Leadership Giving Officer
About College of the Holy Cross:
Founded in 1843 in Worcester, Massachusetts, the College of the Holy Cross is among the nation’s leading liberal arts institutions. A highly selective, four-year, exclusively undergraduate college of 3,100 students, Holy Cross is renowned for offering a rigorous, personalized education in the Jesuit, Catholic tradition.
Holy Cross highly values the unique skills, perspective, talents and passion that each employee contributes to its learning community. To work at The College is to accept an invitation to participate in the growth and development of all campus members, students, faculty and staff. The College’s commitment to diversity is an important feature of the Holy Cross education. Informed by the presence of diverse interpretations of the human experience, Holy Cross is building a community marked by freedom, mutual respect, and civility. We seek others who support our values of diversity and inclusiveness. Job candidates of all diverse backgrounds who embrace the open and inclusive culture of Holy Cross are welcome and encouraged to apply.
Job Description:
Job Summary
The Leadership Giving Officer is responsible for fundraising efforts which support and advance the mission of the College. The Leadership Giving Officer will work with alumni, parents and friends in specific geographic regions as assigned by the Director of Leadership Giving. The successful candidate will work in partnership with colleagues on the Leadership Giving team, Gift Planning team, Holy Cross Fund team, and other colleagues to encourage annual and multi-year leadership-level support (typically in the $25,000-$1,000,000+ range) across the College.
By asking thoughtful and strategic questions that uncover philanthropic aspirations, the candidate will inspire donors to articulate their charitable goals to maximize their support of Holy Cross in alignment with the institution’s ambitions.
The successful candidate will work closely with their manager and with other members of the Advancement Team to develop and execute prospect strategies. Also, the individual will strategically integrate Gift Planning, Reunions, annual giving and other strategic priorities into the development and execution of high-level fundraising strategies to enable the realization of established goals and objectives. Success will be measured by the incumbent’s ability to uncover prospective donors’ philanthropic interests; the quality of their prospect strategies; their ability to move donors from cultivation to solicitation, and the successful closure of leadership and major gifts. The ideal candidate has experience as a fundraiser or has transferable skills that translate to the fundraising process.
The candidate must possess excellent communication skills, including the ability to write persuasively and quickly develop strong relationships with internal and external constituencies to promote a positive and effective collaboration to ensure success. This position requires a bias for action and making the ask, a high level of organization, curiosity, professionalism, and mastery of the objectives of major gifts fundraising. Above all, a strong belief in the transformational power of a Jesuit, liberal arts education is important.
Major Areas of Responsibility
- Qualify, cultivate, solicit, and steward a portfolio of 125 +/- prospects on an annual basis, holding 110+ annual visits with donors.
- Through the development of thoughtful strategies and intentional prioritization of prospects, ensure revenue goal of $1M+ in new annual commitments are met by focusing on upgrading donors and through maintaining an active regional/territory presence.
- Adhere to all prospect management processes and policies around contact reports, proposals, briefing materials, documenting intentions, and writing Statements of Understanding to ensure cross-departmental transparency and effectiveness.
- Serve as a partner to the Holy Cross Fund team, Gift Planning, and Major Gift colleagues by identifying new prospects, volunteers, and supporting the goals of elevating unrestricted and flexibly restricted support at Holy Cross.
- Actively seek to improve professional skills, knowledge, and understanding of Holy Cross by developing relationships with colleagues across campus, attending campus events and activities, and participating in training activities.
- Utilize knowledge of prospects’ interests, to develop and execute robust, multi-step prospect strategies. Strategically leverage academic leadership, faculty, and other members of the Holy Cross community leading to successful solicitation and closure of six and seven-figure gifts.
- Foster relationships between prospective donors and academic leadership, faculty, and other members of the Holy Cross community to deepen a prospect’s engagement with the College.
- Travel occasionally with senior academic and administrative leaders. Responsible for securing anchor visits for all leaders and for constructing meetings to effectively leverage each leader’s time to advance prospect strategies. Responsible for communicating meeting strategies through written briefings and pre-visit briefing meetings or calls.
- Other duties as assigned
Requirements:
Minimum Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree required with five years of experience in fundraising, preferably at an educational institution and in soliciting leadership gifts; some experience with planned giving vehicles is helpful.
- Travel expectations of roughly 35% of working days spent on the road in specified territory(ies)/region(s) and occasional evening and weekend work, as necessary.
Additional Qualifications And Skills
- Successful track record as a fundraiser or transferable experience, with a preference of 5+ years’ of direct solicitation/sales/relationship management experience.
- Intimate understanding of Jesuit, Catholic educational traditions and methodology
- Knowledge of complex academic institutions and experience staffing academic leaders in development work is preferred.
- Strong active listening skills, including an ability to ask sensitive questions with tact. Demonstrated ability to uncover interests, motivations, and objections from prospective donors, clients, or others strongly preferred. Someone who is pleasantly persistent while exhibiting sound judgment.
- Comfortable making solicitations with a bias to asking during each initial prospect meeting.
- Ability to function at a high level within a complex organization, with prior university experience preferred.
- Experience working with fundraising volunteers preferred.
- Demonstrated experience of qualifying prospects during initial visits to determine inclination and capacity to make significant gifts to aid in the identification of new donors at the major gift level.
- Excellent interpersonal skills required to relate to donors, volunteers, and colleagues. Must be able to consistently display tact, diplomacy, discretion, and maintain confidentiality inside and outside of the organization.
- Must be a team player who understands individual success as part of a larger team’s success.
- Demonstrated ability to persuasively communicate the case for unrestricted and current use support strongly preferred.
- Must be a self-starter who is organized, detail-oriented, and able to prioritize and balance multiple tasks in a fast-paced complex environment.
- Must have a natural affinity for collaboration, leading through influence, and a high level of emotional intelligence. Must be drawn to a challenge and exhibit the patience necessary to advance solutions in a complex and collaborative organization. Demonstrates a personal commitment to excellence as well as an ability to admit mistakes and forgive faults in others.
- Experience with Advance or other fundraising systems.
- Must be able to comfortably utilize Microsoft Office and other computer applications.
Core Competencies
- Dependability
- Flexibility
- Service Oriented
- Excellent Written & Verbal Communication
- Proficient Problem Solving
- Understands Risk Management
- Excellent Innovation/Creativity
- Strong Teamwork & Team Facilitation
- Strong Interpersonal Skills
- Strong technology skills including proficiency in Microsoft Office (Word, Excel and
- PowerPoint)
- Good Judgement and Discretion
- Understands, values and respects diversity as an individual, in a team and within groups while fostering an inclusive and supportive environment.
Additional Information:
This is a full-time, exempt-level level position with an annual salary. The College is committed to providing competitive market pay for its employees. The College also offers a competitive benefits package for full-time staff, including:
- 10% College contribution to the 403(b) Retirement Plan (1 year wait waiver available)
- Hybrid work
- NEW – condensed summer 4-day work week
- Tuition benefits
- Wellness programs & ongoing Training and Development opportunities
- Generous paid time off
- Free parking and free use of the athletic/fitness facilities.
- https://www.holycross.edu/human-resources/benefits to learn more.
College Description
The College of the Holy Cross is a private, Jesuit Catholic, undergraduate institution serving approximately 3,100 students. Founded in 1843, Holy Cross is the oldest Catholic college in New England and has a tradition of academic excellence. It is located atop Mount Saint James in Worcester, Massachusetts. The picturesque, 174-acre campus is an award-winning and registered arboretum.
Region Description
Worcester is a city of approximately 200,000 people centrally located in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. It is approximately one hour from Boston, Hartford, and Providence, and three hours from New York City. Worcester is known as the Heart of the Commonwealth. Worcester offers many cultural and recreational opportunities https://livability.com/worcester-region/.
The College is an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer and complies with all Federal and Massachusetts laws concerning Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action in the workplace.
A member of the Higher Education Consortium of Central Massachusetts (HECCMA).
To review our Employee Benefit Options, please go to: https://www.holycross.edu/human-resources/benefits
Holy Cross Benefits at a Glance PDF for download: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vvUJ1aAP9VfP1ZU3yIaj_vYaUF22LqRQ/view
Application Instructions:
Please attach a cover letter addressing the position requirements along with your resume.
In your cover letter please address how your work supports the College’s mission as a Jesuit, undergraduate liberal arts college (see http://www.holycross.edu/mission) and its core commitment to diversity and inclusion. For more information, please visit http://holycross.edu/diversity.
To apply, visit https://apptrkr.com/3953390
The College of the Holy Cross is a highly selective Catholic liberal arts college in the Jesuit tradition. It enrolls about 3,000 students and is located in a medium-sized city 45 miles west of Boston. The College seeks faculty members whose scholarship, teaching, advising, and on- and off-campus service demonstrate commitment to the educational benefits of a richly diverse community. Holy Cross aspires to meet the needs of dual-career couples, in part through its membership in Higher Education Consortium of Central Massachusetts (http://www.heccma.org) and the New England Higher Education Recruitment Consortium (https://new-england.hercjobs.org/)