Senior Associate

Incorporated as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization in 2007, The Beacon’s mission is to provide essential and next-step services to restore hope and help end homelessness in Houston.

We accomplish this by providing compassionate services to individuals experiencing homelessness with the goal of helping them achieve housing stability and improved well-being.

The Beacon operates the largest drop‑in day center in downtown Houston and is a key partner in The Way Home Continuum of Care.

As such, The Beacon serves as the primary entry point for individuals seeking housing and supportive services.

The Senior Advancement Associate plays a key role in leading and strengthening The Beacon’s volunteer program, community engagement, organizational awareness, and advancement operations. Reporting to the Chief Advancement Officer (CAO), this position serves as the team lead for volunteer administration and community engagement functions that attract the resources and support to advance The Beacon’s mission.

The Senior Advancement Associate has primary responsibility for establishing and maintaining formal volunteer recruitment, orientation, retention, and recognition practices to ensure that The Beacon maintains a strong and reliable volunteer pipeline to meet ongoing program needs.

This position will also play a lead role in community engagement opportunities including but not limited to volunteer fairs, corporate fairs and engagement events, church outreach, and other opportunities to raise awareness of The Beacon in the community. This position will also manage a small grants portfolio of opportunities that are $25,000 or less and primarily from religious and/or corporate groups.

This role also serves as a key project and operational partner to the CAO, helping coordinate advancement priorities, improve internal processes, prepare donor and board materials, and ensure projects move efficiently from planning through completion. The ideal candidate is highly organized, technologically capable, detail-oriented, collaborative, and able to independently manage multiple priorities while exercising sound judgment with confidential donor and organizational information.

• Build out and manage a formal volunteer program for The Beacon that includes: recruitment, orientation, onboarding, retention, and recognition.
• Partner with Day Center and program leadership to establish ongoing volunteer staffing needs, monitor volunteer coverage, identify recurring gaps, and proactively recruit individuals and groups to meet program needs.
• Develop and maintain an active pipeline of individual, corporate, faith-based, civic, school, and community volunteer partners, with an emphasis on converting one‑time volunteers and groups into regular volunteers.
• Recruit, train, and manage staff and external volunteers for The Beacon’s annual Come to the Table gala.
• Coordinate volunteer registration and administrative processes, including responding to inquiries, assisting volunteers with registration systems, and troubleshooting registration issues.
• Maintain accurate volunteer records and regularly track and report volunteer participation, hours, coverage, retention, recurring volunteers, and groups, cancellations/no‑show, recruitment sources, and other engagement trends.
• Lead the planning and execution of an annual volunteer appreciation event.
• Develop tools and processes to collect regular volunteer feedback.
• Identify and share opportunities for stronger integration between volunteer engagement and The Beacon’s broader advancement and donor stewardship efforts.

• Represent The Beacon at community engagement events including but not limited to:…