Senior Major Gifts Officer

This is a fully remote position, open to applicants in United States.

📋 Description

• Participate in funder meetings together with executive leadership and program leads to identify, document, and drive follow-up actions.

• Mentor program directors on enhancing their communication and engagement with funders over time.

• Oversee funder strategies across Spark’s programs—aligning funders with programs, clarifying relationship owners, and timing the appropriate asks from the right program.

• Secure funding opportunities by grasping each donor’s perspective and portfolio, knowing when and how to make requests, and effectively managing grant proposal processes and timelines.

• Nurture individual funder relationships—monitoring each funder’s interests and responses, and aligning Spark’s recent achievements, research, and communication outputs with optimal engagement moments.

• Collaborate directly with scientists and program leads to convert intricate research into persuasive philanthropic narratives.

• Create high-quality materials for funders, such as briefings, proposals, reports, and stewardship updates.

• Represent Spark at field gatherings, donor events, and conferences.

• Maintain strict CRM standards and contribute to pipeline reporting and forecasting.

⛳️ Requirements

• Over 7 years of hands-on fundraising experience or equivalent sales or business development experience, with a proven record of securing six- and seven-figure deals.

• Experience in developing a portfolio of new relationships within a growth-stage or start-up context.

• Demonstrated experience collaborating with or within scientific, research, or technical organizations and the capability to partner with subject matter experts.

• High emotional intelligence with the ability to build and maintain trust rapidly over time.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, particularly in pitching, business development, or grant proposal contexts, along with the ability to coach others in effective communication within these settings.

• Familiarity with CRM systems (e.g., Virtuous, Salesforce, or similar) and pipeline management.

• Self-motivated, exceptionally organized, with the capacity to manage multiple relationships simultaneously without losing focus, a meticulous attention to detail, and the ability to quickly assimilate large volumes of information.

• A genuine passion for climate philanthropy and an understanding of climate intervention science.

🏝️ Benefits

• Competitive benefits package that includes 90% health coverage and 75% coverage for dependents.

• 401k matching.

• Generous paid time off (PTO).

• Sick leave.

• End-of-year closure period.

• Parental leave.

• Annual national park pass.

• Additional perks.