Palante is hiring a new tech worker!

Palante Technology Cooperative is seeking a new technical support person to join us in our work with incredible nonprofit and community organizations. The new worker will join our tech support team, providing remote and on-site assistance to our clients in New York City.

Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis until the position has been filled, with the target start date of April to June 2024.

Who we are

Palante Tech is a worker cooperative that provides tech services to progressive nonprofit, social justice, activist and community organizations. Over the years, in our individual and collective work, we've developed a deep understanding of nonprofit tech needs and the expertise required to meet them. Each of us has also been long involved with activism and organizing in non-technological capacities. This breadth of experience allows us to provide services that are tailored to meet the specific needs of nonprofit community organizations.

Palante is currently composed of six worker-owners living around the US. You can find out more about each of us on our website at https://palantetech.coop/about.

Wages and Benefits

All Palante workers are paid at the same hourly rate of $40.00, plus patronage if they become worker-owners after 9-to-12 months of successful onboarding. We typically consider 30 hours/week to be full time. Professional development and community involvement of various sorts are also paid; we encourage workers to seek out opportunities! We offer 11 paid holidays per year, with paid vacation and health time accruing per hour worked. We offer health, dental, vision, and disability insurance to all workers, as well as an FSA, paid parental and family leave, and paid bereavement time. Workers are eligible for a paid sabbatical after 8 years of working at the coop. We have a strong commitment to collective accountability, treating each other well, and ensuring that each worker is able to lead a healthy, fulfilling, and balanced life. You can read more about our cooperative values at https://palantetech.coop/our-values.

Our Worker Cooperative

As a member of our worker cooperative you will participate in the day-to-day business of Palante Tech: prospecting for new work, managing projects and clients, helping with billing and bookkeeping, and making business decisions via consensus at our weekly meetings. We have many areas of work and we encourage all workers to learn about them all and branch out into other areas. All Palante Tech workers are candidates for worker ownership of the cooperative; one of the benefits of ownership is patronage, or a share in the company profits based on a worker's percentage of the total hours worked. You can read this piece from 2016 for more information on what it's like to work at our coop.

Who we’re looking for

We're looking for someone who is able to serve clients in the greater NYC area–specifically lower Manhattan and downtown Brooklyn–hybrid 85% remote with occasional site visits, has a well-rounded set of technical skills, and is good at learning new skills. We prefer that you have experience with working remotely and independently; you should be comfortable with a high amount of communication via phone, video, email, chat, and an online project management system. Ideal candidates will share our commitment to working with progressive and social justice nonprofits & community organizations.

The ideal person will be able to demonstrate the following qualities and skills:

• Ability to work remotely with minimal supervision in an organization with collective decision making processes 

• Talent for explaining technical concepts to a non-technical audience

• Outstanding customer service and people skills in person, over the phone, and via email

• Comfort solving a wide range of software, networking and hardware issues that might be found in small (5-20 person) offices 

• The ability to work well under pressure when the situation requires it

• Ability to do root cause analysis

• Ability to create/update thorough and accessible documentation 

• Commitment to worker-cooperatives and alignment with our values

Also most or all of these technical skills: 

• Installing, configuring and troubleshooting a wide range of Windows operating systems and software (Windows 10/11, Microsoft Office, web browsers, etc.)

• Comfortable with basic networking concepts and installing / troubleshooting / maintaining networking hardware

• Configuring and troubleshooting email-related issues across a number of platforms/clients (SMTP, IMAP, Thunderbird, Outlook, smartphone clients)

• Comfortable writing and editing basic scripts to automate simple tasks

• Installing, configuring, and troubleshooting servers, particularly Windows Server and Debian/Ubuntu Linux

• Experience with Google Workspace and Microsoft tenancy administration

• Familiarity with the open source software ecosystem

• Familiarity with the Linux command line

• The ability to write clear technical documentation for internal use

Other pluses: 

• Experience with leveraging automation (Puppet, wpkg, chef, powershell, and similar)

• Experience with MySQL, PHP, bash scripting, Postfix, Apache

• Experience with directory services including Samba, MS Azure AD, and/or Jumpcloud 

• Experience with PGP encryption

• Knowledge or experience with horizontal or collective decision making process and/or organizations

Furthermore, this job has the following requirements:

• Fluency in English

• Ability to climb stairs, lift and carry computer and small server-sized objects

• Ability to read text from a screen for extended periods of time

• Ability to travel to client offices in Manhattan and Brooklyn to fix issues that come up (travel time and personal protective equipment is covered by the cooperative)
   

Responsibilities for the role & work plan: 

First month:

• Onboarding. Train up and learn Palante's internal and client-facing systems and processes including Bitwarden, Gusto, HappyFox, Redmine, Harvest, May First, and RingCentral. This also includes onboarding to consensus-based decision-making.

• Become familiar with Help Desk processes including but not limited to on-call procedure and ticket workflows. 

• Staff our tech help desk as a tier-1 agent, providing entry-level, ticket-based tech support to our tech clients. Training will be provided for this part of the role.

• Start monthly buddy/steward check-ins and complete 1st/3rd month Worker-to-Owner Transition check-ins. 

First 3 months:

• Conduct site visits a few times a month to provide on-site support such as networking device setup, hardware installation, and hardware maintenance. 

• Staff our tech help desk as a tier-2 agent, providing independent tier-1 and tier-2 remote and onsite support using our knowledge base in addition to your own expertise and Palante-provided training 

• Participate in coop processes including our weekly meetings and/or different teams as interest and experience align.

3-6 months: 

• Staff our tech help desk as a tier-3 agent, providing all levels of support both remote and on-site (as needed) using our knowledge base in addition to your own expertise and Palante-provided training.

• Facilitate staff meetings on a rotating basis, if desired. Resources can be provided for this part of the role.  

6+ months: 

• Assist in prospecting and onboarding of new tech support clients.

• Prepare for worker-owner transition. Worker-ownership happens somewhere between 9 and 12 months.

How to Apply

Please email us at jobs@palantetech.coop with the following:

• A cover letter including:

  • Why you're interested in joining a worker cooperative

  • Your relevant skills and experience for the job

• Your resume

People of color, women, queer, and trans folks are strongly encouraged to apply.