Detailed Job Listing:
JOB FAMILY: MANAGERIAL AND PROFESSIONAL
STARS Requisition: 79465BR
University Job Title: Major Gifts Officer, Professional School
Department Job Title: Major Gifts Officer
Grade: P5
Position Focus:
As a member of the Development team, the Major Gifts Officer is responsible for soliciting prospective donors to a professional school for gifts to priority areas, as defined by the Dean, and plays a central role collaborating with school leadership, faculty, Development senior leadership, campaign volunteers, and colleagues throughout the school.
Essential Duties:
- Identifies, cultivates, and solicits alumni/alumnae and new potential donors who have capacity to make gifts to the school. Manages a portfolio of prospects, developing and implementing solicitation strategies for all assigned prospects, including identification of appropriate solicitation timetable, ask amount, method of approach, and programmatic purpose of ask. Ensures that all proposals submitted are on time and of high quality.
- Initiates and maintains contact with current, past, and prospective donors, promoting positive donor relations. Engages volunteers proactively as needed. Determines and executes events and programs in support of development activities, assessing the success of such events/programs and recommending changes. Identifies disaffected or disinterested donors and devises strategies to encourage/redirect their interests as appropriate.
- Interacts with internal contacts such as deans, directors, faculty, officers, and other development staff to consult on school needs, cultivation, solicitation and stewardship strategies, and potential donors.
- Performs other duties as assigned.
Required Education & Experience:
Bachelor’s Degree in a related field and five years of experience or an equivalent combination of education and related experience.
Required Skills & Abilities:
- Demonstrated ability in personally and consistently closing five and six-figure or larger philanthropic gifts from donors. Uses industry standard best practices and a donor-centric approach in managing a donor portfolio of individuals. Determines donor philanthropic interests related to specific fundraising goals.
- Ability and willingness to travel throughout the year, including multi-day trips.
- Excellent written and oral communication skills. Demonstrated ability synthesizing and prioritizing information from a wide array of sources while maintaining an attention to detail.
- Proven ability building and maintaining long-term donor relationships. Leverages relationships to implement strategic solicitation of donors for gifts of their full philanthropic capacity.
- Demonstrates initiative, drive, and a resourceful and data-driven work ethic. Creative, innovative, flexible, with excellent organizational and analytical skills. The ability to work independently while being a proactive, productive team contributor with a positive attitude.
- Demonstrable commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI).
Preferred:
Six to eight years of fundraising experience. Experience fundraising in higher education and moves management systems. Global orientation; experience working across countries and regions, and fluency in more than one language.
Competencies:
- Customer Service Focus – Listening carefully to and understanding customers’ needs and proactively responding to those needs in a consistent and timely manner.
- Teamwork/Communication – Working cooperatively to achieve common goals. Support cooperation, collaboration and the sharing of information.
- Product Excellence – Provide the best quality product available and continuously upgrade standards to maintain quality.
- Leadership – Provide direction and motivation to others through communication, modeling appropriate behavior, optimism and high achievement
- Innovative – Openness to new ideas and their implementation. Ability to react and adapt to changing situations appropriately.
- Strategic Thinking – Recognize opportunities, identify critical, high pay-off activities and prioritize them to attain goals.