Development Officer

DEVELOPMENT OFFICER

Position Overview

Healthy Humor seeks a strategic and operationally excellent Development Officer to help drive the execution of an ambitious $1.3-1.5 M fundraising strategy in 2026. This role is critical to the organization's 10th anniversary year, requiring a professional who can manage multiple revenue channels and scale the organization's development capacity.

The Development Officer is responsible for leading the operational execution of Healthy Humor's $1.5M fundraising strategy across seven revenue workstreams: 10th Anniversary Gala, Institutional Grants, Major Donors & Corporate Giving, Running of the Noses peer-to-peer charity race, Annual Fund & Digital, plus Infrastructure and Asset Creation.

This role reports to the CEO and works in close partnership through non-negotiable weekly development meetings. By Day 60, the DO owns 90% of fundraising operations, with the CEO focusing on major donor cultivation and strategic leadership.

Start Date: March 30, 2026 | Reports to: CEO | Location: Remote with NYC presence

Primary Responsibilities

INSTITUTIONAL GRANT WRITING (35-40% of time)

• Manage all aspects of proposal development: research, writing, budget narratives, evaluation frameworks, CEO input and evaluation coordination
• Maintain and grow a master prospect list of 100+ foundations (national and regional)
• Manage grants calendar with all deadlines, reporting requirements, and renewal dates
• Steward foundation relationships through timely reports, updates, and acknowledgments

CAMPAIGN MANAGMENT (25-30% of time)

10th Anniversary Gala (October 2026):

• Assist in all gala operations: sponsor outreach, materials creation, logistics coordination, vendor management
• Support CEO in closing top 10-15 sponsors; own remaining 20+ sponsor relationships
• Execute invitation mailing, RSVP tracking, seating, program book production

Running of the Noses (March-July 2026):

• Assist campaign launch, execution, and follow-up
• Manage City Captains across 10 cities, track runner recruitment (target: 100+ runners)
• Execute Match Week in May, and provide support to runners and committee

Annual Fund & Digital (ongoing):

• Manage Monthly donor program and email campaigns (April-December), Giving Tuesday, year-end campaign

INFRASTRUCTURE AND SYSTEMS (15-20% of time)

• CRM management (Bloomerang): donor database, pipeline tracking, reporting dashboards
• Weekly Development Meetings with CEO: pipeline review, strategic planning, decision-making
• Donor stewardship: e.g. acknowledgment letters, impact reports
• Board and committee support: materials preparation, meeting facilitation when needed

CEO PARTNERSHIP AND SUPPORT (10-15% of time)

• Prepare CEO for key donor meetings: briefings, materials, talking points, follow-up coordination
• Assist CEO's major donor pipeline
• Coordinate cultivation dinners, thank-you calls, and stewardship touches

Key Performance Indicators

Org Revenue Targets (2026):

• Total revenue: $1.35M-$1.5M across all workstreams (Institutional grants, Gala, Running of the Noses, Annual Fund)

Operational Metrics:

• Take full ownership by Day 90 (90% of fundraising operations)
• Write and submit 25-40 grant proposals annually (target: 2-3 per month)
• Target: 50+ monthly donors by year-end, 2,000+ email subscribers
• Post-ROTN: convert 20-40 runners to monthly donors, identify 10-20 major donor prospects
• CRM data accuracy and pipeline visibility maintained weekly
• Donor acknowledgments within 72 hours of gift receipt

Compensation

Salary: $80,000-$90,000 depending on experience, plus access to health coverage and ability to contribute to retirement plan

Location: Remote with regular NYC presence for meetings and events

Start Date: March 31, 2026

IDEAL NON-PROFIT CANDIDATE

Experience Level: 5-7 Years

We're looking for a mid-level professional who has moved beyond entry-level fundraising and is ready to own a complex, multi-workstream development operation. This person has 5-7 years of progressive fundraising experience, ideally including roles where they've taken increasing ownership of revenue generation and donor management.

Desired Qualities

• Mission-Aligned: Genuinely connects with HH's work
• Systems Thinker: Will use CRM religiously, not build workarounds
• Action-Oriented: Doesn't wait for perfect info, executes quickly
• Storyteller: Can write compelling emails and proposals
• Relationship Builder: Cultivates donors, not just transactions
• Organized & Detail-Oriented: Tracks every interaction, follows through
• Comfortable Asking; Can make asks (with training)
• Coachable: Takes feedback, improves quickly

Specific Core Competencies

Institutional Grant Writing (CRITICAL)

• Track record of securing $500K+ in foundation funding annually
• Experience writing significant grant proposals per year (12+ per year)
• Strong proposal writing, budget narrative, and evaluation framework skills
• Understanding of foundation research, cultivation, and stewardship

Campaign Management & Execution

• Experience managing peer-to-peer campaigns or grassroots fundraising
• Track record of hitting revenue targets across multiple channels simultaneously
• Strong project management skills with ability to juggle 5-7 active workstreams

Systems Thinking & Infrastructure Building

• CRM proficiency (Bloomerang, Salesforce, DonorPerfect, or similar)
• Experience building donor pipelines, tracking systems, and reporting dashboards
• Strategic mindset: can translate big-picture strategy into operational tactics

Communication & Storytelling

• Excellent writer who can translate clinical impact into compelling narratives
• Experience developing donor-facing materials (decks, one-pagers, impact reports)
• Strong interpersonal skills for working with volunteers, committees, and others

Personal Attributes

Ownership Mentality: This role requires someone who takes initiative, problem-solves independently, and thrives with autonomy. By Day 60, you own 90% of fundraising operations.

High Standards: Attention to detail, commitment to excellence in every donor touchpoint.

Resilience & Adaptability: Comfortable with intensity, able to handle rejection, willing to iterate and improve based on results.

Mission Alignment: Passion for healthcare, pediatrics, or therapeutic arts.

Collaboration: Strong partnership with CEO through weekly development meetings. Ability to prep CEO for donor meetings, provide strategic counsel, and manage up effectively.

What We're NOT Looking For

✗ Entry-level professionals (0-3 years) - This role requires proven fundraising results and operational experience

✗ Major gifts specialists only - We need grants + campaigns + systems, not just relationship fundraising

✗ Event planners - While gala execution is part of this role, we need a fundraiser who manages events, not an event manager who does fundraising

• ✗ '9-to-5' mindset

Q3 (July-September) is peak season requiring higher intensity. We need someone who understands and embraces fundraising cycles and can flex accordingly.

IDEAL FOR-PROFIT CANDIDATE

Sales & Customer Success Professionals

Experience Level: 5-7 Years

We're looking for a mid-level professional who has moved beyond entry-level sales/customer success roles and is ready to own a complex, multi-channel revenue operation. This person has 5-7 years of progressive experience in sales, business development, account management, or customer success—ideally including roles where they've taken increasing ownership of revenue targets and relationship management.

Your Transferable Skills

• Sales/Business Development = Fundraising/Development
• Pipeline management = Donor cultivation tracking
• Closing deals = Securing commitments/gifts
• Prospecting & lead generation = Prospect research & identification
• Account management = Major donor cultivation
• Customer success/retention = Donor stewardship/retention
• Upselling/expansion revenue = Upgrading donor commitments
• CRM management (Salesforce, HubSpot) = Donor database management (Bloomerang, Salesforce)
• Sales decks & presentations = Funding proposals & donor materials
• Quota attainment = Revenue target achievement
• Campaign/promotion execution = Fundraising campaign management
• Customer journey mapping = Donor journey/moves management

Desired Qualities

• Mission-Aligned: Ready to trade commission for impact. Genuinely care about healthcare, kids, or therapeutic arts
• Systems Thinker: Will use CRM religiously, not build workarounds
• Action-Oriented: Doesn't wait for perfect info, executes quickly
• Target-driven: understand quotas, forecasting, and accountability. Revenue targets motivate, not intimidate
• Storyteller: Can write compelling emails and proposals
• Relationship Builder: Cultivates donors, not just transactions
• Organized & Detail-Oriented: Tracks every interaction, follows through
• Comfortable Asking; Can make asks (with training)
• Coachable: Takes feedback, improves quickly

Specific Core Competencies

Revenue Generation & Pipeline Management

What This Looks Like in Nonprofit:

• Track record of consistently hitting or exceeding revenue targets ($500K+ annually)
• Managing multiple revenue channels simultaneously (in our case: grants, gala, peer-to-peer, major donors, annual fund)
• Building and managing pipelines with 50-150 prospects across various stages
• Forecasting revenue and tracking progress against goals weekly/monthly

For-Profit Equivalent:

If you've managed a sales pipeline with 6-12 month deal cycles, qualified leads through discovery calls, and closed $500K+ in annual revenue (either individually or as part of a team), you have exactly what we need. Fundraising is just sales where the 'product' is impact instead of software or services.

Relationship Management & Customer Success Mindset

What This Looks Like in Nonprofit:

• Donor retention and engagement (like customer retention and upselling)
• Building long-term relationships that deepen over time, not just transactional interactions
• Creating touchpoints that add value: impact reports, thank-you calls, quarterly updates, behind-the-scenes content
• Identifying opportunities to 'upgrade' donors (increase giving) through strategic cultivation

For-Profit Equivalent:

If you've ever been responsible for customer retention metrics (churn rate, NPS, renewal rates), managed key accounts, or built customer success playbooks, you already understand donor stewardship. The same principles apply: understand their motivations, deliver value, communicate proactively, and create reasons to stay engaged.

Systems Thinking & Operations

What This Looks Like in Nonprofit:

• CRM proficiency: Bloomerang, Salesforce, DonorPerfect (if you know Salesforce or HubSpot, you'll pick these up in a week)
• Building workflows, templates, and scalable processes (just like RevOps or Sales Ops)
• Creating dashboards and reports for tracking performance (similar to sales dashboards)
• Translating strategy into operational tactics (like going from annual targets to weekly activities)

For-Profit Equivalent:

If you've built out a CRM, created sales playbooks, automated email sequences, or designed customer onboarding flows, you understand systems thinking. Nonprofit fundraising desperately needs this mindset—most organizations run on spreadsheets and gut instinct. Your operational rigor will be a superpower here.

Project Management & Multi-Tasking

What This Looks Like in Nonprofit:

• Managing 5-7 active revenue workstreams simultaneously (grants, events, campaigns)
• Coordinating committees, volunteers, and vendors (stakeholder management)
• Hitting deadlines across different timelines (grant deadlines, event dates, campaign launches)
• Prioritizing ruthlessly when everything feels urgent

For-Profit Equivalent:

If you've managed product launches, coordinated cross-functional teams, or balanced multiple accounts with different needs and timelines, you already know how to juggle complexity. In this role, you'll be managing a gala (like a product launch), writing grants (like RFP responses), running a peer-to-peer campaign (like a partner/channel program), and cultivating major donors (like enterprise accounts)—all at once.

Communication & Storytelling

What This Looks Like in Nonprofit:

• Writing compelling proposals and donor materials (like sales decks and case studies)
• Translating complex impact into emotional narratives (like translating technical features into customer benefits)
• Creating email campaigns that drive action (like marketing emails, but for giving)
• Coaching the CEO on donor conversations (like coaching an executive before a big pitch)

For-Profit Equivalent:

If you've written proposals, created pitch decks, developed customer case studies, or trained others on effective sales messaging, you can absolutely translate those skills to fundraising communications. The mechanics are the same: understand your audience, identify their pain points/values, articulate your unique value proposition (in our case, impact), and make it easy for them to say yes.

What Makes For-Profit Candidates GREAT for This Role

You're Used to Being Held Accountable: In sales and customer success, your performance is measured weekly or monthly. You're used to pipeline reviews, forecast calls, and performance metrics. This translates beautifully to nonprofit fundraising, where rigor, discipline, and accountability are key

You Think Like an Operator, Not Just a Fundraiser: For-profit professionals understand that hitting targets requires systems, processes, and infrastructure—not just effort. You know how to build a machine, not just work harder. This is exactly what Healthy Humor needs: someone who can build fundraising infrastructure that scales, not just hustle to close deals.

You're Comfortable with Aggressive Targets: Our $1.5M goal is ambitious. Many nonprofit professionals might feel overwhelmed. But if you've ever had a $2M quota or managed a customer success book worth $5M in ARR, you understand how to break big numbers into manageable activities. You know that aggressive targets are achieved through consistent execution, not magic.

You Understand Urgency and Velocity: In sales, speed matters. You respond to leads quickly, move deals through the pipeline efficiently, and understand that urgency creates momentum. Nonprofit fundraising can be slow and bureaucratic—your bias toward action will be a massive competitive advantage.

You're Data-Driven, Not Gut-Driven: You make decisions based on conversion rates, pipeline velocity, and performance metrics—not anecdotes or feelings. This analytical approach will help you identify what's working, double down on successful strategies, and cut what's not delivering results.

What We're NOT Looking For

✗ Entry-level SDRs/BDRs (0-3 years) - This role requires proven ability to own revenue targets and manage complex relationships independently

✗ Pure individual contributors who've never built systems - We need someone who can build infrastructure, not just execute tasks

✗ Transactional sellers - If you've only done short sales cycles (days or weeks), you may struggle with 6-12 month donor cultivation timelines

✗ 9-to-5 mindset - Q3 (July-September) is peak season requiring higher intensity. If you've never worked through busy seasons or end-of-quarter pushes, this may not be the right fit.

Access to health coverage and ability to contribute to retirement plan

Fluent in English