Major Gifts Manager

ABOUT YOUTHCARE: YouthCare works to end youth homelessness and to ensure that young people are valued for who they are and empowered to achieve their potential. Founded in 1974, YouthCare was one of the first programs to serve runaway and homeless youth on the West Coast. The goal was to help young people find safety today and build a future for tomorrow. Over four decades, we’ve defined best practices and developed programs that are a national standard for excellence. Using a youth-centered approach, we ensure that young people experiencing homelessness ages 12-24 have the hope, skills, and confidence to gain long-term stability.

ABOUT THE DEVELOPMENT TEAM: YouthCare’s Development Team provides young people and staff at YouthCare with the support and items young people need to get off the streets and prepare for life. The team is responsible for fundraising, community engagement, external communications, public policy work, volunteer and in-kind donation management, and much more!

POSITION SUMMARY: Under the supervision of the Community Campaign Project Director, the Major Gifts Manager will work collaboratively with the Development team and agency leadership to implement tailored strategies to identify, qualify, cultivate, solicit, and steward individual major donors and prospects. This position will build an annual stewardship plan, ensuring for robust and authentic relationships with key YouthCare supporters and prospective and existing major donors. This position will provide strategic thinking and project management support to meet annual revenue goals. In addition, the Major Gifts Manager will be responsible for building and supporting a new board alumni group.

ESSENTIAL RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Be a thought partner with the Associate Director of Development and Community Campaign Project Director to provide significant leadership towards direct donor relations. Lead execution and evaluation of key activities and relationships. 
• Support external relationships through leading initial tours in program environments, engaging with individuals hopeful to link to YouthCare as supporters, and presenting at community gatherings.
• Support the development of a board alumni community, serve as primary contact, and steward the group with the goal of growing the group over time.
• Build and maintain a planned giving program at YouthCare.
• Serve as initial point of welcome and contact for major donors with questions, stories, ideas, or who need support to complete a project on YouthCare’s behalf.
• Work in constant collaboration with Development team to evaluate existing major donor relationships and new introductions, determine next-steps, and serve as central task and strategy manager for major donor support and correspondence.
• Build expanded major donor stewardship calendar to deepen relationships and investments (financial, expertise, and introductions) from prospective major donors and current major donors to increase donor loyalty.
• Work in collaboration with the team to build multi-year growth plans for major donors and major donor prospects.
• Working with communications staff, help to develop customized outreach materials (paper and digital) for current and prospective major donors and other key community stakeholders
• Evaluate and make recommendations for updated and more tailored “thank you” procedures, work with Associate Director of Development and communications team on implementation and evaluation.
• Collaborate with the Community Campaign Project Director and Individual Giving Specialist to ideate, select, map, and execute on future virtual fundraising and donor cultivation events. 
• Support Development team on the planning and execution of the signature annual luncheon.
• Work with Community Campaign Project Director, Associate Director of Development, and the Development team to support the community campaign as needed.
• Build and maintain working knowledge of youth homelessness, Seattle homelessness trends, and YouthCare’s programs and remain consistently updated on changing and nuanced donor messaging in order to be able to answer a myriad of questions or redirect to appropriate staff. Serve as an ambassador and momentum creator for YouthCare’s mission in a variety of environments.
• Create and manage budget for major donor engagement in partnership with Associate Director of Development.
• Use donor database to consistently track and note relationships and communications with current major donors and major donor prospects to drive solicitation strategies.
• Work with Donor Database Assistant to support gift tracking and timely acknowledgment.
• Support the Development Department in all its endeavors to reach annual revenue goals; serve to support teammates and overall departmental success.