Director of Development

Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota’s mission is to improve the lives of people affected by epilepsy through education, advocacy, research, and connection. Our vision is that no one faces epilepsy alone. Founded in 1954, EFMN offers services for people with epilepsy and seizures across Minnesota.

Position Overview

The Director of Development is a key member of the leadership team responsible for driving both philanthropic and grant-based revenue growth through individual, corporate, foundations, and government grant related work that will support the mission of Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota (EFMN). This role will drive growth by providing leadership and direction for EFMN’s comprehensive development program, ensuring plans are successfully executed or adjusted as needed, and fostering a culture of philanthropy within the organization.

Essential Duties And Responsibilities

Department Strategy and Leadership – 30%

• Develops and maintains the annual development budget, including revenues and expenses. Monitors and analyzes results and data on an ongoing basis to evaluate performance against budgets and plans. Adjusts strategies and communicates with leadership team as needed to achieve goals on an annual basis.
• Maintains strong partnership with Strategic Communications Department to ensure communications strategies and tactics are aligned with plans and within budget.
• Supports the goals, objectives, and activities of the Board Advancement Committee, in partnership with the Executive Director.
• Provides leadership and supervision of Development Team, including clearly defining expectations and keeping the team motivated, focused, and engaged, while holding them accountable for execution of the annual plan and achieving results.
• Overall leadership of development programs, including leadership giving, annual fund program, annual walks (peer-to-peer giving), planned gifts, corporate philanthropy and sponsorships, foundations, and government grants.
• Keeps abreast of market, new technologies, trends, and practices to ensure the long-term sustainability of all donors.
• Acts as an ambassador of EFMN, having knowledge of all aspects of the agency to provided needed information to supporters, donors, clients, and the community.

Donor Relationship Management – 60%

• Oversees the development and execution of a donor stewardship plan, ensuring an appropriate frequency of impactful and meaningful stewardship for individual and corporate donors at all levels of giving. Ensures all gift receipts, acknowledgments, and stewardship materials convey a consistent level of quality and impact.
• Identifies and actively cultivates a portfolio of 35-50 individual donors with the ability to make gifts to EFMN of $2,500 or more and ensures everyone in the portfolio makes a personally meaningful annual gift.
• In partnership with the Executive Director, ensures each member of the EFMN Board of Directors is solicited annually with expectation of 100% participation.
• Leads efforts to engage and build strong relationships with foundation partners, corporations, and other organizations that support strategies and maximize revenue.

Development Operations – 10%

• Ensures Development Dashboard is created and utilized to ensure timely and accurate tracking and reporting of progress and key milestones.
• Oversees all donor data and ensures it is up to date in organizational systems.

Qualifications

• A Bachelor’s degree and minimum of five years of development experience with demonstrated success in planning and execution of a fundraising program with individuals, including major gifts, as well as foundations, corporations, and government grants.
• Demonstrated skills in effective relationship management with high-level and mid-level supporters.
• Demonstrated success as a leader and manager.
• Ability to form relationships with Board members and leadership volunteers to cultivate, solicit and steward new major donors.
• Ability to safeguard confidential and sensitive donor and organizational information.
• Strong information technology skills and experience with Salesforce database or similar sophisticated donor database. Solid aptitude for working with databases, Word, Excel, and other e-resources is essential.
• Demonstrated experience working within a diverse team and developing effective collaborative relationships with program, finance and development staff.
• Outstanding written and verbal communication skills.
• Knowledge of and compliance with the Fundraising Code of Ethics.

Physical Demands

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

• Ability to sit and/or stand for up to 8 hour periods
• Ability to lift 10 pounds frequently and up to 40 pounds
• Ability to look at a computer monitor, utilize a keyboard and mouse or equivalent equipment for up to 8 hours per day

Travel

Regular travel within the metro area and occasionally in greater Minnesota