Director of Institutional Giving

Washington, DC, United States

About the Role:

Merit America empowers low-wage workers to build family-sustaining careers through innovative training programs and supportive coaching. As the Director of Institutional Giving, you'll play a pivotal leadership role in fueling this mission by stewarding and securing transformative gifts from foundations and corporate partners.

The Director of Institutional Giving will actively work with Merit America co-CEOs, the executive team, and the Vice President of Development to expertly manage and thoughtfully cultivate relationships with new and existing funding partners and ensure their support for the organization's mission.

A successful candidate will:

Thoughtfully and strategically own relationships and manage a robust portfolio of existing partners with annual grant sizes between $50,000 and $1M+ (with most of the grants at $250K+).

Develop and present strong, compelling cases for support to attract new six-, seven-, and eight-figure corporate and foundation funding partners to our mission and impact.

Manage, coach, and develop two full-time staff members.

The Director of Institutional Giving is an exempt role and will report directly to the Vice President of Development and work primarily with Merit America’s co-CEOs and the Development Team, which is part of the broader Growth Team.

What You’ll be Doing:

Alongside the VP of Development, the Director of Institutional Giving will create and implement a comprehensive fundraising strategy focused on foundation and corporate funding partners. This leader will manage all relationships and opportunities with foundations and corporations that support Merit America or are likely to do so in the future. The 2024 fundraising target for this role is ~$4M ($500k of which has already been secured) in funding opportunities directly led by them and their team. This leader will also contribute to a broader org-wide 2024 fundraising goal of $27M with strategy and execution in close coordination with Merit America co-CEOs and the VP of Development.

The responsibilities of the Director of Institutional Giving will include, but are not limited to, the following:

Pipeline Development (30%):

Design outreach strategies and streamline systems to increase Merit America's visibility among potential funding partners at the right time, leveraging the right resources. This work may include:

Working with the Development Coordinator to conduct thorough prospect research and relationship mapping to help identify paths to connect with new prospective partners.

Establishing relationships with and embedding Merit America within aligned funder communities via meetings, networking, conferences, events, speaking engagements, and more.

Collaborating with the Sr. Development Manager to fully manage the grant reporting calendar and prospect pipeline, executing action items aligned to internal and external deadlines.

Partner with Finance, Growth, Product, Policy, and Program teams to craft compelling proposals to prospective funders and meet the needs of Merit America’s mission and strategy.

Create well-written, engaging, and strategic grant proposals and reports that position Merit America for success according to all submission and reporting deadlines.

Prepare co-CEOs/executive leaders for external meetings with current and prospective funders.

Manage the Institutional Giving pipeline, identifying which prospects are in which stage, which prospects may need additional cultivation, and coordinating with other team members to execute those actions and close gifts to hit fundraising targets.

Portfolio and Relationship Management (50%):

With the team’s support, manage the relationship with each funding partner’s primary point(s) of contact, including producing all grant applications, proposals, and reports; interacting via regular meetings or presentations; and handling all communications.

Execute creative and authentic quarterly stewardship or cultivation touchpoints for all institutional funders and prospective funders.

Successfully position the organization for renewed and increased investment from partners at the end of their grant cycle.

Draft impactful, smart, engaging correspondence, including for co-CEOs and others, to engage with current and prospective donors and ensure leaders receive timely reminders to engage prospects.

Understand and leverage Merit America’s impact data platform (Hex) and donor management system (Salesforce) to drive accurate reporting and decision-making.

Maintain accurate records in the Salesforce database to enable reporting to the team and stakeholders.

Leading a Collaborative Team (20%):

Manage a talented team of two (Sr. Development Manager and Development Coordinator), providing mentorship, coaching, and performance management.

Strategically grow the team over time, aligned to fundraising success and increased goals.

Engage the team in identifying and addressing pipeline gaps with a solutions-oriented approach.

Assist with and/or consult on any activities related to donor identification, qualification, cultivation, solicitation, or stewardship. Examples include:

Events

Website experience

Reporting

Surprise and delight experiences for donors (thoughtful, unexpected stewardship)

Assisting in donation processing, recognition, and database accuracy

What Makes a Successful Candidate:

We recognize that individuals from marginalized backgrounds, including women, people of color, and those with disabilities, are often less likely to apply when they don’t meet 100% of the job qualifications. Don’t let that be the reason you miss out on this opportunity! We want to emphasize that your unique skills, experiences, and perspectives are valuable, and we encourage you to apply if you can demonstrate many of the skills and competencies. Below are the skills that are relevant for thriving in this role:

Must Haves:

Proven experience working within a nonprofit development team, including directly managing an institutional giving portfolio which includes multiple six- seven and eight-figure gifts

Demonstrated ability to build and lead a small strategic team of fundraisers to meet or exceed fundraising targets

Exceptional relationship-management skills, strong, poised and inspiring communication and presentation skills, and ability to draft communications on behalf of co-CEOs

Phenomenal writing skills, with an emphasis on clear, concise narrative; a knack for aligning the organization’s mission to the funder’s goals and interests; and a keen eye for detail

Proven ability to effectively and independently correspond and engage with influential funders in writing, on calls, and in person

Comfort with impact data and leveraging that data to shape external narrative with funders and prospects

Strong cross-functional coordination ability

Committed to Merit America’s mission to pave pathways to family-sustaining careers, break the poverty cycle, and create upward mobility for low-wage workers

Demonstrated history of embodying our values , which inform our work and drive our organization's culture

Shared sense of responsibility and ownership for our collective work in making a positive impact on the community we serve, true to our value of Win & Lose Together

Committed to continuous learning and growth in understanding and addressing issues of diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice

Passionate about fostering a workplace culture that embraces and values individual differences, aligned with our core value of inclusivity

Nice to Have:

Experience with Salesforce

Experience with iWave or similar wealth prospecting tool

Familiarity with the workforce development sector

Comfort working with ChatGPT or similar AI tools

Other Logistics

This position is full-time: 4-day work week (Fridays are an operating day if there is a holiday closure during the week)

Location:Remote

Salary: Base salary of $151,100 , along with the potential to earn an incentive bonus of up to $20,000

Application Deadline: Sunday, May 19th at 11:59 pm ET

Our goal is to have competitive and equitable compensation. We have a market-based compensation approach, which means we benchmark each role from reputable data sources. We compare our benchmarks against similarly sized non-profit organizations with comparable annual budgets and geographical areas. We pay the same rate for the same roles and adjust to comply with statutory mandates.

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