Senior Director of Development, Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center

All full-time university staff are eligible for VCU’s robust benefits package that includes: comprehensive health benefits, paid annual and holiday leave granted up front, generous tuition benefit, retirement planning and savings options, tax-deferred annuity and cash match programs, employee discounts, well-being resources, abundant opportunities for career development and advancement, and more. Learn more about VCU’s benefits here.

At Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU), we are UNlike any other.  With more than 300,000 students, faculty and staff, we are a mix of attitudes, styles and stories. Inclusion is our heartbeat and it drives us to tackle difficult challenges others can’t. Or won’t. Focused on impact, we pursue a future that is built by us rather than preserving a past that’s been left to us. We are home to creativity, teaching, discovery and healing, and we prove everyday that different works. VCU offers employees work flexibility, a generous leave package, career paths for advancement, competitive pay, and an opportunity to do mission-driven work.  To explore our benefits further, please visit https://hr.vcu.edu/current-employees/benefits/university-and-academic-professional-benefits/.
So if you’re interested in blazing trails, then you too can be UNstoppable here. 

The mission of VCU’s Office of Development and Alumni Relations (DAR) is to maximize philanthropic support by engaging stakeholders with our institution working in partnership with all VCU schools, programs and campuses as one development and alumni relations community and implementing the best practices and efficient strategies to achieve a comprehensive development program. 

VCU Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center is working toward a future without cancer – one revolutionary idea, one promising therapy and one life saved at a time. Through innovative research, patient care, education and community engagement, Massey Cancer Center is discovering, developing, delivering and teaching effective means to prevent, detect, treat and cure cancer and to make these advancements equally available to all. For more information please visit: https://www.masseycancercenter.org/about-us/

Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center is committed to establishing a 21st-century model for promoting diversity, equity and inclusion in the oncology workforce, optimizing cancer healthcare outcomes for all and spearheading interdisciplinary approaches to cancer disparities research.

Job overview

Virginia Commonwealth University’s Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center seeks a highly motivated, self-starting fundraiser who is looking to take their next step in major gift fundraising. Under the direction of the Executive Director of Development for the Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center, the Senior Director plays an integral role in securing philanthropic support through the identification, cultivation, and solicitation of individuals, grateful patients and families, corporations, and foundations. 
The Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center Development team supports the philanthropic efforts of the cancer center and cancer-specific initiatives across the School of Medicine and VCU Health.

The position coordinates closely with leadership and development colleagues at the MCV Foundation, School of Medicine, Monroe Park Campus and VCU Development and Alumni Relations (DAR), and supports fundraising priorities connected to the VCU and VCU Health’s tripartite mission of research, education, clinical care/physical environment.

As Senior Director of Development, the incumbent will:

•  Manage a portfolio of approximately 100 -125 major, principal, and planned giving prospects;
• Demonstrate an understanding of the educational, research, clinical, and financial needs and goals of the VCU Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center;
• Partner with assigned faculty members to identify and qualify prospects, as well as to establish philanthropic funding opportunities for assigned research and clinical-focus areas;
• Work with prospect development staff to identify prospective donors; 
• Successfully conduct a high number of quality engagement interactions through personal visits requiring travel, telephone and zoom solicitations, and coordinated personal written proposals in order to obtain and/or increase major gift contributions;
• Maintain prospect records and contact reports in order to facilitate repeated donations and establish gift histories;
  Solicit gifts at the major gifts level (at or above $50K) through personal appointments, calls and correspondence in order to obtain and/or increase donor contributions in support of the Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center;
• Supervise one or more direct reports;
• Collaborate with DAR Corporate and Foundation Relations to further establish and lead the emerging corporate and foundation giving activities within the Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center;
• Provide guidance and assist with stewardship events and correspondence in coordination with the Medical Philanthropy Strategic Engagement office and the Medical College of Virginia Foundation;
• Report regularly to the Executive Director of Development on all fundraising activity through active implementation of the major gifts tracking/reporting/moves management system;
• Work with the Executive Director of Planned Giving for the Medical Campus to market and secure planned gifts on behalf of cancer center priorities;
• Collaborate with the Executive Director of Development, SAVP for Medical Philanthropy, VCU’s Office of Development and Alumni Relations and School of Medicine leadership and faculty to meet or exceed fundraising goals

Required qualifications:

•  Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience;
• Previous significant years of professional experience working in fundraising environments, directly with people for engagement and soliciting major gifts ($50,000 and above);
• Demonstrated knowledge of the principles, ethics and practices of successful fundraising;
• Experience supervising and mentoring one or more direct reports;
• An outgoing and positive personality, strong interpersonal skills and a collaborative working style;
• Strong written, oral, and data-analysis skills;
• Familiarity with technology, software, and digital tools to communicate and engage with others;
• Ability to work and navigate within a complex organization and diverse constituencies;
• Ability to plan and execute travel for donor visits that may include overnight trips (valid driver’s license is required);
• Willingness to learn, collaborate, and grow within a high performing fundraising team; 
• Demonstrated experience working in and fostering a diverse faculty, staff and student environment or commitment to do so as a university professional at VCU.

Preferred qualifications:

•  Master’s degree in a related field;
• Five years or more of professional experience working in fundraising environments, directly with people for engagement and soliciting major gifts ($50,000 and above);
• Experience with grateful patient fundraising;
• Demonstrated knowledge of Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
• Five or more years of professional fundraising experience in grateful patient programs, academic medical center or higher education (Research I) setting or similar complex environments;
• Demonstrated success securing six- and seven-figure gifts;
• Demonstrated knowledge of planned giving;
• Demonstrated ability to execute objectives and goals aligned to the mission of a complex, urban university and the ability to persuasively represent its goals to multiple constituents;
• CFRE Certification.

Izzy Kane
irkane@vcu.edu