Career opportunities at Catalyst

Catalyst is an international creative production and performance learning community based at the extraordinary Funkhaus. Our courses span electronic music production and performance, music production and sound engineering, film production, tech arts & visual effects, and acting and follow a progressive educational approach. We provide students with a safe space to dream big, grow their own greatness and build a life they love.
Our international team of professionals work under a progressive work model called Holacracy - a decentralised management system where decision-making is distributed throughout different circles that hold clear and driven purposes and all feed back to our core values. Working with purpose means that our roles and accountabilities adapt to always align with our purposes and this provides for a flexible and dynamic work and collaboration amongst our team members.
What can you expect from us:
- Opportunity to learn and exchange experiences with a vibrant creative community
- Dynamic and fast changing work environment
- Encouragement to express yourself and take initiative in shaping your role
- Freedom to express yourself within your specific academic focus
- Possibilities to develop yourself as teacher as well as a music professional
Current open positions at Catalyst
See the open positions and consider joining the Catalyst community.
You will lead our Storytelling circle and will have the mission to increase our yearly student intake and enhance our digital presence. Working within our distributed management structure you will have the flexibility to evolve workflows, prioritize your projects, and run campaigns to meet your circle’s objectives. In this role you will achieve an increased awareness of our brand both locally and globally, and work closely with our admissions team and collaboratively with our students, tutors, alumni and industry partners. At Catalyst, you will lead cost effective and targeted marketing campaigns to attract and retain new audiences, and ultimately contribute to the growth of our educational products and the impact our students have on the world.
Key Accountabilities
- Plan and oversee allocation of budgets across all circle activities.
- Identify current and potential marketing opportunities with input from our educational programme leads.
- Work closely with Admissions to monitor conversion performance and the effectiveness of campaigns and workflows.
- Design and promote virtual and IRL touchpoints with prospective students (ie recruitment-focused events such as Virtual Open Days).
- Continue to develop and implement the Catalyst brand identity and story.
- Develop targeted and audience-centric marketing strategies and materials for all marketing channels (ad campaigns, content strategy, newsletters, brochures), specifically around key milestones and events.
- Manage our paid advertising strategy, regularly review ad performance and optimize ad copy.
- Work with our digital specialist, developing the content and editorial strategy to meet KPIs, in line with the characteristics and USP’s of each learning programme.
- Promote our diversity authentically in events and marketing practice.
- Provide support for bespoke projects in collaboration with students, tutors or industry partners.
- Analyse and benchmark competitors.
- Drive all PR activities by supporting journalists and maintaining contact lists for media and press coverage.
- Oversee the maintenance and development of Catalyst’s digital assets (ie website, social media channels) - making sure everything is “on-brand” and in line with our objectives.
About You
You may have some or all of these characteristics / skills
- Leadership Know-how.
- Operationally very active - taking projects from ideation to execution.
- Well developed strategic and conceptual muscles.
- Data-driven decision making: ability to balance analysis with gut feeling.
- Understanding of all stages of the marketing funnel.
- Structured workflows focused on the customer journey.
- Skills in product, direct, and digital marketing.
- A passion for sound and visual art and their associated industries.
As part of the interview process you may expect a short introductory phone call, an hour long interview with three of our colleagues, as well as a brief task or trial day.
Next Steps
Please send us your most recent CV and cover letter, and email both to your_mission@catalyst-berlin.com with the subject “Digital Marketing Lead”. Include in your application, a short letter describing one of your most successful marketing campaigns or a project in the digital space, and how your skills and learnings could apply to this role at Catalyst. Don’t forget to give us the rationale behind your choice in strategy!
We look forward to reading your application and getting to know you!
We’re looking for an enthusiastic and experienced academic to run our brand new Music and Sound Design for Visual Media B.A programme. As the course/programme lead you will be tasked with designing, developing and running a cutting edge B.A (Hons) programme according to your own practical experience in the industry, whilst aligning with our teaching and learning philosophy. You will have the support of multiple roles within the organisation, both to ensure cohesion between all of our courses and to get inspiration from what we’ve done before - but your hands will be free to develop the course that you feel will excite, motivate, and create the best possible space to learn in.
Below you’ll find a list of responsibilities that the programme lead role carries, along with more details. This position is part-time and can be structured around other professional work. The actual hours offered will depend on the subject areas that you can teach and the amount of teaching that is available. We encourage applications from adaptable and flexible individuals who are looking for new opportunities to grow!
Purpose
Designing and upholding the vision and direction of the programme through thorough planning, development and refinement processes.
Key Accountabilities
A - Management / Development
- Setting out objectives, vision and strategy.
- Designing programme content, course structure, schedules, outlines, and delivery methods.
- Managing, and providing educational support and planning for tutors.
- Helping to design appropriate spaces and equipment.
- Supporting the marketing team with your subject specialism.
- Communicating with potential students about the course.
- Advertising for, interviewing, hiring and onboarding new tutors.
- Developing projects and module handbooks with tutors in line with module descriptors.
- Running weekly team meetings.
B - Teaching
- Creating and sustaining a positive and challenging learning environment.
- Preparing and delivering workshops, including, but not limited to -
- >> developing scheme of work and workshop overviews.
- >> developing workshop content.
- >> weekly delivery of workshop sessions.
- >> managing and publishing workshop resources.
- Providing and encouraging formative and summative feedback in a healthy environment.
- Assessing/grading student submissions and resits in line with education policy.
About You
You may have many or all of these qualities/experiences:-
- Strong pedagogical background, with a relevant B.A/M.A.
- Relevant industry experience with a strong creative portfolio.
- Strong communicator, with high level of written and spoken English.
- An interest in progressive education methodologies (PBL a bonus).
- Efficiency in designing and carrying out administration processes.
- Ability to critique and guide the teaching and assessment of others.
- Experience in conceiving, developing and enacting planning strategies.
- Achieving great results with ideas rather than large budgets.
- Happy to get your hands dirty and be a team player
You should be able to demonstrate that you are exceptionally capable with evidence of earlier real-world roles/ projects to prove your abilities.
We will be testing your capabilities and role fit as part of our interview process.
Next Steps
Please send us your most recent CV and cover letter, and email both to your_mission@catalyst-berlin.com with the subject “Music and Sound - PL”. Additionally, please describe to us in 500 words your perspective on education and how you feel it could develop in the future.
We look forward to reading your application and getting to know you!
We’re looking for an enthusiastic and experienced professional to refine and run our Visual Effects, Digital Arts and Animation B.A programme. As the programme lead you will be tasked with refining, developing and running a cutting edge B.A (Hons) programme according to your own practical experience in the industry, whilst aligning with our teaching and learning philosophy. You will have the support of multiple roles within the organisation, both to ensure cohesion between all of our courses and to get inspiration from what we’ve done before - but your hands will be free to develop the course that you feel will excite, motivate, and create the best possible space to learn in.
Below you’ll find a list of responsibilities that the programme lead role carries, along with more details. This position is part-time and can be structured around other professional work. The actual hours offered will depend on the subject areas that you can teach and the amount of teaching that is available. We encourage applications from adaptable and flexible individuals who are looking for new opportunities to grow!
Purpose
Upholding the vision and direction of the programme through thorough planning, development and refinement processes.
Key Accountabilities
A - Management
- Setting out objectives, vision and strategy.
- Designing programme content, course structure, schedules, outlines, and delivery methods.
- Managing, and providing educational support and planning for tutors.
- Helping to design appropriate spaces and equipment.
- Supporting the marketing team with your subject specialism.
- Communicating with potential students about the course.
- Advertising for, interviewing, hiring and onboarding new tutors.
- Developing projects and module handbooks with tutors in line with module descriptors.
- Running weekly team meetings.
B - Teaching
- Creating and sustaining a positive and challenging learning environment.
- Preparing and delivering workshops, including, but not limited to -
- >> developing scheme of work and workshop overviews.
- >> developing workshop content.
- >> weekly delivery of workshop sessions.
- >> managing and publishing workshop resources.
- Providing and encouraging formative and summative feedback in a healthy environment.
- Assessing/grading student submissions and resits in line with education policy.
About You
You may have many or all of these qualities/experiences:-
- Strong pedagogical background, with a relevant B.A/M.A.
- Relevant industry experience with a strong creative portfolio.
- Strong communicator, with high level of written and spoken English.
- An interest in progressive education methodologies (PBL a bonus).
- Efficiency in designing and carrying out administration processes.
- Ability to critique and guide the teaching and assessment of others.
- Experience in conceiving, developing and enacting planning strategies.
- Achieving great results with ideas rather than large budgets.
- Happy to get your hands dirty and be a team player
You should be able to demonstrate that you are exceptionally capable with evidence of earlier real-world roles/ projects to prove your abilities.
We will be testing your capabilities and role fit as part of our interview process.
Next Steps
Instead of sending a traditional cover letter, please describe to us in 500 words your perspective on education and how you feel it could develop in the future. Please send that text in the body of your email with your most recent CV attached as a PDF. Email this to your_mission@catalyst-berlin.com with the subject “Visual Effects PL”.
We look forward to reading your application and getting to know you!
Role: This position is full-time
You will work cross functionally with our admissions, student administration, and finance roles. Within our self management structure this gives you flexibility to evolve workflows and prioritize your own work. This is a client facing role and you will be their primary contact for all financial questions. If you love speaking with customers, are comfortable with accounting practices and payment systems, and you enjoy bringing warmth to your interactions, then we would love to hear from you.
Key accountabilities
- Serving as the first point of contact for students with payment related questions.
- Monitoring a portfolio of approximately 450 accounts receivables.
- Reconciling invoices.
- Administration and annual review of payment platforms, automations, and workflows.
- Working with students to resolve billing issues, refunds, payment plans, and contracts.
- Planning payment schedules in line with academic and financial calendar targets.
- Updating policies to ensure they are fit for purpose, fair, and accessible internally and externally.
- Reporting annual and monthly revenue forecasts.
- Analyzing revenue and striving for cost effectiveness across payment services.
About you
You may have many, or all of these qualities/experiences:-
- You love speaking with clients and customers
- You are seeking a workplace which gives you space to define your roles, think critically, and engage in active problem solving.
- You are experienced with payment processing (eg. Chargebee, Gocardless)
- Accounting systems are familiar to you (eg. Xero)
- You’ve worked in accounting or a similar role in the past
- You have strong written and verbal command of the English language
As part of the interview process you may expect a short introductory phone call, an hour long interview with three of our colleagues, as well as a brief task or trial day.
What can you expect from us
- A dynamic and fast changing work environment in a vibrant creative community.
- Encouragement to express yourself and take initiative in shaping your role.
- A supportive and friendly work environment where you can be yourself.
- Possibilities to develop yourself.
- A focus on onsite work with options for offsite.
- Exciting team benefits (BVG transit card, pilates, fresh snacks, access to facilities and courses)
Next steps
Please send us your most recent CV and cover letter, and email both to your_mission@catalyst-berlin.com with the subject “Accounts Receivables Specialist”. Include in your letter a short paragraph putting yourself in the shoes of one of our students and describe to us briefly how you wish to be supported by your school’s payments team.
We look forward to reading your app and getting to know you!
Role: This position is part-time freelance
We’re looking for an enthusiastic and experienced professional, freelance artist, specialising in movement for our teaching team in the Screen Acting programme. We are primarily interested in applicants with artistic or industry expertise and academic experience in the following areas, but open to receiving applications with other expertise:
Movement for Actors
Screen Choreography
Dance
Fight Choreography
Intimacy Coordination
Physical Theatre
Acting Technique
Below you’ll find a list of responsibilities that a teaching position carries, along with more details. This position could be anything from a few hours to a few days a week, depending on the skills you have to offer and the amount of teaching that is available. We encourage applications from adaptable and flexible individuals who are looking for new opportunities to grow!
Key accountabilities
- Writing and developing module handbooks and schemes of work.
- Attending weekly team meetings.
- Setting assessments in line with learning outcomes.
- Writing and developing module content.
- Preparing exciting content for lessons (Including lesson handouts).
- Delivering classes, workshops, lectures, seminars and tutorials.
- Monitoring student progress.
- Assessing and grading student submissions.
- Providing feedback to programme lead.
- Carrying out second marking.
- Completing module reports.
- Attending programme meetings.
- Providing academic support for students.
About you
You may have many, or all of these qualities/experiences:-
- Fluent in English, both spoken and written (other languages are a bonus).
- An open mind and supportive approach to teaching.
- Strong motivational skills to draw students into study.
- Bachelor's degree or equivalent industry and teaching experience.
- Interested in helping to build a growing creative community.
- Artistic or industry experience.
- An interest in progressive film/acting education methodologies (PBL a bonus).
- Highly developed real-world teaching practice at Higher Education level.
- Ability to critique and guide the teaching and assessment of others.
- Achieving great results with ideas rather than large budgets.
- A team player.
- Ability to work onsite from Funkhaus.
- Permission to work in Germany.
You should be able to demonstrate that you are exceptionally capable with evidence of previous real-world roles/ projects to prove your abilities with a deep knowledge and practical understanding of working in a higher education environment.
We will be testing your capabilities and role fit as part of our interview process.
Next steps
Please send us your most recent CV and cover letter, and email both to your_mission@catalyst-berlin.com with the subject “Screen Acting Tutor”. Include in your letter a short paragraph about your perspective on education and how you feel it could develop in the future.
Closing date: Dec 5th, 2022
Interviews starting: Dec 7th, 2022
Role: This position is part-time
We are looking for an enthusiastic team member who will support our people team in all administrative aspects of employment from the moment of recruitment, to onboarding, and all the way to off-boarding. You will be critical in not only building a resilient and diverse team, but in maintaining and developing all of our systems and processes that support a strong team in delivering on our promise of a transformational learning experience to our students.
Key accountabilities
- Being the first point of contact for all queries regarding the employment relationship.
- Creating and maintaining accessible information for all team members relevant to their employment or freelance relationship with us.
- Ownership and coordination of the processes and policies which impact recruitment and off-boarding for all employees and freelancers; including the issuing and revision of contracts, and maintenance of accurate employment records.
- Working closely with internal stakeholders such as our finance & legal team, and external stakeholders such as payroll.
- Supporting our team members with sabbaticals, maternity/paternity leave, holidays, sick leaves, and other team benefits.
- Coordinating and continuously improving the recruitment and on-boarding/off-boarding experience.
- Continuous development of any processes associated with our team.
About you
You may have many, or all of these qualities/experiences:
- You care about people and their experience.
- You’ve been told you're an excellent communicator.
- You have a background in HR, business administration or similar
- You have experience working with German employment law.
- You are comfortable sharing your ideas, making proposals, and moving new projects forward
- You are highly organised and enjoy the challenge of detailed work with high impact.
- You're conversationally multilingual with native-level fluency in English, (our students come from over 80 different countries!) and you speak German.
- You have permission to work in Germany.
Next steps
Please send us your most recent CV and cover letter, and email both to your_mission@catalyst-berlin.com with the subject “People Operations”. Include in your letter a short paragraph putting yourself in the shoes of one of our employees and describe to us briefly how you wish to be supported by your people team.
As part of the interview process you may expect a short introductory phone call, an hour long interview with three of our colleagues, as well as a brief task or trial day.
Closing date: Feb 6, 2023
Interviews starting: Feb 6, 2023