Development director Jobs in St Louis, MO

Director Of Development

PreventEd is seeking a thoughtful, relationship-centered, and strategic Director of Development to lead a diversified fundraising program generating nearly $6 million annually through government grants, institutional funding, events, and individual giving.

The Director of Development will lead a team of 23 fundraising professionals + volunteers and work closely with the Executive Director, Board, program staff, and organizational partners to build the relationships and resources necessary to advance our mission.

We approach fundraising as more than securing money. Fundraising is an opportunity to build relationships, invite people into meaningful participation, and move resources toward the communities and issues at the heart of our work. We strive to practice fundraising in ways that are rooted in trust, reciprocity, transparency, dignity, and shared power.

The ideal candidate will be an experienced fundraiser who can balance meeting revenue goals with a strong commitment to community-centered fundraising practices. They will be equally comfortable developing strategy, managing a team, cultivating a major donor, writing a grant, supporting a board member through a solicitation, analyzing fundraising data, and listening deeply to the people most connected to the organization's work.

Under the immediate supervision of the Executive Director, the Director of Development serves as a member of the Executive Leadership team and oversees the Development team. The Director of Development is dedicated to generating revenue for the organization, both restricted and unrestricted, and helps donors reach their philanthropic goals.

Lead a Values-Based Fundraising Strategy

• Develop and implement an annual and multi-year fundraising strategy that supports the organization's mission, strategic priorities, and long-term sustainability.
• Lead a diversified fundraising program generating approximately $6 million annually across government grants, institutional funding, individual giving, events, and other contributed revenue.
• Ensure fundraising strategies are aligned with the organization's values and responsive to community priorities.
• Regularly assess not only how much money is raised, but how resources are raised, from whom, and at what cost to staff and community.
• Partner with organizational leadership to ensure that fundraising priorities do not drive or distort the organization's mission or programmatic commitments.

Build Authentic Relationships With Donors & Funders

• Cultivate relationships with individual donors, foundations, corporations, government partners, and other supporters based on shared values and mutual investment in the organization's mission.
• Develop donor engagement strategies that invite people to participate meaningfully rather than simply asking them to provide financial support.
• Personally cultivate, solicit, and steward a portfolio of major donors and prospects.
• Help donors understand the broader context of the organization's work and the systemic issues it seeks to address.
• Communicate impact without exploiting, sensationalizing, or diminishing the experiences of people and communities served by the organization.
• Create opportunities for donors to listen, learn, connect, and contribute beyond financial giving.
• Develop stewardship practices that demonstrate genuine appreciation without treating donors as customers or centering their preferences over community needs.
• Be willing to respectfully challenge donor or funder expectations when those expectations conflict with organizational values or community priorities.

Institutional & Government Fundraising

• Provide strategic leadership for the organization's foundation, corporate, and government funding portfolio.
• Build and maintain relationships with institutional funders whose priorities align with the organization's mission and values.
• Identify prospective funders and evaluate opportunities based on alignment, relationship potential, restrictions, reporting burden, and true organizational benefitnot simply available dollars.
• Oversee compelling proposals, letters of inquiry, budgets, reports, renewals, and other funder communications.
• Works closely with the Director of Advocacy and partners with program and community-facing staff as needed to ensure proposals accurately reflect the organization's work and community priorities.
• Advocate for flexible, multi-year, and unrestricted funding whenever possible.
• Help funders understand the importance of funding the organization's infrastructure, operations, and full cost of delivering its work.
• Maintain strong systems for tracking grants, deliverables, restrictions, reporting requirements, and renewal opportunities.

Individual Giving & Major Gifts

• Lead a relationship-centered individual giving program encompassing annual giving, major gifts, recurring giving, planned giving, and donor stewardship.
• Manage a portfolio of major donors and prospects and develop individualized cultivation and solicitation strategies.
• Make direct, meaningful fundraising asks and coach othersincluding the Executive Director and Boardin making them.
• Develop strategies to increase donor retention and deepen relationships without relying primarily on transactional fundraising tactics.
• Create opportunities for donors to understand and connect with the people, communities, and movements behind the organization's work.
• Ensure donor communications reflect the dignity, agency, and strengths of community members rather than using stories of hardship primarily to generate revenue.
• Develop accessible opportunities for people to contribute at different financial levels and in ways that go beyond monetary giving.

Events & Community Engagement

• Provide strategic oversight of fundraising events and campaigns.
• Evaluate events based on both financial performance and their ability to strengthen community, relationships, and participation.
• Develop event strategies that are welcoming and accessible to people across different income levels and backgrounds.
• Ensure that fundraising events do not create unnecessary financial, emotional, or labor burdens for community members or staff.
• Explore creative approaches to community fundraising, peer-to-peer engagement, and collective resource mobilization.

Lead & Develop the Fundraising Team

• Supervise, coach, and support a team of 23 development professionals.
• Establish clear goals, roles, workflows, and measures of success.
• Build a development culture that values collaboration, learning, experimentation, accountability, and joy.
• Develop staff members as relationship builders and fundraisers rather than simply task managers.
• Create opportunities for team members to develop their fundraising skills, professional networks, and leadership capacity.
• Ensure fundraising responsibilities and relationship-building labor are distributed equitably across the team.
• Model healthy boundaries and sustainable fundraising practices that recognize staff capacity and prevent burnout.

Partner With the Board & Executive Director

• Serve as a strategic thought partner to the Executive Director on revenue strategy, donor relationships, and organizational sustainability.
• Develop a strong partnership with the Board and help establish a shared understanding that fundraising is a collective organizational responsibility.
• Equip board members with the tools, training, information, and support needed to participate in fundraising in ways that feel authentic to them.
• Help board members identify prospective supporters through their own relationships and networks.
• Coach board members and organizational leaders in relationship-based cultivation, stewardship, and solicitation.
• Bring fundraising realities, opportunities, and challenges to leadership conversations with honesty and transparency.
• Help leadership assess when a fundraising opportunity is genuinely aligned with the organizationand when saying "no" is the more values-aligned choice.

Data, Systems & Fundraising Infrastructure

• Oversee effective use of the organization's donor database/CRM and fundraising systems.
• Maintain accurate records of donor relationships, prospects, solicitations, grants, and stewardship activities.
• Develop and monitor fundraising metrics, including revenue, donor retention, donor acquisition, upgrades, pipeline development, grant renewal, and event performance.
• Use data to support learning and decision-making rather than simply to measure individual staff performance.
• Develop revenue forecasts and regularly communicate progress, challenges, and opportunities to organizational leadership.
• Ensure timely and meaningful donor acknowledgment and stewardship.
• Build systems that make fundraising more sustainable, transparent, and equitable.

Core competencies include:

• 7+ years of progressive nonprofit fundraising experience.
• Demonstrated success managing or contributing significantly to a fundraising program of approximately $5 million or more annually.
• Experience with multiple fundraising streams, including government grants, foundation funding, individual giving, and events.
• Demonstrated experience with major gift fundraising and direct solicitation.
• Experience supervising and developing fundraising staff.
• Strong grant writing, proposal development, and relationship management skills.