay it forward by connecting and contributing.
WHO WE ARE LOOKING FOR
What you need: You have built a community, membership, or platform that people wanted to belong to, and you can show how it grew. You understand network effects and two-sided platforms, or you know how to learn them quickly. You use AI fluently, and you know how the technology behind an online community should work, even if you have never written the code. You have designed learning experiences where people teach each other. You build trust quickly with experts in a field new to you.
Even better if: You have built both sides of a two-sided network, worked in rural community or economic development (or alongside the people who do), or managed contractors or outside developers.
YOU SHOULD NOT APPLY IF
• You are not already using AI platforms like Claude to improve your workflows and make smarter decisions. We mean in your own work, every day. Better yet, you have created Claude skills files, built a dashboard that shows project data and progress, or developed a tool or application without writing the code.
• You need close supervision and specific direction. You will not get those here. You will be accountable for outcomes big and small, and you will be expected to figure out the path yourself.
• You see a network as an audience to deliver content to. Here, leaders learn from each other by solving things together, and the network grows because they bring their peers.
• You want to be at the center of every connection. The best sign that Thriverr is working is leaders helping each other without you in the thread.
• You need certainty before you act. You will make calls on the resource provider network and the new platform before anyone can tell you they are right.
• You do not believe rural communities have a thriving future. We do, and we believe the people in them already hold most of what it takes. You do not have to live in a small town, but you do have to show us how you are rooted in rural.
WHO WE ARE
Dakota Resources connects capital and capacity to empower rural communities. We are a nonprofit community development lender based in Renner, South Dakota, focused on building the capacity of rural community and economic development organizations to help their towns thrive. We level up those organizations in three ways at once: capital, capacity, and connection.
We’ve created real impact. In 30 years, we have supported more than 150 rural organizations in South Dakota and 18 other states, and more than 8,300 rural leaders have connected and learned together through our events.
We believe in a thriving rural. Every rural community has the right to define and build its own future, and everyone in those communities deserves a real shot at contributing to it and benefiting from it.
The future of rural is here. Here means now, not someday when conditions improve, and it means wherever you already are.
HOW WE WORK
Here, you are more important than the work. Your wellbeing comes first, and so do your people and your property. When you are sick, when your family needs you, or when the basement floods, we make space for that to be your priority. When a week runs past 40 hours, you flex that time back within the next few weeks, because when you work too much, you cannot offer your best. You hear where you stand in one-on-ones with the CEO every two weeks, not six months later.
Everyone is powerful here. We are a small, agile team where everyone contributes to the mission wherever they are needed. Dakota Resources runs more like a network than a hierarchy: there are few layers, people hold roles rather than positions, and nobody stands over your work. Whatever you hold, you lead, and you collaborate with teammates to get things done.
We build on each other’s strengths. Everyone on our team knows their CliftonStrengths, and we use them to understand each other, share the work, and rely on each other. If you are selected for an interview, you may be asked to complete a CliftonStrengths assessment or share a recent one.
We work fully remote. Work-from-home is both freeing and isolating, sometimes in the same week. You need to be content with no conversations one day and four video calls the next.
Our five core values are actions we live by: include, connect, inspire, empower, celebrate. They are promises, not slogans. They shape how we treat each other and how we make every decision, design every project, and deliver every program, with our team, our board, our partners, and the communities we serve.
What that looks like on a typical Tuesday:
• Nobody checks your hours or hands you a to-do list. You set your own direction and notice you are behind before anyone has to tell you.
• You will usually know the target but not always the route. You propose the steps and ask anything along the way. Curiosity is how you get to clarity.
• You seek out feedback and offer it with care. We push on each other’s ideas because we want them to work, and we stay open to changing our minds with new information or ideas.
• You communicate clearly, often, and in the open. You write things down, tell teammates where you need help, and keep your progress where everyone can see it.
Applications will be accepted through October 31 or until the position is filled, whichever comes first.
Dakota Resources is a certified CDFI and an equal opportunity provider and employer.
$85,000-105,000