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Development Director
Ventura Land Trust (VLT) is a local, private, non-profit land trust working to protect the land, water, wildlife, and scenic beauty of the Ventura region for current and future generations. The organization strives to create a fun, inspiring and team-oriented work environment with flexible work hours.
The Development Director is responsible for securing revenue for Ventura Land Trust. Duties include overseeing and managing fundraising efforts, building strong and successful relationships, maintaining communications with donors, and collaborating effectively with staff to execute fundraising events. The Development Director reports to the Executive Director, supervises the development team, and works collaboratively with fellow VLT staff, board members, committee members and volunteers in all development endeavors.
Responsibilities
- Build, foster, and maintain relationships and ongoing communications with existing and prospective individual and corporate donors
- Build a major gifts program including identification, solicitation and cultivation of donors $5,000+
- Direct multiple capital campaigns and other major fundraising campaigns, including consultant and volunteer management
- Direct the annual fund program, including mailings
- Direct grant seeking efforts including research, proposal writing, and reporting. Work collaboratively with other staff members to develop and submit grant applications
- Generate and manage annual fundraising budget
- Work with the Education team to generate funding for the program
- Coordinate donor events, excluding general outreach events
- Oversee donor prospect research
- Lead migration of VLT’s CRM database to Salesforce
- Develop metrics and annual targets with the Executive Director for tracking progress toward short-term and long-term fundraising goals
- Provide Executive Director, Development Committee, and Board with fundraising reports and updates
- Collaborate with Development Committee Chair on the coordination of meetings and implementation of action items
- Oversee fundraising database
- Generate and produce annual mailing for both Winter and Spring appeals
- Procure sponsorships and donations for the Wild and Scenic Film Festival
- Partner with Outreach Director in marketing and public relations efforts to support development activities
- Improve gift recognition, donor stewardship and member benefits programs
- Develop VLT’s legacy giving program
- Make public appearances and accept speaking engagements to share VLT’s mission and programs with the community
- Supervise and motivate staff, board members and volunteers in development efforts
- Attend occasional community meetings
- Perform other related duties as requested
Qualifications
- The successful candidate will embrace VLT’s mission
- Has natural passion and aptitude for making meaningful connections with new people, strengthening relationships, and is comfortable with being an ambassador for VLT in all social situations
- A minimum of 6 years of development experience and 3 years of management experience
- Prior fundraising success, particularly major gift fundraising of $25,000 and above
- Prior experience leading and/or participating in capital campaign fundraising
- Supervisory experience, including ability to motivate, lead, set objectives and manage performance of junior staff
- Proficiency in discussing programs and priorities with the goal of making funding connections
- Prior grant writing and reporting experience for operational funding and special project funding
- Experience in budget planning and analysis
- Be a “self-starter” and goal-driven to initiate donor visits and fundraising connections
- Be organized and follow through on tasks and goals
- Proficient in using donor management databases; experience with Salesforce a plus
- Excellent verbal and written communication skills
- Bilingual English and Spanish a plus
Annual compensation range $80,000-$90,000, commensurate with experience and other qualifications. Development Director qualifies as a full-time salaried/exempt employee and is eligible for full-time holiday, vacation, and sick time. To be considered for this position, please email resume and cover letter to [email protected] with "Development Director" in the subject line.