Overview
Right now, it’s almost impossible to vote informed on the entire ballot - as a result, most voters guess, leave blanks, or stay home altogether. 

We believe that it’s critical to our democracy to help every voter cast an informed vote on every race, every election. That’s why we started BallotReady - a startup that creates digital nonpartisan voter guides and builds tools to help advocacy groups and campaigns inform and mobilize voters, powered by the most comprehensive database to local politics. 

Founded in 2015 with funding from the National Science Foundation, the Knight Foundation, and the University of Chicago, BallotReady is an award-winning Chicago startup now available nationwide. In 2018, we were shared widely, including by xkcd, usa.gov, USA Today, CNN, ProPublica, and Snapchat, as well as Alicia Keys, Arne Duncan, Ilana Glazer, Joan Jett, and John Green. In total, we covered 94,000 candidates on our platform and reached over 6 million voters in the midterm elections. Now we’re scaling for 2019, 2020, and beyond.

Role
With the 2020 election just 400+ days away, we are looking to grow our tech team to enhance and scale up our products and that educate and engage with voters - and we know that the 2020 election will see historic turnout. We will be ready.

We are currently a highly effective, 4-person tech team (Ludo, Isabel, Tom & Mike) looking to add two new members to complement our skills - one focused on DevOps and one focused on program management. 

We value curiosity and transparency. We spend a lot of time in Slack but have strong opinions about unnecessary meetings. Our HQ is in the Chicago Loop but we also work from our Evanston location and may at times work remote. We work hard but appreciate flexibility.

We use React, Javascript, Python, SQL, and a lot of AWS products.

Who We’re Looking For
Mission: Teammates must bring a deep commitment to our mission. They understand why this work matters - why every click researching a candidate is essential to ensuring that voters have the correct information they need to participate in our democracy or why late nights around Election Day are critical for voter support. 

Leadership: BallotReady is a startup, meaning that every single person contributes to our success, roles often change or evolve, and team members are frequently given new projects and asked to figure out how to make them happen. We’re looking for teammates who are ambitious problem-solvers, who love to tackle challenges and run short tests to inform next steps, and who are excited by the ambiguities and possibilities in this role. Ideal candidates are interested in stepping up to identify opportunities and drive collaborative solutions that will have a lasting impact.

Accountability: At BallotReady, we’re strong believers in flexibility in exchange for accountability. We trust our team to understand our goals and allocate their time accordingly - this requires strong communication, organization, and self-reflection in order to manage multiple deadlines without a lot of oversight. 

Growth: This comes with enormous opportunities to spearhead major projects and acquire new skills. We’re seeking individuals with a strong interest in learning and growing together.

Undergraduate degree in Computer Science strongle preferred.