Individual Giving Officer - Texas Triangle

This position is based in the Texas metropolitan area - Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio, and Austin.

The National Park Foundation’s historic fundraising initiative, The Campaign for National Parks — in collaboration with the National Park Service and Park Partners – will catalyze solutions that make America’s parks resilient and secure their future.  Through the campaign, NPF will raise $1 billion for four priority investment areas: Conserving and preserving threatened parks and wildlife; Ensuring a world-class visitor experience; Telling the story of America; Inspiring the next generation of park stewards.

 POSITION SUMMARY

The Individual Giving Officer, Major Gifts – Southwest (Texas) is a key part of an expanding regional team responsible for building a new portfolio of major gift prospects and generating significant individual gifts $25,000 and above, annually.  This role is instrumental in scaling-up, by helping contribute to overall revenue of the Individual Giving channel, aligning with NPF’s campaign goals focused on sustaining, and growing a $200M/year and beyond, organization.

The Gift Officer will use a hybrid outreach approach for discovery and qualification working primarily with NPF’s annual fund donors with the capacity and affinity to make five, six, and seven figure gifts. As Relationship Manager, the Gift Officer will develop and manage up to 125 major gift prospects, proactively create and implement personalized strategies to solicit $25K - $1M+ outright donations and multi-year commitments that will help advance the NPF mission and strategic priorities under the transformational Campaign For National Parks.

The position, based in Texas, will focus on a multi-state regional territory for discovery, cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship of individual donors and family foundations.

The ideal candidate will be highly flexible and adaptive to a dynamic and fast-paced work environment, be located in a key city in Texas, have familiarity with the philanthropic community in the surrounding multi-state region, work remotely from your home office, and travel to meet with donors and prospects frequently.  Travel to NPF’s headquarters in Washington D.C. required quarterly, and as requested.

Essential Functions/Duties/Tasks:

The Individual Giving Officer, Major Gifts - Southwest region will be expected to undertake the following responsibilities and duties:

• As a key member of the philanthropy team, the gift officer is responsible for rapidly building a pipeline by meeting with, qualifying, and managing a high-value portfolio of donors and prospects with capacity to give primarily at the five-and-six figure level, and above. 
• Collaborate with Research Team to develop a largely discovery portfolio of up to 125 prospective donors in the region, and advance pipeline of new major gift prospects through planned and strategic moves.
• Under the direction of Sr. Director, Individual Giving, establish annual fundraising and targets with clear deliverables and milestones for success, with an aspirational revenue goal of $1M+/annually.
• Develop short and long-term cultivation / solicitation strategies and timelines to engage individuals, via strategic in-person meetings, events, written communications and other donor-centric approaches. 
• Oversee and drive all aspects of the giving cycle with an emphasis on the qualification process, leading to and through direct solicitation and securing major gifts and multi-year pledges. 
• Build key relationships and close gifts of $25,000 and above, identifying opportunities to solicit blended gifts - which includes multi-year major gift commitments, outright annual gift, and planned gift conversations.
• Educate prospective individual donors on NPF’s national mission, raising funds for both unrestricted and restricted support in alignment with organizational priorities.  Stay current on NPF programmatic needs, budgets, and priorities. 
• As Relationship Manager, monitor and drive all prospect contacts to ensure positive and purposeful prospect and donor relations.  Write and deliver proposals and other donor-centric correspondence.
• Maintain timely visitation reports. Accurately record correspondence, meetings, donor strategies, and moves management activities in donor database.  
• Maintain timely expenses, in accordance with NPF policy. 
• Work collaboratively and as a team with volunteer and staff leadership, including Sr. VP of Individual & Foundation Relations, Chief of Philanthropy, and Office of the President, to cultivate and solicit prospective donors.

Required knowledge, skills, and abilities:

The ideal candidate for the position of Individual Giving Officer – Major Gifts, Southwest will have:

• A proven track record: Demonstrated ability to secure outright gifts and multiyear pledges in the 5-7 figure range. Ability to successfully connect with major gift and annual fund donors and inspire higher levels of major giving and engagement. Comfort with the high volumes of cold calling and outreach required of a discovery portfolio, moving prospects from transactional to relational impact giving utilizing moves management to close major gifts.
• Donor collaboration: Ability to understand the interests and motivation of major gift donors while connecting them to NPF priorities.   Developing long-lasting relationships that maximize gifts to benefit the national parks.
• Expertise in Major Gift fundraising: Fundamental and industry-accepted standards for all aspects of the gift cycle involving prospects and donors.
• Excellent communication: Ability to interface effectively with the highest level of NPF donors and senior staff members, verbally, in writing, and through professional interpersonal skills.
• Ability to travel: Work well from your home office, and travel extensively throughout the assigned multi-state territory in the South-western region to meet with prospects and donors, and when required, Washington D.C.  Some evenings, weekends and holiday work will be required.
• Self-Motivation: Ability to both thrive in a fast-paced, fluid, collaborative, team-oriented environment and to work independently effectively while sharing information openly. 
• Passion for NPF’s mission: Dedication to promoting NPF’s core mission and priorities and connecting donor’s philanthropic impact to advancing shared goals.
• Knowledge of Raiser’s Edge NXT or similar donor database.

Preferred education and experience:

A bachelor’s degree is required for this position and a minimum of 7-10 years in development with specific expertise in major gift fundraising.  As the position is remote, working from your home office, the ideal candidate will be based in Texas, and have experience with the philanthropic landscape in the region.  A master’s or advanced degree is preferred.

Application Materials: For consideration, please include a resume plus cover letter.  

Location: This is a remote position for applicants located in the Texas metropolitan area - Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio, and Austin. Applicants located in the following states and district are welcome to apply for NPF opportunities:  AL, AZ, CA, CO, DC, FL, IL, MA, MD, MN, NC, NH, NM, NJ, NY, OH, PA, SC, TN, TX, VA, WA, WI.

The starting salary for this position is $125k.

The National Park Foundation is an Equal Opportunity Employer