Senior Manager, Partnerships (Fundraising)

About the Position

Namati is entering a critical new phase. As we deepen our impact across the globe, we seek a strategic and collaborative Senior Manager, Partnerships to help grow and sustain Namati’s $10M+ annual budget as a key member of our resource mobilization (RM) team.

The Senior Manager, Partnerships will lead a portfolio of approximately 40 relationships – across private foundations, bilateral agencies, re-grantors, and others – serving as the primary relationship lead for both new and existing funders. Drawing on their own networks and experiences in the philanthropic space as well as leveraging Namati’s existing position across a variety of networks, the Senior Manager will identify, secure, and steward 5- to 7-figure awards. This role will be responsible for generating an average of $2-3M in annual revenue through a mix of new awards and renewals, with the expectation that the portfolio will grow over time.

This is a highly cross-functional role. The Senior Manager will be an exemplary collaborator across numerous internal stakeholders, providing strategic guidance and ensuring smooth coordination amongst RM colleagues, Namati’s executive leadership, program leads, and the finance team. This role will report to the Director of Partnerships.

This is a unique opportunity for an ambitious non-profit leader to make a mark on a global scale in the company of a diverse team of dedicated and caring colleagues around the world.

Key Responsibilities:

• Cultivation: The Senior Manager, Partnerships will identify, vet, and cultivate a portfolio of productive new funding relationships, drawing from (and consistently expanding) Namati’s prospect pipeline. This person will secure invitations to apply, develop proposals, and manage application processes in coordination with relevant stakeholders – while uncompromisingly advancing our mission and values. We aim to increase the volume, speed and effectiveness of our fundraising, and the successful candidate will advance those goals each quarter.
• Donor stewardship and reporting: Namati’s long-term relationship-building focus often leads to engaged partners that consistently renew awards at the highest possible levels. The Senior Manager will steward key partnerships – both existing partnerships and new relationships – from managing renewal proposals and reports, to ensuring timely communications and thoughtful touchpoints– all with a strategic eye to the unique character of the relationship and how to nurture it through the lifespan of the award and beyond.
• External representation: The Senior Manager will represent Namati and provide thought leadership at relevant forums and events, expanding Namati’s visibility across the philanthropic sector and building a stronger network of potential partners. This could include annual trips for the Skoll World Forum and Climate Week, accompanying program team members at the Asia Venture Philanthropy Network conference or the African Philanthropy Forum, and representing Namati at other relevant events.
• Strategic contributions: The Senior Manager will meaningfully contribute to shaping the team’s strategic direction through annual planning and quarterly team KPI reviews, as well as working closely with the rest of the RM team to strengthen fundraising systems and policies at Namati.

Here’s what you might have tackled last week:

• You oversaw the development of a proposal to a foundation for our land, environment, and climate justice work in Kenya, Sierra Leone, and within the Grassroots Justice Network, based on existing materials supplemented by dialogue with the Managing Director overseeing those programs about their upcoming priorities, and coordinated with the finance team to develop a draft budget.
• You followed up with 8 potential funders for the Grassroots Justice Network Academy after attending a high-level funder gathering. You carefully reviewed their existing grantees, grantmaking practices, and Namati’s due diligence considerations, and then worked with the Managing Director overseeing the launch of the Academy to identify key points to emphasize in outreach. After crafting thoughtful and targeted emails for each funder, you’re now scheduling 5 follow-up calls for the coming weeks.
• In collaboration with key RM and program staff, you assembled a list of 30+ funders from our prospect pipeline where communications have recently gone dormant, yet whose focus on democracy may offer an opening for new dialogue. You assembled funder-facing materials that powerfully highlights our recent achievements in protecting minority rights, building grassroots power, and countering authoritarian tactics, and organized a short internal meeting to discuss roles and timeframes for outreach.
• A major funding institution has just undergone a significant internal shift, so you leveraged your network and strategic experience to map out dynamics and possible points of engagement, ensuring that Namati is well-positioned to continue our relationship. You then shared this analysis with the Director of Partnerships and the CEO, in preparation for the CEO’s upcoming touchpoint with the institution.

About You

Must-Haves

• A strong track record in fundraising: We will prioritize applications from candidates with at least 7 years of progressively responsible experience in the non-profit field, with demonstrated success in fundraising. You must be able to lead fundraising independently – from lead generation and securing an invitation to apply, to proposal development and donor stewardship – in close coordination with key stakeholders.
• Excellent communication skills, including great writing: You’re great at understanding your audience. You present big ideas with clarity and specificity. You speak from your heart and develop compelling arguments. You can produce strong written products (concept notes, proposals, talking points, etc.) relatively quickly, and value receiving feedback and collaborating with others on your written product.
• Strategic thinking grounded in pragmatism and collaboration: You often see opportunities in not-so-obvious places and in unexpected ways, helping you create strategic donor engagement opportunities and develop powerful, unique fundraising campaigns.
• Growth-oriented: You’re always seeking to better yourself and your work, and you will push yourself to help fulfill our mission. In service of that growth, you welcome and delight in feedback from supervisors, peers, and anyone else.

Nice-to-Haves

• Experience living in or working with programs in Africa, Asia, and/or Latin America.
• Familiarity with legal empowerment, human rights, or international development.
• Experience representing organizations at philanthropic or global policy events.

Location and Travel

This position is open to candidates currently based in the following locations in the United States: Washington D.C., CT, MA, MD, NJ, NY, or VA. Please note that candidates must already be legally eligible to work in the United States to be considered for the role; Namati cannot sponsor visas.

If the successful candidate is based in/near Washington D.C., they will follow Namati’s hybrid office policy, which calls for staff to report to the office two days per week between Tuesday and Thursday.

The role typically requires around 10-15% travel, including internationally. Travel requirements may change over time based on evolving priorities. The successful candidate will be expected to work non-standard hours occasionally to accommodate the various time zones of Namati’s teams.

Namati’s work has been featured in/on Democracy Journal, Amanpour & Co. New York Times, the Guardian, Devex, WIRED, the Washington Post, among others, and has been documented by the Sundance Institute. Vivek Maru, Namati’s CEO, gave a TED Talk in 2017 which has been viewed over 1.3 million times. In 2016, Namati was honored with the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship and in 2017, the Schwab Foundation named Vivek Maru and colleague Sonkita Conteh two of its Social Entrepreneurs of the Year. Namati has a perfect score, 100/100, on Charity Navigator and has earned Guidestar’s Platinum Seal of Transparency.

About Namati

Since 2011, Namati has worked to build a movement of grassroots justice advocates worldwide. We’ve grown tremendously, from a small founding group of big-hearted change-makers to a global staff of 180+ people across 12 time zones in Asia, Africa, and the Americas. The Grassroots Justice Network, which we co-founded and still convene to this day, has grown from 30 people in one room to the world’s largest community of justice advocates, with membership from 4,200 organizations across 175 countries.

Since our founding, we have supported local communities to take on thousands of justice issues, directly improving the lives of over 5 million people, protecting over 3 million acres of forests and grasslands, and strengthening rights for over 155 million people. Together with communities, partners, and Network members, we’ve envisioned - and won- transformative changes, like the Customary Land Rights and National Land Commission Acts of Sierra Leone, and the world’s first Legal Empowerment Fund.

About Resource Mobilization

Alongside the growth in our ambition and impact, Namati’s budget has increased, on average, by 18% per year -- from $5M to more than $15M in ten years. Our donor base has grown from 3 founding partners to over 40 bilateral and philanthropic funding partners. Major recent investments include an unrestricted award from philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, and an 8-year, $20M award from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation through the Racial Equity 2030 competition. Many of our funding partners remain with us for the long haul. We are particularly proud that two longtime supporters, the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation and the Hewlett Foundation, went on to support the Legal Empowerment Fund, with an aim to mobilize $100M to support grassroots justice.

At the heart of our fundraising track record is our commitment to bold, inspired action as fundraisers: fundraising is organizing. Namati’s Resource Mobilization team does not take a transactional approach to fundraising; instead, we form relationships with funding partners committed not only to our organization, but to the entire legal empowerment movement. We strive to build and steward expansive, long-term, and high-level funding partnerships that match the ambitious scale of our vision.

This kind of fundraising requires a team of aligned, courageous, and strategic connectors who understand where Namati is uniquely placed to make a difference, who can learn continually from our work - and the work of our network and collaborators - to identify promising opportunities, and to create new ones.

Compensation and Benefits

We base our compensation on the markets where our staff operate and the responsibility, scope, and complexity of the role. Namati's staff position bands range from 1 (entry level / assistant) to 9 (Managing Director). This position is at band 7. We base our compensation on the markets where our staff operate. The offer range for this position is likely to fall between $100,000 - $115,000 based on the final job level determined by the responsibility, scope, and complexity of the position; most offers are made in the first half of the offer range.

Namati offers a broad range of benefits, including:

Health insurance: we pay 80% of the base plan premium for individuals, and 50% for dependents.

Paid time off: new staff have 12 sick days and 3 personal days, and accrue 15 days of paid vacation (increasing to 20 after two years). Namati closes its offices organization-wide for “winter break” from December 25 to January 1. Additionally, we provide six weeks of paid parental leave.

401(k) retirement planning: Namati contributes 5% of your salary plus matches your contribution up to an additional 5%.

Professional development: we value – and set aside a professional development fund toward – staff having access to external professional development opportunities.