Associate Director - Employer & Industry Development (Engineering) at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, TN

Job description

Position Summary: The Associate Director for Employer & Industry Development for Engineering & Technology is a senior business development and relationship-management professional responsible for significantly expanding Vanderbilt University's corporate relationships across engineering, technology, computing, data science, manufacturing, aerospace, artificial intelligence, and other technical industries. Working in partnership with Career Advancement & Engagement and the School of Engineering, the Associate Director will develop and steward a portfolio of strategic employer relationships that create meaningful opportunities for Vanderbilt students while strengthening Vanderbilt's visibility and reputation among leading technical organizations. The position will take an entrepreneurial, market-facing approach to employer development. Rather than focusing primarily on recruiting logistics, the Associate Director will identify organizations that align with Vanderbilt's academic strengths and student interests, develop relationships with decision-makers, understand companies' talent and innovation needs, and create multiple points of engagement between those organizations and Vanderbilt. A central priority will be expanding experiential learning opportunities. The Associate Director will work directly with companies to develop internships, employer-sponsored projects, technical challenges, site visits, mentoring, job-shadowing, co-op and other work-based learning models, while simultaneously expanding internship and full-time recruiting pipelines. The Associate Director will help transform individual employer contacts into broad institutional relationships connecting companies with Vanderbilt students, faculty, alumni, academic programs, and the broader Vanderbilt career ecosystem. Key Functions and Expected Performance: Strategic Employer & Business Development Develop and execute an aggressive employer-development strategy across priority engineering and technology industries. Identify, cultivate, and steward relationships with leading companies, emerging firms, startups, and other organizations employing engineering and technical talent. Build relationships with senior executives, engineering and technology leaders, talent leaders, recruiters, Vanderbilt alumni, and other organizational decision-makers. Expand Vanderbilt's employer portfolio beyond traditional campus recruiters and establish relationships with organizations that have not historically recruited Vanderbilt students. Develop an active prospect pipeline and systematically move organizations from initial contact to sustained institutional partnership. Represent Vanderbilt externally at employer meetings, industry events, professional associations, conferences, and other venues. Experiential Learning Development Work directly with companies to create meaningful experiential-learning opportunities for Vanderbilt students. Develop internships, employer-sponsored projects, technical challenges, hackathons, job-shadowing opportunities, company visits, mentorship programs, co-op models, and other innovative forms of work-based learning. Identify opportunities for companies to engage students earlier in their Vanderbilt experience, allowing students to explore industries and build professional capabilities before traditional internship recruiting begins. Collaborate with School of Engineering faculty and Career Advancement & Engagement colleagues to ensure employer-sponsored experiences align with student interests, academic strengths, and professional-development needs. Develop scalable models that allow employer relationships to create opportunities for multiple students and academic programs rather than relying solely on individual placements. Recruiting & Talent Pipeline Development Significantly increase the number and quality of engineering and technology internship and full-time opportunities available to Vanderbilt students. Develop recruiting relationships with or