You: A relationship builder with a passion for liberty who can connect the dots to achieve fundraising success. You’re a strategic, enterprising thinker and savvy manager who brings a donor-centered philosophy and a get-it-done approach to your work. And now you aspire to lead a nationwide development team in securing increased investment in the ambitious growth plans of the nation’s premier defender of liberty.
Them: Bureaucrats, city councils, mayors, governors, and federal agencies stripping Americans of their rights every day. There’s a lot of government overreach out there, and it’s backed by seemingly endless resources. But fortunately, like all lumbering giants, abusive government is most vulnerable when countered by individuals who act strategically and nimbly, take calculated risks, have each other’s backs, and are confident in and passionate for the cause—the very sort of swashbucklers we employ in spades here at PLF.
Us: We fight back. Pacific Legal Foundation is the nation’s first and most successful public-interest law firm dedicated to vindicating individual liberty. PLF has an unmatched record in the United States Supreme Court, with 17 victories out of 20 litigated there, with one ruling still pending. We also have more than a hundred active cases across the nation.
PLF is a next-generation public interest law firm. What does “next generation” mean for a legal nonprofit? It means we aren’t interested in doing the same thing as everyone else. We aspire to be the best player in a constantly changing game.
Here’s what you get to do in this role:
Your chief objective is to lead our nationwide development team in securing the increased financial resources necessary to fund PLF’s ambitious plans for growth. This includes providing strategic vision for the department, overseeing a comprehensive fundraising program, ensuring radical customer service for our donors, and inspiring your team to achieve new heights of success.
As the leader of PLF’s development team, you will guide and mentor the directors of our three development units—Donor Relations, Stewardship & Operations, and Grants—as they plan and execute strategies for cultivating strong relationships with donors and regularly showing those donors the impact of their investment in PLF. You will assist the president in managing his portfolio of key donors and also may manage your own portfolio of major gift donors.
This role calls for you to be an active presence in the organization, fostering strong collaboration with other departments and keeping donors’ needs and interests visible to all of PLF. The vice president will work with executive leadership and senior management to help guide overall strategies for the organization’s future growth and success.
In short, we’re looking for a relentless go-getter who’s passionate about freedom, well-versed in development strategies and mechanics, and who has the right mix of drive and entrepreneurship, humility, and unconventional thinking to lead our high-achieving development team.
Your specific job duties will include:
- Setting overall vision for fundraising and working with the development leadership team to devise and execute strategies for raising the increased investment needed to fund PLF’s ambitious plans for near-term growth.
- Overseeing day-to-day operations of a comprehensive development program that includes major gifts, planned giving, grants, mid-level donors, direct mail, donor acquisition, stewardship, and database management.
- Supervising, mentoring, and inspiring the development leadership team, comprising the directors of each of the department’s three units: Donor Relations, Stewardship & Operations, and Grants.
- Managing a portfolio of major gift donors and working closely with the president to assist him in managing his portfolio of key donors.
- Helping to develop organizational plans, strategies, and policies as a member of the president’s senior management team.
- Ensuring that PLF maintains a donor-centered approach to fundraising, which includes providing radical customer service to donors.
- Providing regular updates/reports to the president, board of trustees, and PLF staff.
- Travel approximately 15% of the time.
This role is ideal for someone with:
- 7 or more years of progressively responsible development or equivalent applicable experience and a broad knowledge of fundraising strategies and mechanics.
- Considerable experience leading a team to meet or exceed its goals.
- Demonstrated track record of success in cultivating, soliciting, closing, and stewarding major gift donors or the temperament, gravitas, and capacity to do so.
- Exceptional communication skills—a natural gift for comfortably connecting with people at all levels and for speaking and writing in a clear, confident, and compelling way.
- Outstanding organizational skills, with a proven ability to envision, execute, and evaluate plans and processes. The ideal candidate will have a bias for action.
- Knowledge of, and passion for, the ideas of freedom and individual liberty.
- Familiarity with Salesforce and/or other fundraising/CRM databases is helpful.
General information:
Pacific Legal Foundation identifies and litigates important legal issues to set landmark precedents that will benefit Americans nationwide. Using strategic and principled litigation, communications, and research, we battle for freedom in the nation’s courts and in the court of public opinion.
A national nonprofit organization, PLF has brick-and-mortar offices in Sacramento, California; Arlington, Virginia; and Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, although half of the staff work from home offices across the country. You may work virtually or in any of our physical offices.
This is a full-time, permanent position. PLF is committed to recruiting and retaining the highest-quality talent available nationwide, and we offer a total compensation package that includes a competitive salary, medical and dental insurance, and employer-paid retirement savings. We take work-life balance seriously through our generous paid leave and flextime policies. We have a flexible, collaborative, positive, and collegial work environment. We take pride in investing in your future and encourage internal advancement. PLF is the place for someone principled, tenacious, and determined to succeed in positively shaping the future of our country and restoring real limits on government power. Join us.
To Apply
Qualified candidates should submit the following application materials (in order) in one PDF document:
- Your resume, including your experience in the liberty movement and relevant professional experience.
- A cover letter explaining why PLF is the place for you, why you want to fight for liberty, what distinguishes you from typical applicants, and your salary requirements.
Applications should be submitted to Talent Market via this link:
talentmarket.org/apply-for-your-dream-job/.
Questions can be directed to Claire Kittle Dixon, Executive Director of Talent Market, who is managing the search process: [email protected].
There is no application deadline for this position. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis. This job will remain posted on our site until it is filled. While we thank all applicants in advance for their interest in this position, we are only able to contact those to whom we can offer an interview. Only direct applications will be considered. No phone calls, please.
Talent Market is a nonprofit entity dedicated to promoting liberty by helping free-market nonprofits identify talent for critical roles. We provide consulting and recruiting services at no cost to 501(c)3 nonprofit organizations that clearly and directly focus on advancing the principles of economic freedom, free enterprise, free trade, free speech, property rights, rule of law, and limited regulation.