Position Overview
Director, Corporate and Foundation Partnerships, to lead the organization’s institutional fundraising efforts. This individual will build and steward engaging and sustainable partnerships with corporations and foundations to support a growing organization. The Director will work closely with the entire development team, impact staff, corps, boards, and other volunteers.
Job Description
City Year is seeking a Director of National Corporate Partnerships and Development, a strong and thoughtful relationship-builder leading the growth of City Year’s existing national corporate partnerships to support our mission to enable students in systemically under-resourced schools to succeed. Annual philanthropic support from companies is essential to City Year’s ability to sustain and grow our capacity to provide supports to students in systemically under-resourced schools across the country. The Director will be responsible for building a pipeline of new potential national corporate partners, supporting the qualification, building the engagement strategy, supporting the pitch and securing revenue from new national partners. This position will play a critical role on the City Year National Development team that is responsible for raising $33 million annually across corporations, foundations and individual donors.
Reporting to the Vice President of National Corporate Partnerships, you will ensure that we meet our strategic objective of engaging companies in the education and national service agenda by building and maintaining integrated partnerships that advance the goals of both City Year and the partnering company. As an engaging communicator, relationship builder and project manager, you will serve as the main relationship lead for a portfolio of national corporate partnerships by proactively assessing stakeholder needs and going above and beyond to ensure partnership satisfaction. This includes providing superior partnership management, building authentic relationships, holding regular check-ins, delivering impact reports and guiding the strategic growth of those partnerships. You will also be responsible for leading the renewal of these partnerships on an annual basis and identifying revenue growth opportunities.
You will be responsible for collaborating with various City Year national departments (e.g., Marketing and Communications, Program Design, Recruitment, Career Pathways, etc.), senior leadership and staff at our 29 City Year sites across the country to manage, activate partnership elements and grow our corporate partnerships – an excellent opportunity to learn about all facets of the organization and build strong working and collaborative relationships. You’ll support our site Development leads and provide national updates, information and resources to assist their work locally. In addition, you will gather data and impact stories and collaborate with our Marketing and Communications team to support the communications strategies (e.g., social media, blogs, etc.) to showcase the impact of our partnership and demonstrate a return on investment to our partners.
In addition to managing a portfolio of national partnerships, in collaboration with the Vice President of Development, you will manage the national pipeline, prioritize prospects, and determine appropriate cultivation strategies to deepen companies’ interest and secure their commitment. The Director is responsible for leveraging existing relationships across the organization and leading outreach via targeted prospecting, conference and event attendance and other activities as needed to build a robust pipeline of potential corporate partners. The Director will prioritize prospects and allocate time and resources appropriately to ensure maximum return for City Year. You will also stay apprised of areas of need and opportunities to advance City Year’s work to proactively drive funder interest and resources towards them.
In this role, you will engage companies in our work, identify the greatest points of alignment, and support the development proposals in collaboration with National Headquarters and City Year site team colleagues. This includes developing proposals and sales materials that distill the partnership opportunity and communicate the impact the company can have for the students we serve in a succinct and compelling way. You will lead the engagement strategy and the cultivation team to execute elements and touchpoints with the prospect. You will also be responsible for building a robust pipeline that ensures we have sufficient prospects we are cultivating two fiscal years ahead.
A life-long learner, you will be curious and eager to understand all you can about the corporate partners you work with. You’ll be a passionate advocate for the responsibility and opportunity that companies have to positively impact the communities in which they operate. And as you quickly build rapport with your portfolio of corporate partners, you’ll identify opportunities to inspire and grow those relationships into larger, multi-year commitments that invest in the success of our City Year AmeriCorps Members and the students, schools and communities that they serve.
Your outcomes will include:
- Successfully managing a portfolio of corporate partnerships, delivering on all elements of partnership agreements and reporting back to the companies about the return on their partnership investment.
- Communicate with partners regularly via calls, emails and in-person visits keeping them up to date on partnership activities.
- Lead on the internal strategies, communication and coordination of activity across departments including external and internal written communications, impact, leadership, etc. to ensure alignment and effective execution of partnership initiatives.
- Generate renewed and increased commitments from current corporate partners for the following fiscal year.
- Working with a team of colleagues that support the partner relationship, develop and deliver on a plan to cultivate each of your partners over the course of the year.
- Continuously seek to better understand your partner companies’ business and corporate responsibility goals, strategies, programs, measurement, etc. so that you can proactively bring new ideas and opportunities for them to increase the return on their partnership with City Year.
- Lead efforts to identify, qualify, and cultivate national corporate partner prospects, with a goal to secure $1M in new funding for the next fiscal year.
- This includes conducting market research to surface leads for potential new national partnerships, qualifying leads through research and outreach.
- Leading the engagement strategy for qualified prospects, including convening the cultivation team (national and local), leading the moves management of the prospect, supporting the cultivation and pitch strategy and leading sales material development.
- Build a pipeline with the potential for $1.5 million in new funding in the next fiscal year, by adding prospects into the discovery phase, identifying forward-looking areas of need and opportunity to advance City Year’s work, and advancing prospects through the pipeline.
- Collaborate with the Vice President of National Corporate Partnerships and national departments to identify forward-looking organizational priorities and packaging them for the corporate audience.
- Identify the top 5-6 national corporate prospects to build the long-term engagement and cultivation strategy, including SLT engagement.
- Leverage Salesforce platform to ensure prospects in the national partner pipeline are advancing through cultivation phases and serve as an expert user of these pipeline management tools.
- Provide ongoing communication to engage and support site development teams in driving corporate partnership success.
- Communicate with City Year site staff in 29 cities to ensure local Development leads can successfully activate key national partner initiatives by outlining clear objectives, facilitating best practice sharing and helping to overcome challenges.
- Develop site communications templates, briefings and a variety of internal and external communications around partnership activities and reporting requirements.
- Assist with increased site funding opportunities where possible with national partners (e.g. facilitating introductions to new sites, supporting asks for increased funding for currently supported sites, etc.).
Qualifications
- Passion for City Year’s mission and values.
- 8-10+ years of experience in the corporate responsibility, account management, philanthropy, or nonprofit sector with a demonstrated track record of success.
- Experience managing a pipeline via a prospect database; Salesforce experience a plus.
- Strong organizational skills, project management, attention to detail and the ability to balance, accomplish tasks on time with high quality, and prioritize multiple high-priority deliverables simultaneously.
- Clearly articulates information and ideas orally and in writing, demonstrates active listening skills, inspires diverse audiences through compelling, tailored messaging and storytelling that integrates data and emotional appeal and ability to develop a variety of written communications (e.g., emails, pitch concepts, partnership presentations, etc.).
- Ability to synthesize complex ideas into clear and compelling concepts and communicate them via developing a visual PowerPoint presentation.
- Builds trust in critical internal and external relationships, ability to understand corporate partner prospect and City Year goals and serve as the advocate for and deliver on those shared objectives, uses interpersonal interactions to achieve mutually beneficial outcomes and advance City Year’s mission, demonstrates personal presence and confidence when working with partners.
- Strong relationship building skills; it is easy for you to make connections with diverse groups and individuals, you invest in getting to know and understand people and you build trust quickly and authentically.
- Competency and desire to learn and grow in diversity, equity, inclusivity, and belonging work.
- Strong presentation, negotiation and liaison skills are required.
- Orientation for problem solving and identifying and developing opportunities for expanded partnership.
- Collaborative work style; teamwork orientation.
- Desire to learn; willing and eager to continue to be a life-long learner.
- Strong and efficient use of Microsoft Office; Specifically, with Microsoft PowerPoint.
Additional Qualities Needed
- Excellent Writing Skills: Ability to craft coherent, organized, and compelling proposals and reports. Effective and persuasive storyteller. Ability to distill complicated topics into language that is accessible.
- Communication: Ability to communicate mission and vision to diverse audiences using creative storytelling to connect to passions and purpose; clearly articulates information and ideas orally and in writing.
- Executes to Results: takes initiative, produces high quality work, prioritizes appropriately, and accepts accountability; delegates responsibilities and holds others accountable.
- External Relationship Development: takes initiative in establishing new relationships and external opportunities; strong interpersonal and relationship-building skills in one-on-one and large group settings.
- Project Management, Coordination, Facilitation: Ability to lead, direct, and motivate teammates across the organization responsible for delivering on discreet aspects of grant proposals or reports.
- Effective Collaborator: Builds authentic relationships with colleagues within the National Development team and across departments. Ability to work collaboratively and effectively with a diverse, largely remote staff.
Location
Preferred Boston-based applicants, with flexibility for internal candidates to serve remotely with a need to be based in Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, or Philadelphia.
Compensation and Benefits
Full-time employees are entitled to compensation commensurate with experience. Salary range for this role is $90,000 - $100,000. Benefits for full-time employees include health insurance with Flexible Spending Account, paid vacation, holidays, parental leave, 401K, and more.
City Year is an Equal Opportunity Employer, committed to a diverse workforce. Individuals from all backgrounds are encouraged to apply, including persons with disabilities and veterans.
Benefits
Full-time employees will be eligible for all benefits including vacation and sick days and organization holidays. You may participate in all benefit programs that City Year establishes and makes available to eligible employees, under (and subject to all provisions of) the plan documents that govern those programs. Currently, City Year offers medical, dental and vision, life, accidental death and dismemberment and disability coverage, Flexible Spending Accounts (FSA), other benefits including 401(k) plan(s) pursuant to the terms and conditions of company policy and the 401(k) plan document.
Employment at City Year is at-will.
City Year does not sponsor work authorization visas.
COVID-19 Notice
Our number one priority is the health and safety of our employees and AmeriCorps members and their families; our students and school partners; and the community at large from COVID-19. Proof of COVID-19 vaccination is required for employment and service – all staff members, including remote staff, and AmeriCorps members are required to be fully vaccinated* no later than their start date. If you are unable to be vaccinated for medical reasons or sincerely-held religious beliefs, we will consider requests for reasonable accommodation consistent with our policy, and where we are able to provide such accommodations without undue hardship to the organization pursuant to applicable law. Notwithstanding any language herein, City Year will comply with any state, local, or federal orders, statutes, or regulations that may conflict with the COVID-19 vaccination policy.
- Individuals are considered fully vaccinated 14 days after the completion of their primary vaccination series.