Country Director - Philippines
New Energy Nexus · Cebu City
Who We Are & Where Are We Going
New Energy Nexus is an international organization that supports clean energy entrepreneurs with funding, business acceleration, skills development, and access to networks. We operate across multiple markets in Asia, Africa, Australia, and the United States.
New Energy Nexus launched its Philippines chapter in 2019 to strengthen the ecosystem of entrepreneurs and market actors advancing the country's clean energy transition. Today, New Energy Nexus Philippines works with clean energy and climate entrepreneurs, solar installers, workforce and training partners, grassroots industry groups, and other ecosystem actors building the nation's clean energy economy.
After six years of experimentation, learning, and growth, New Energy Nexus Philippines has established itself as a trusted and influential contributor to the country's clean energy transition. The chapter has developed deep local expertise, a highly capable team, meaningful ecosystem relationships, and a growing body of locally grounded knowledge.
The next Country Director will build on this strong foundation to lead the chapter into its next phase of scale, ambition, and impact—strengthening what works, developing the next generation of leaders, and shaping the future of New Energy Nexus Philippines.
The Role
The Country Director is the senior leader of New Energy Nexus Philippines and is accountable for the vision, strategy, growth, sustainability, and overall health of the chapter.
This is a highly external, strategic, and entrepreneurial leadership role. The Country Director will position New Energy Nexus Philippines within a rapidly evolving clean energy ecosystem; build and steward the chapter's network of relationships with funders, partners, government, industry, and other ecosystem actors; and develop other leaders and experts across the team to represent the chapter and hold strategic relationships in their areas of expertise. The Country Director will ensure that insights from these relationships and from the chapter's work are translated into a clear and evolving chapter strategy.
The Country Director will lead a strong, self-directed team that has built substantial expertise and a deeply collaborative culture. The next leader will be expected to preserve what is strongest about that culture while challenging the organization to think bigger, move beyond established comfort zones, and build the capabilities and structures needed for scale.
The Country Director reports to the CEO of New Energy Nexus and works closely with leaders across the global New Energy Nexus network.
Core Accountabilities & Key Responsibilities
1. Create, Inspire, and Steward the Vision and Strategy for New Energy Nexus Philippines
The Country Director owns the long-term direction, strategic development, and programmatic success of New Energy Nexus Philippines. They are accountable for ensuring that the chapter's portfolio of programs, partnerships, and initiatives remains strategically aligned, delivers meaningful impact, and advances the organization's mission.
They will:
- Develop and continuously steward a compelling vision, Theory of Change, and strategy for New Energy Nexus Philippines.
- Continuously assess developments in the Philippine clean energy market, policy environment, donor landscape, and the broader regional and global energy transition, translating these into clear strategic priorities for the chapter.
- Identify where New Energy Nexus Philippines can create the greatest value and impact, making deliberate choices about where the chapter should—and should not—focus, while identifying opportunities to grow and strengthen work in areas such as distributed energy, rooftop solar, workforce development, climate technology, energy efficiency, energy access, and innovative or blended finance.
- Ensure that strategy remains an active leadership discipline rather than an annual planning exercise by continuously integrating market developments, ecosystem insights, and program learning into the chapter's direction and evolution.
- Inspire program leaders, staff, partners, and stakeholders around a shared vision for the chapter's future and foster strategic alignment across the organization in pursuit of that vision.
2. Lead Chapter Growth, Fundraising, and Strategic Partnerships
The Country Director is accountable for the growth and financial sustainability of New Energy Nexus Philippines.
They will:
- Develop and execute a diversified growth strategy by building and stewarding a pipeline of funding opportunities, strategic partnerships, and new initiatives aligned with the chapter's long-term vision.
- Build trusted relationships with foundations, development agencies, corporate partners, investors, high-net-worth individuals, and other strategic supporters, positioning New Energy Nexus Philippines as a partner of choice.
- Shape compelling funding concepts, partnership strategies, and organizational narratives that translate program learning, market insights, and strategic priorities into successful funding and collaboration opportunities.
- Evaluate and pursue strategic opportunities that strengthen the chapter's impact, sustainability, and long-term growth, while making deliberate choices about which partnerships and initiatives best advance the chapter's mission.
- Contribute Philippine market insights, partnership opportunities, and fundraising intelligence to strengthen regional and global collaboration across the New Energy Nexus network.
3. Lead the External Positioning and Relationship Network of New Energy Nexus Philippines
The Country Director is accountable for the external positioning, visibility, and strategic relationship network of New Energy Nexus Philippines.
They will:
- Build the visibility, credibility, and influence of New Energy Nexus Philippines and the broader New Energy Nexus network by establishing trusted key relationships with funders, government, industry, media, entrepreneurs, communities, and other ecosystem actors.
- Develop and steward the chapter's relationship architecture, ensuring that strategic relationships are intentionally cultivated, appropriately owned across the team, and institutional rather than dependent on any one individual.
- Represent New Energy Nexus Philippines as a speaker, convener, mentor, thought partner, and ambassador within the clean energy and entrepreneurship ecosystem, while actively developing program leaders and subject matter experts to become credible external representatives in their own right.
- Shape and communicate a compelling narrative about New Energy Nexus Philippines' work and the role of entrepreneurship in accelerating the clean energy transition, ensuring that the chapter's external voice remains grounded in the lived realities and experiences of entrepreneurs, installers, communities, and partners.
- Continuously expand the chapter's reach, influence, and strategic partnerships by identifying new networks, collaborations, and opportunities that advance its mission and long-term impact.
4. Maintain Strategic Insight into the Clean Energy Transition
The Country Director is accountable for ensuring that New Energy Nexus Philippines develops and maintains a sophisticated understanding of the clean energy transition and the market forces shaping it.
They will:
- Maintain a deep understanding of developments affecting clean energy entrepreneurship and adoption in the Philippines—including market, policy, regulatory, financing, workforce, technology, and industry trends—and interpret these within the broader Southeast Asian, Asian, and global context.
- Develop a clear point of view on the barriers, opportunities, and market dynamics shaping the Philippines' clean energy transition and the role entrepreneurs and other market actors can play in accelerating it.
- Continuously strengthen the chapter's collective sector knowledge by drawing on the expertise of program leaders, technical specialists, entrepreneurs, partners, and external experts, while identifying where additional capabilities or perspectives are needed.
- Apply this sector understanding to strengthen the chapter's strategy, partnerships, external positioning, and ability to identify emerging opportunities and respond to a rapidly evolving market.
- Position New Energy Nexus Philippines as a trusted and credible contributor to the country's clean energy transition through informed thought leadership, ecosystem engagement, and the quality of its work.
5. Turn Program Learning and Ecosystem Signals into Strategy
The Country Director is accountable for ensuring that New Energy Nexus Philippines is a learning organization whose strategy, programs, and external influence are continuously strengthened by evidence, experience, and evolving market realities.
They will:
- Stay closely connected to the learning generated through the chapter's programs, entrepreneurs, partners, and communities without becoming the day-to-day program manager, ensuring that meaningful insights are systematically captured and shared.
- Synthesize programmatic learning and ecosystem signals into clear strategic insights, challenging assumptions, refining the chapter's strategy, and identifying opportunities for new or scaled initiatives.
- Foster a culture of curiosity, experimentation, and continuous improvement, encouraging the team to test ideas, learn from experience, and adapt when evidence or changing market conditions warrant it.
- Translate the chapter's learning into compelling insights for funders, partners, communications, New Energy Nexus global teams, and the broader ecosystem, strengthening the organization's influence and thought leadership.
- Ensure that learning flows in both directions across the New Energy Nexus network by contributing insights from the Philippines while actively integrating relevant learning from other chapters into the Philippines' strategy and programs.
6. Build, Lead, and Develop a High-Performing Team
The Country Director is accountable for building and leading a high-performing organization with the leadership, capabilities, and culture required to achieve the chapter's long-term ambitions.
They will:
- Lead and inspire a collaborative, self-directed, high-performing culture rooted in learning, ambition, accountability, and care.
- Develop the chapter's leadership capacity by coaching team members, expanding their capabilities, and creating opportunities for professional growth and increasing responsibility, including as credible external representatives of New Energy Nexus Philippines.
- Build an organization for the future by evolving its structure, leadership, staffing, and capabilities to support the chapter's continued growth and strategic ambitions.
- Foster an inclusive environment that values diversity of backgrounds, perspectives, and expertise while preserving the trust, collaboration, and sense of purpose that define the chapter's culture.
- Empower leaders and teams with the clarity, support, and autonomy needed to deliver excellent programs, build strong partnerships, and continuously improve their work.
7. Ensure the Financial, Legal, and Organizational Health of the Chapter
The Country Director holds overall accountability for the financial sustainability, legal compliance, organizational health, and long-term resilience of New Energy Nexus Philippines.
Working closely with the Head of Operations & Organizational Growth (to be hired) and, where appropriate, New Energy Nexus global functions, they will:
- Own the chapter's overall financial performance and P&L, ensuring that growth is financially sustainable and aligned with available resources.
- Regularly review the chapter's financial position, funding pipeline, organizational capacity, and major financial, legal, operational, and reputational risks, making timely strategic decisions where needed.
- Ensure that appropriate financial, operational, legal, compliance, and risk management systems are in place and that donor commitments, organizational obligations, and reporting requirements are consistently met.
- Provide effective governance and oversight by ensuring that significant risks are appropriately managed, escalated, and communicated to New Energy Nexus leadership.
- Foster a culture of accountability, sound stewardship, and organizational integrity across the chapter.
The Country Director is accountable for these outcomes but is not expected to personally manage the chapter's day-to-day administrative and operational processes.
8. Collaborate Across the New Energy Nexus Network
The Country Director is a leader within New Energy Nexus as well as the leader of the Philippines chapter.
They will:
- Actively contribute to the leadership, collaboration, and knowledge-sharing mechanisms of the New Energy Nexus network.
- Serve as a bridge between the Philippines chapter and the wider network, bringing Philippine implementation realities into regional and global discussions while connecting the chapter to relevant network strategies, expertise, and opportunities.
- Share chapter learning, market insights, program evidence, and emerging opportunities to strengthen the collective impact of New Energy Nexus.
- Seek out relevant expertise, partnerships, and learning from other chapters and global teams, adapting successful ideas to the Philippine context where appropriate.
- Contribute constructively to cross-network initiatives, regional collaborations, and the continued evolution of New Energy Nexus as a global organization.
9. Ensure Strong Impact Measurement, Learning, and Reporting
The Country Director is accountable for ensuring that New Energy Nexus Philippines measures what matters, learns from its work, and communicates its impact with credibility.
They will:
- Ensure that appropriate impact measurement and management (IMM), monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEL) approaches are embedded across the chapter's work and aligned with its strategic objectives.
- Ensure that programs have clear objectives, measurable outcomes, and meaningful indicators of success, using performance and impact information to inform strategic and resource allocation decisions.
- Foster a culture of evidence-based decision-making, ensuring that impact and learning are actively used to strengthen programs, partnerships, and organizational strategy.
- Ensure high-quality internal and external reporting that communicates the chapter's results, impact, and learning with clarity and credibility to funders, partners, New Energy Nexus leadership, and other stakeholders.
- Ensure that reporting captures not only quantitative outcomes but also the broader market, ecosystem, and organizational learning generated through the chapter's work.
Requirements
What We Are Looking For
The successful candidate will bring:
- Strategic leadership with the ability to interpret complex market, ecosystem, policy, and organizational signals, make clear strategic choices, and inspire others around a compelling long-term direction.
- An entrepreneurial mindset and a demonstrated ability to identify opportunities, build new initiatives, challenge established approaches, and scale what works while maintaining sound judgment about organizational capacity and sustainability.
- The ability to build organizations through people. You develop leaders rather than becoming the sole expert or decision-maker, creating the conditions for capable teams to grow, collaborate, and thrive without unnecessary hierarchy or micromanagement.
- Exceptional relationship-building and partnership skills, with the credibility and emotional intelligence to build genuine trust across entrepreneurs, communities, industry, government, philanthropies, investors, and other ecosystem partners, and the confidence to engage sophisticated funders and senior decision-makers.
- Excellent communication and synthesis skills, with the ability to translate detailed market and programmatic learning into compelling strategic insights, persuasive narratives, and clear organizational direction.
- Curiosity, humility, and a learning orientation. You seek out diverse perspectives, continuously deepen your understanding of the sector, and adapt your thinking as markets and evidence evolve.
- Sufficient understanding of clean energy, climate, entrepreneurship, market development, policy, or a related field to operate credibly within the ecosystem. Deep technical expertise is not required, but you are motivated to develop a sophisticated understanding of the clean energy transition and its implications for entrepreneurs and markets.
- A strong appreciation of the Philippine context, with the cultural fluency to build authentic relationships across Manila, provincial and regional communities, and diverse stakeholder groups, together with a regional and global perspective that enables you to connect local opportunities to broader trends and developments.
Experience
We expect that strong candidates may come from different professional pathways. Relevant backgrounds could include clean energy or climate, entrepreneurship and innovation, market development, philanthropy or international development, finance, policy, business, or ecosystem-building organizations.
Candidates should have substantial leadership experience and a demonstrated track record of:
- Leading organizations, business units, major initiatives, or complex portfolios.
- Developing and executing strategy.
- Building external partnerships and senior stakeholder relationships.
- Growing programs, organizations, markets, or funding portfolios.
- Leading and developing high-performing teams.
- Communicating complex ideas clearly to diverse audiences.
Experience in the Philippine clean energy sector is highly valuable, but we are equally interested in candidates who bring exceptional strategic and entrepreneurial leadership and can rapidly build the necessary sector depth.
Benefits
Location
The role is based in the Philippines and requires regular engagement with partners, communities, and ecosystem actors across the country, as well as periodic regional and international travel.
TO APPLY, TIMELINE, AND PROCESS
All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply as soon as possible
- Submit your resume, cover letter and responses to our application questions.
- Click the “APPLY FOR THIS JOB” button to begin your application.
- Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis until filled.
New Energy Nexus is an equal employment opportunity employer and does not discriminate against applicants or employees because of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, age, citizenship status, disability status, genetic information, sexual orientation, or gender identity or expression of an otherwise qualified individual, or membership in any other class protected by applicable law. New Energy Nexus hires and promotes individuals on the basis of their qualifications for the job to be filled. We strongly encourage diverse applicants to apply.