Mission Manager

Looking to match your professional drive with a passion for animals? Welcome to Heartland Animal Shelter
. We are a progressive, community-forward organization dedicated to saving lives, protecting human-animal bonds, and redefining animal welfare. For an ambitious professional, Heartland isn’t just a place to work—it’s a launchpad. Here, you will find an energetic, collaborative environment where your ideas are valued, your network will expand, and your hustle directly impacts hundreds of homeless animals and the people who adopt them every single day.

If you’re ready to build your career while making a tangible difference, you belong at Heartland.

Heartland Animal Shelter is seeking a highly organized, strategic, and results-driven Mission Advancement Manager to spearhead the planning, execution, and growth of our fundraising events and initiatives. This role is responsible for raising $250,000 in revenue signature initiatives—including the Walk of Love peer-to-peer event and the Golden Paw Gala— as well as supporting Heartland’s Young Professionals fundraising events, third-party fundraising events and donor cultivation events throughout the year.

As a vital member of the Mission Advancement team and a fundraising professional, the ideal candidate will look beyond logistics to actively help identify, cultivate, and steward new and existing supporters across all events, campaigns, and initiatives. The perfect fit is a collaborative project manager who excels at leading sponsorship solicitation, event marketing strategy, donor relationship-building, and flawless on-site event operations.

• Target Ownership: Drive strategies to meet or exceed the annual $215,000 revenue target across ticketing, table sales, peer-to-peer registrations, live/silent auctions, Fund-A-Cause appeals, and third-party events.
• Fundraising Professionalism: Actively identify, cultivate, and steward new and existing supporters, donors, and corporate partners across all events, campaigns, and advancement initiatives to deepen their connection to Heartland.
• Mid-Level Sponsor ships: Conduct proactive outreach to local businesses, veterinary clinics, pet stores, and community shops to secure cash sponsor ships, vendor village booths, and gala program advertisements.
• Corporate
  
  Collaboration:
  
  Partner with the Mission Advancement Director on high-level corporate outreach ($2,500+ sponsorship requests).
• Fulfillment & Benefit Management: Serve as the primary point of contact for sponsors. Collect logos, manage the master fulfillment checklist, coordinate guest lists, and ensure all marketing/promotional deliverables (e.g., t-shirts, route markers, screens) are perfectly executed.
• Auction Procurement: Oversee all aspects of live and silent auction solicitation for the Gala. Source in-kind items, manage procurement letters, bundle items into high-value experiential packages, write descriptions, and manage inventory tracking in the event software.
• Heartland’s Young Professionals: Provide operational, administrative, and strategic support for fundraising events and initiatives driven by Heartland’s Young Professionals cohort, helping them maximize revenue and engagement.
• Third-Party Fundraising: Serve as the primary point of contact and support for external, community-led third-party fundraising events benefit ting Heartland, ensuring hosts have the necessary resources, guidelines, and stewardship alignment.

• Needs Assessment: Evaluate digital and physical asset requirements needed to drive ticket velocity, peer-to-peer participant registration, and auction engagement.
• Campaign Requests: Draft and submit formal, comprehensive marketing requests to the Director of Mission Advancement for execution (including direct emails, newsletter inclusions, flyers, social media assets, invitations, and signage).
• P2P Fundraising Enablement: Develop and design a "Walker Toolkit" featuring fundraising templates, sample social media copy, and tip sheets to empower peer-to-peer fundraisers.
• Recruitment & Outreach: Analyze registration platform…