Director, Donor Relations

Vice President for Development

New York’s first museum, The New York Historical is a leading cultural institution documenting over 400 years of American history through a peerless collection of art, documents, and artifacts. Our offerings span groundbreaking exhibitions; acclaimed educational programs for teachers and students nationwide; and thought-provoking conversations among leading scholars, journalists, and thinkers about the past, present, and future of the American experiment.

The New York Historical is a museum of museums and a collection of collections. We are home to the Patricia

D. Klingenstein Library, the Center for Women’s History, the Reiss Family Graduate Institute for Constitutional History, the Dorothy Tapper Goldman Center for Teaching Democracy, the DiMenna Children’s History Museum, and the future American LGBTQ+ Museum. We elevate the perspectives and scholarship that define the United States’ democratic heritage and challenge us all to shape our ongoing history for the better.

The Development Department secures funding to advance The New York Historical’s mission, fostering relationships with individuals, foundations, and corporations to raise philanthropic support, driving membership growth, working with government funders, and securing contributed revenue through event rentals in our landmarked building.

The Director of Donor Relations leads strategies and programs that strengthen donor and member relationships, demonstrates the impact of philanthropy, and supports retention and revenue growth. The position oversees donor stewardship, membership, annual giving, and donor communications, using data to drive strategic decision-making and program growth. The Director supervises two employees.

• Lead the development and implementation of comprehensive donor stewardship, membership, and annual giving strategies to deepen engagement, demonstrate the impact of giving, and grow, retain, and upgrade the Museum’s donor base;
• Develop messaging strategies and content to engage, retain, and inspire supporters. Collaborate with institutional leadership, program teams, and external partners to create compelling impact narratives and donor-facing materials, including case documents, proposals, reports, letters, emails, the website, and other materials as needed;
• Leverage data, donor insights, and analytics to inform strategy and drive growth across donor relations, membership, annual giving, and communications, improving retention, recurring giving, and donor lifetime value while developing qualification and engagement strategies that build a strong pipeline for mid-level and major giving;
• Establish systems, processes, and standards for tracking and reporting on significant programmatic, endowed, and capital gifts, leveraging Tessitura. Oversee the planning, preparation, editing, quality control, and distribution of compelling donor communications and reports;
• Manage and continuously improve gift acknowledgement strategies, processes, and correspondence, developing differentiated approaches based on gift level, engagement, and philanthropic potential. Establish efficient workflows and standards, leveraging Tessitura, to ensure timely, accurate, and appropriately personalized acknowledgement of gifts. Provide direction and quality control for acknowledgement correspondence and write bespoke correspondence for Museum leaders as appropriate;
• Manage donor recognition and naming strategy and implementation for exhibitions, programs, capital projects, named spaces, and positions. Establish standards, guidelines, and approval processes to ensure naming commitments, agreements, and recognition requirements are accurately documented, tracked, and…