Director of Development

ABOUT CODE NATION

Code Nation is a community of teenagers, technologists, teachers, business leaders, and other champions. A movement spanning cities, cultures, and industries, our community builds bridges across social and economic divides and unites people with the power to change each others’ lives. 

Code Nation equips students with the skills, experiences, and connections that together create access to careers in technology. With a volunteer teaching cohort of over 300 professional web and software developers and a network of school and company partners, we provide coding courses and work-based learning programs to students who attend under-resourced high schools. Our industry-aligned curriculum and vast network of supporters provide students with the tech skills and social capital they need to break into the tech workforce.

During the 2019-2020 school year, Code Nation pivoted to reach 1,630 students in 72 programs across the Bay Area, Chicago, and New York City, 100% virtually. Software developers collectively volunteered more than 45,000 hours to provide in-person and remote learning in support of Code Nation’s mission in the San Francisco Bay Area, Chicago, and New York City.

Code Nation is committed to being an inclusive, pro-Black, and anti-racist organization. Ideal candidates are committed to educational and tech equity and working against institutional inequities. We believe that anyone can learn to code, and everyone should have access to careers in the thriving tech workforce. Check out our latest commitment with CS for All to provide coding courses, workplace experiences, and industry mentorship with a focus on equity and representation for 1,200 students across New York City, Chicago, and the Bay Area by Summer 2021.

THE ROLE

The salary range for this position is $85,000 - 140,000. This range is wide because Code Nation is eager to meet candidates who have fully mastered all aspects of this role as well as candidates who would be learning some aspects for the first time.

Code Nation seeks a Development Director to lead our development work nationally and to support each of our regional leaders to strategize and execute in service of local fundraising goals. Our CEO loves fundraising and our board and Bay Area regional leadership council are highly engaged in fundraising. Our regional leaders have mixed experience with fundraising and we are still forming leadership councils in New York and Chicago. The Development Director will be a master strategist and project manager who will enjoy managing multiple solicitors in support of their successful fundraising outcomes, including regional leaders, board members, leadership council members, and other Code Nation champions. A successful Development Director will meet people where they are, diagnose opportunities to provide content expertise, and will lead Code Nation’s leadership on their journey towards fundraising success.

In the first ~six months, this Development Director will help us to close out our FY21 fundraising goal of approximately $5.9mm while learning all about what we think is a special program that is meeting the needs of our students. This amount represents the total of each region’s fundraising goals ($1.8mm in the Bay Area, $722K in Chicago, $1.4 mm in NYC, and $2mm for the National region). We had a strong fundraising year in FY20 and closed the year having raised approximately $5.3mm. A successful Development Director will support the Bay Area and NYC regions achieve slightly higher fundraising goals from last year ($1.6mm and $1.2 mm respectively) and assist Chicago with fundraising an approximate 70% increase from FY20 to FY21. Over the first two years in the role, the Development Director will help us to expand our fundraising primarily through increasing the number of individuals providing major gifts and developing and executing against a robust corporate partnerships strategy, which we are uniquely positioned to pursue given our role in workforce development.

Code Nation is committed to being an inclusive, pro-Black, and anti-racist organization; ideal candidates are committed to educational and tech equity and working against institutional inequities.

RESPONSIBILITIES

The primary responsibilities will include, but are not limited to:

Development strategy, execution and tracking

• Refine and support execution of Code Nation’s organization-wide fundraising strategy at the national and local level in pursuit of our annual fundraising goal (Code Nation’s FY21 fundraising goal is $5.9mm and will likely increase in support of programmatic growth)
• Develop and implement a plan to increase the racial diversity of Code Nation’s funders
• Create a cadence of support to the CEO and three regional leaders to offer strategic guidance, build capacity, and monitor progress
• Lead periodic (e.g. quarterly) stepbacks to assess overall progress to goal against development goals
• Lead organizational leaders and development team members through an annual development planning process to set realistic goals around fundraising and help to tether overall organizational planning to realistic revenue targets

Build strategy and drive execution to achieve national fundraising goal

• Support and eventually own board engagement towards fundraising outcomes including fundraising sessions at board meetings and individualized communication outside of board meetings
• Function as a “development Chief of Staff” for the CEO as primary solicitor including helping her set strategy, project manage donor engagement, and build capacity around donor materials and communications
• Set vision for and project manage fundraising events

Partnering with regional leaders (Bay Area, Chicago and NYC) to drive fundraising at the regional level

• Provide meaningful and differentiated strategic, operational, and development skill coaching to regional leaders in service of their learning and success
• Create meeting and routine structures to help regional leaders to successfully plan and execute actions to deliver fundraising outcomes
• Supporting the Bay Area regional team with substantial support to engage their regional leadership council to drive towards fundraising outcomes
• Supporting the creation of regional leadership councils in Chicago and New York 

Lead and manage the development and communications team

• Hire, manage, coach, and retain a small team including three development and one communications staff members
• Create a division of responsibility across the team that ensures that:
• Data integrity is consistently upheld in service of strong project management and accurate forecasting
• Team is executing on actions in support of the CEO and regional leaders both to drive efficiencies and help focus solicitor time on donor facing activities
• Grant requirements are managed tightly without errors
• Managing organizational communications with the primary goal of supporting fundraising and the secondary goal of communicating to Code Nation’s other key audiences (a vision for communications has recently been established by a communications consultant)

Donor program development

• Lead organizational leadership to think expansively about opportunities to build donor facing programs including but not limited to:
• Creation of “sponsor a student’ or “sponsor a cohort” donor programs or giving circles
• Identifying and acting on opportunities to engage our volunteers who have means to donate
• Development of a robust corporate partnerships program in pursuit of both volunteer hours and donations, likely with the assistance of a consultant expert, which will be largely driven by regional partnerships managers who will hold a dotted line relationship to the Development Director

SKILLS AND QUALIFICATIONS

Success in this position will require, but not be limited to, the following proven experiences and competencies:

What you’ve accomplished (required):

• Demonstrated ability to create and lead the execution of a development strategy that met or beat its objectives for either an entire organization of comparable size or for a region of a larger, geographically matrixed organization
• Experience engaging board members towards fundraising outcomes
• Successfully managed a small team in support of development work
• Experience managing forecasting including regular progress to goals meetings and tightly managing data integrity to ensure accuracy

Other things you might have accomplished (preferred) or would be excited to learn here:

• Managing institutional relationships including the full lifecycle of foundation grants
• Setting vision for and executing towards a robust set of corporate partnerships resulting in donation of both time and money
• Facilitating conversations across the organization to educate other staff about our donors and fundraising strategies while helping to sharpen thinking around living out our values in our fundraising (including recognizing, honoring, and reconciling any potential tensions)
• Owning a vision for communications at the organizational level including management of a junior level communications staff member
• Supporting organizational leaders to successfully engage and solicit high wealth individuals
• An understanding of tech education and youth development programs

Skills you have developed and knowledge you have acquired:

• Ability to organize and keep track of many projects, deadlines and priorities at the same time, specifically in the context of matrixed fundraising
• Ability to organize and manage the actions of others who don’t report into you
• Ability to manage a small team including both strong work outputs and facilitating an experience of fulfillment and belonging
• Ability to manage self while leveraging manager for strategic support rather than accountability
• Strong orientation towards customer service in a shared services context with a focus on meeting the needs of others without being asked
• Ability to communicate verbally and in writing in clear, concise, and linear ways
• High level of self-awareness, humility, interpersonal skills and emotional intelligence
• A baseline comfortability with tech concepts and terminology

How you work and what you value:

• Deep commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion
• Comfortability with ambiguity while finding responsibility in driving towards and/or creating clarity
• Enjoys iterative work
• Self starter and entrepreneurial. Comfortable with failure as a path towards progress
• Enjoys working on a team and operates in a way that will build trust with teammates (e.g. curiosity, integrity, consideration, etc.)
• Driven by results
• Enjoys fundraising
• Sees themselves in our core values

WHAT YOU CAN EXPECT

Code Nation has a high-performing culture characterized by our desire to provide our staff members with the support, resources, and information they need to be successful in our organization and in the non-profit field in general. If you take on this position, you can expect to be offered a compensation package, including salary and benefits, that will be commensurate with your experience and competitive within the non-profit sector. Some of the benefits we offer to our staff members include, but are not limited to:

• Medical, Dental and Vision Insurance and a Flex spending account for out of pocket medical costs
• Generous Time Off policy-15 days of paid time off & 14 paid holidays/office closures
• 401k Retirement Plan 

TO APPLY

Code Nation is partnering with RCG Talent Solutions to find our next Development Director. Please submit a resume and cover letter to jobs@rcgtalent.com with the phrase “Code Nation Development Director” in the subject line. We ask that when writing your cover letter, you focus on naming both what interests you about Code Nation’s work and how your experience would lend itself to successfully leading our development function.

Code Nation strives to build a staff and board that reflect the cultural diversity of the communities and neighborhoods we serve. Code Nation is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, gender, handicap, age, religion, sexual orientation, or national or ethnic origin. BIPOC individuals are encouraged to apply.