major gifts officer Brookline, MA
Dexter Southfield School
Full Time
Brookline, MA
250000 - 12.04 USD ANNUAL Today
Job description
Alumni Leadership Gift Officer
Full-time, Year-Round Position
Immediate opening
About Dexter Southfield
Dexter Southfield is an independent day school where boys and girls in Pre-K through Class 12 develop their individual talents and build an ethical foundation for life. Students learn to lead and serve with character, confidence, and compassion. Our 36-acre campus is located on the Brookline-Boston line, just minutes from the city’s best museums, libraries, hospitals, performing arts venues, colleges, and universities—all of which serve as an extension of our classrooms. At Dexter Southfield, we approach everything we do with enthusiasm and commitment, living by our school’s motto: “Our Best Today, Better Tomorrow.”
We are seeking an Alumni Leadership Gift Officer, under the supervision of the Senior Major Gift Officer and with strong coordination across the External Relations team, who manages delivering a personalized, concierge-like experience for 4- and 5-figure annual giving donors, helping retain and grow gifts, securing new gifts, and identifying donors with the ability and proclivity to make major gifts. The primary goals of this position include substantive contacts such as conversations in person, as well as via email, social, phone, or Zoom, solicitations, and major gift referrals. The Alumni Leadership Gift Officer will play a critical role in elevating alumni leadership donor retention while growing new alumni donors at the leadership level.
To be successful in this role, you must be able to:
1) Manage a portfolio of 150-200 alumni prospects (a mix of engaged and discovery prospects), guiding the donor experience for new, existing, lapsed, and future leadership annual donors by providing a multi-touch donor concierge experience, raising $250K+ annually for the Dexter Southfield Fund.
- Secure leadership gifts of $5,000+ by soliciting prospects through best practice donor discovery methods, solicitation visits, and technology tools.
- Engineer multiple touchpoints using social media, email, texting, and video.
- Conduct 12+ monthly solicitation visits in person, via Zoom and/or via phone.
- Create and facilitate connections between alumni classmates and other graduates to facilitate networking, reconnection, and School pride.
- Create and manage young alumni and leadership alumni giving associations that are meaningful to prospects and elicit further engagement with and investment in the School.
- Cultivate and facilitate planned giving conversations, as appropriate.
2) Create a donor touchpoint library to build annual giving and inspire pride and engagement with the school.
- Use customized touchpoints for alumni prospects, including student experience videos, impact stories, and campus updates on the areas that matter most to each specific individual.
- Develop and maintain a broad knowledge of the school, including academics, admissions, athletics, alumni engagement, and student life.
- Develop a network of contacts throughout the school for additional information. Build out resource hub of relevant content to share with prospects and donors.
- Create a donor itinerary to ensure the effective movement of targeted annual donors through the annual giving pipeline.
- Send bimonthly (6x per year) customized touchpoints to targeted alumni.
- Develop and execute an outreach plan and cadence of touchpoints to establish a connection with and secure an introductory solicitation visit with future donors.
- Develop and execute an outreach plan and cadence of touchpoints for LYBUNT and SYBUNT annual donors to strengthen their connections and secure solicitation visits/annual gifts.
- Develop and execute an outreach plan to acknowledge new and upgraded annual gifts in a timely manner.
- Develop and execute an outreach plan and cadence of touchpoints for current fiscal year annual donors to demonstrate the impact of their gifts and to continue to strengthen their connections.
3) Build Dexter Southfield’s major gift pipeline.
- Elevate 25 prospects to the major gift qualification team annually.
- Develop transition strategies for those prospects that are moved into a major gift portfolio.
Other duties as assigned.
Skills and Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree required.
- Thrives in an entrepreneurial atmosphere, has a high degree of personal responsibility, is committed to continuous improvement to ensure the best outcomes, and has unwavering focus on the alumni we serve.
- Highly professional and able to productively collaborate with colleagues on the External Relations team.
- Able to diplomatically collaborate with faculty, students, administrators, and departments campus wide.
- Ability to multi-task and thrive in a changing, dynamic environment.
- Knowledge of annual giving fundraising best practices.
- 3+ years of annual giving fundraising experience, preferably in an educational setting.
- Experience using relationship-building technology tools, including social media, email and text platforms, web platforms, and video platforms.
- Travel, as required.
At Dexter Southfield, we promote a culture of excellence that extends beyond academics, athletics, and the arts. We value a diverse and inclusive community in which different identities and perspectives are accepted and respected to create a sense of belonging for all.
