Prospect Manager

Prospect Manager is responsible for overall leadership of prospect development functions including, but not limited to, portfolio assignments and optimization, pipeline management, prospect identification, and portfolio analysis. He/she serves as a strategy partner to fundraisers to help them meet their goals. In partnership with the Prospect Researcher, he/she identifies/proposes new prospects for potential assignment to portfolios, ensures fundraisers have the information they need to move assigned prospects through the donor cycle, and contributes to executive research needs on an as-needed basis.

The Prospect Manager will report to and collaborate closely with the Executive Director of Operations and Analytics to ensure prospect development processes and reports are created, refined, and standardized to be as efficient as possible. He/she will work closely with the AVP Major and Planned Gifts to support portfolio development and help measure and evaluate gifts officers’ progress towards meeting fundraising goals and performance metrics.

• Lead prospect assignment process to achieve appropriately balanced portfolios for principal gifts through leadership annual (Leadership Circle) gifts.
• Manage and regularly review major and principal gift pipeline; conduct monthly pipeline management meetings to review progress towards organization-wide fundraising goals.
• Lead and conduct quarterly portfolio management meetings with each gift officer to evaluate changes in portfolio balance and the need to grow or refresh portfolios.
• Encourage and facilitate (when necessary) strategy sessions between gift officers and key people involved in the relationship with top donors/prospects. Ensure all materials are prepared for these meetings and distributed ahead of time.
• Determine when prospects should be moved to active prospect lists for cultivation, solicitation and stewardship.
• Lead pipeline building efforts through research, including a pipeline for Board member recruitment with a concentration on demographic and affinity-focused priorities.
• Develop and expand upon policies, procedures, and systems necessary for the identification, evaluation, and tracking of prospects, including contract report and proposal recording systems.
• Conduct prospect analysis to inform proactive research activities.
• Conduct in-depth research to identify and qualify major gift prospects.
• Prepare detailed prospect profiles, meeting briefings, and corporate strategy summaries for key stakeholders.
• Manage and regularly review campaign pipeline and annotated pyramid.
• Work with fundraising leadership to envision and anticipate future department/school needs.
• Participate intensively in campaign planning.

• Bachelor's degree required.
• Three to five years of experience in donor prospect management and research and a thorough working knowledge and understanding of best practices related to prospect research and fundraising.
• One to three years of experience carrying a portfolio and soliciting gifts from donors and prospects.
• Experience conceptualizing, developing and implementing proactive prospecting methodologies to identify potential major gift donors.
• Advanced analytical skills to synthesize a high volume of information from a variety of sources and perform complex analysis.
• Working knowledge of current prospect research technologies and databases.
• Enthusiastic about the application of analytics and use of technology, and a desire to improve efficiencies to the prospect management system.
• An excellent communicator and collaborator with colleagues; prefers working in a team environment.
• Manage and maintain rating system and department-wide adherence to contact report and proposal recording system and deadlines.
• Guide constituent list segmentation for annual giving appeals, planned giving appeals and marketing, and alumni outreach.
• Lead analysis in tracking and reporting on wealth screening and research results.
• At the university's discretion, the education and experience prerequisites may be exempted where the candidate can demonstrate to the satisfaction of the university, an equivalent combination of education and experience specifically preparing the candidate for success in the position.