Partnerships & Operations Officer

Partnerships & Operations Officer – Sama Digital Foundation

Every laptop we refurbish has to reach a real classroom, a real centre, a real learner. You make sure it does.

Full-time | Location: Remote with 40–50% field travel | Reports to: Program Manager / Head of Programs

Experience: 1 year preferred. Freshers with the right energy are warmly welcome.

About Sama

Sama Digital Foundation is a Section 8 nonprofit working to close India's digital divide. We collect end-of-life laptops from corporates and individuals, refurbish them, and deploy them through NGO, school and institutional partners to the women and youth who need them most. What would have been e-waste becomes a door to education, skills and livelihood.

To date, Sama has refurbished and distributed 16,500+ devices, reached 2,10,000+ women and girls, and supported 1,000+ jobs, working with 51 NGO partners across 21 states.

Alongside our core refurbishment work, we are scaling the Sama Saathi Programme (women-run digital centres at the heart of rural communities) and Build for Good (our national student hackathon). Sama is incubated by NavGurukul, and our goal is to reach one million underserved women and young people by 2030.

The Role

A laptop's journey doesn't end at the refurbishment table. It ends when a girl in a school lab or a woman at a Saathi centre opens it and starts learning. As Partnerships & Operations Officer, you own that last mile.

You will be the person our NGO and school partners know by name: setting up installations, following up until things close, solving problems on the ground, and capturing the stories and data that prove the work is changing lives. Those stories then become the evidence that brings in our next partner, our next CSR donor, our next batch of devices.

This is a field-first role. Expect to spend 40–50% of your time travelling to schools, centres and partner sites.

What You Will Do

Build and care for our partner network

• Build strong, trusting relationships with NGO and school partners who deploy Sama devices
• Run regular partner reviews and follow-ups so every commitment closes on time
• Conduct partner orientations on device usage, care, data collection and reporting, and provide ongoing operational support

Run field operations, end to end

• Coordinate school and centre installations, field activities and partner requirements
• Visit schools and partner sites regularly to spot gaps early and solve issues on the spot
• Work closely with Sama's refurbishment and logistics team so devices move smoothly from intake to deployment

Own the numbers

• Set weekly and monthly targets with your manager and track them honestly
• Maintain clean trackers (Excel / Google Sheets) for progress, pending activities and closures
• Flag delays early, with a proposed fix, not just a problem

Capture and share impact

• Collect data, testimonials, photos and success stories from the field
• Turn field evidence into concise reports and coordinate media and impact stories
• Help close the loop for donors, so every company that gives a laptop can see whose life it touched

Help grow the network

• Support outreach to new NGOs, CSR partners and vendors, using real impact evidence to make the case
• Help shape one-pagers and partner materials that show Sama at its best

What Success Looks Like (First 12 Months)

• Strong partnerships: partners who trust Sama, stay engaged, and respond to your follow-ups
• Timely execution: installations and field activities completed on schedule, with clean closures in the tracker
• Better field follow-up: gaps spotted and solved on the ground before they become escalations
• Measurable impact: a steady flow of data, testimonials and stories from every partner site
• Increased programme reach: new NGOs, schools and CSR partners onboarded, backed by the evidence you gathered

Who You Are

• 1 year of experience in operations, partnerships, field coordination or programme work is preferred; freshers are welcome
• A natural people person: you build relationships easily and keep them warm
• Relentless about follow-up: you don't let things fall through the cracks
• Comfortable with Excel / Google Sheets and keeping trackers honest and up to date
• Happy on the road: willing to travel 40–50% of the time to schools and partner sites
• Self-driven, organised and solution-oriented: you show up with fixes, not just updates
• Genuinely interested in the social impact / NGO sector
• Fluent in English and Hindi; the local language of your field region is a strong plus

Bonus points

• Prior field experience with NGOs, schools or community programmes
• Exposure to education, digital inclusion, women's empowerment or e-waste / sustainability work
• A good eye for a story, and comfort taking photos and short videos in the field
• You've sat a Vipassana course: we value the equanimity, patience and inner steadiness the practice builds, and it's part of Sama's own DNA

Why This Role

• See the impact with your own eyes. You'll be in the room when a laptop that was headed for a landfill becomes a learner's first device.
• Learn the whole engine. Partnerships, field ops, logistics, impact data and fundraising evidence: you'll touch every part of how a nonprofit scales.
• Real ownership, early. Your trackers, your partners, your stories. What you build here directly shapes where Sama goes next.
• Grow with us. As Sama expands state by state, so does the scope of this role.

If you enjoy working with people, travelling to the field and turning ideas into measurable impact, we'd love to hear from you. : )