Video Storyteller and Donor Communications Officer
HOW TO APPLY
Send us your CV and short note about who you are and why this appeals to you. Then show us your work: two or three pieces, and at least one of them should be video you made yourself. Phone footage is fine. We care about the story, not the gear. Send it to [email protected]
WHO WE ARE
Palmera works with women-headed households in rural Sri Lanka. We match families with sponsors, mostly in Australia, and run community programs that help those families earn a steady living. We have been doing this for a long time and we are still small, which we like. Most of our team are volunteers.
The thing that makes Palmera work is that our donors stay close to the families they support. They see the daughter start school. They see the shop open. They see the hard months too. Almost all of that happens through video, sent on WhatsApp, and that is where you come in.
THE JOB
We need someone to tell those stories. Full-time, based in Colombo, sitting inside our small donor communications team.
Our field team sends us raw stories and footage from the villages where we work. It is honest material, straight from the families themselves, but it needs shaping. Your job is to turn it into stories that engage and inspire our donors, and that show them clearly what their support has changed.
That means short videos and updates a donor will actually stop and watch, engage with, and then send on to a friend. Sometimes that means a 60-second clip for WhatsApp. Sometimes it means a longer piece for the website or a year-end film. Sometimes it means going out to the village yourself with a camera and coming back with something better.
You will also be talking to donors directly. Replying to their messages, sending them a personal update when something happens with their family, thanking them properly when they give. Our bigger donors get a very personal touch, and you will work alongside our director on those relationships.
WHAT YOU WOULD ACTUALLY BE DOING
Most weeks look something like this. You review what has come in from the field and decide which stories are worth telling and how. You shoot or edit video, cut it for WhatsApp, write the caption, and get it checked by the family and by our team before it goes out. You put together the monthly newsletter and keep the website and social channels alive. You answer donor messages and log the conversations. You go back to the field team and tell them what worked so the next batch of footage is better than the last.
Over time you will help shape how Palmera sounds and looks on screen. We have a voice already, warm, plain, never corporate, but we have never had one person owning it full-time.
WHO YOU ARE
You love telling stories. Not as a job description line, but as the thing you would be doing anyway. You notice the small detail that makes a story land and you know when to let a moment breathe and when to cut.
You think in video first. You are comfortable filming on a phone, you can edit confidently in tools like Canva, Kapwing, CapCut or Premiere, and you know what makes a vertical clip work on a small screen. Writing matters too, for captions, newsletters and the odd longer case study, and your English needs to be clear and warm.
Language is important here. Our families speak Tamil and Sinhala, our donors mostly speak English. We would love someone who moves comfortably across all three. If you have strong English and one of the other two, please still apply.
You are good with people. Donors are trusting us with something personal and you treat every message as a relationship, not a task. You are organised enough to run a communications calendar without being reminded, and you are honest. You never make a story better than the truth.
If you have worked in community development, with a charity, or have your own roots in rural Sri Lanka, that will help you enormously. It is not required.
THE PRACTICAL BITS
This is a full-time role based in Colombo. There will be travel to the field across the country. Salary range to be discussed based on experience.