Philanthropy Specialist - Individual Giving

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston is one of the world's most respected centers focused on cancer patient care, research, education, and prevention. It was named the nation's No. 1 hospital for cancer care in U.S. News & World Report’s 2022-2023 rankings. It is one of the nation's original three comprehensive cancer centers designated by the National Cancer Institute.

The Individual Giving team is dedicated to securing philanthropic gifts in support of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center’s initiatives across all segments of individual donors supporting the institution. An integral part of the Individual Giving Team business model is planning and implementing investigation, cultivation, solicitation and stewardship strategies for all constituents and stakeholders (new and established) for the purpose of executing on those strategies with precision and excellence thereby securing philanthropic gifts.

MD Anderson Cancer Center is seeking a Philanthropy Specialist. As an important member of the Philanthropy administrative support team, the Philanthropy Specialist provides high level administrative support and executes on various process-oriented tasks for a group of Philanthropy gift officers in a matrix management system. This position readily partners with the gift officer to ensure execution of tasks and assignments associated with specialized donor strategies.

Utilizing self-direction and strategic thinking, this administrative professional will balance simultaneous requests and projects for matrix managers, prioritizing and executing in appropriate sequence on a variety of administrative responsibilities and tasks associated with fundraising portfolio management. The ability to manage task switching across multiple, competing projects for varied stakeholders and bringing all work to resolution with timeliness and a keen attention to detail and completeness are core requirements for this position. 

In addition to performing routine administrative tasks such as complex calendar management across multiple time zones, travel and expense preparation, telephone call management, and mailings, this person will also compose formal and informal correspondence, create and format presentations and provide professional and supportive assistance to donors, patient referrals and other institutional stakeholders. Central to all activities is to support the gift officer’s donor engagement activities through facilitating internal and external meetings, site visit preparation and providing thorough follow-through on all related follow up deliverables for the assigned gift officers. Additionally, this team member will leverage partnerships with division service lines in donor communications, donor relations and the Grateful Giving Program on gift officer related donor engagement tasks and projects, requiring the comprehension of project content and deliverables and ensuring appropriateness and completeness of associated documents and donor communications. 

The Philanthropy Specialist will support data integrity and data stewardship, recording all relevant correspondence, actions and tasks in the CRM in agreement with established business processes and procedures. This team member will actively review all emails, call reports, strategy documents, donor correspondence and proposal documents to identify and/or infer relevant information for supporting the team member and/or data entry into the CRM. This team member will enable the gift officers to operate efficiently by utilizing strong anticipatory and critical thinking, independent judgement and problem-solving skills. It is essential that this team member handle materials and issues with urgency, confidentiality, and prudence.

KEY FUNCTIONS

Philanthropic Business Support – 60%

This position supports donor relationship development activities, tracking and delivery of strategy. The successful candidate possesses knowledge of fundraising operations, donor stages and life cycle, moves management and engagement activities. This position requires the ability to anticipate next steps and prepare accordingly, ability to effectively communicate with internal and external stakeholders and proactively approach one’s work. Organizational, time management and event coordination skills are critical to the role as well as detailed focus with proficient writing and proofreading skills. The Philanthropy Specialist must have the ability to prioritize the care of donors and knowledge of when and how to request and coordinate services from internal partners for report generation, donor prospect research, donor prospect management, donor communications and stewardship activities.

Administrative Portfolio Support – 20%

Portfolio activity and donor outreach support (portfolio mass mailings with correlating data entry and mail merge, individualized donor outreach by portfolio [birthday cards, donor anniversaries and other milestones, donor summary reports, etc.], CRM updates. Readily completes Philanthropy Operations support request according to portfolio activity need [research, prospect management, business solutions requests, gift designation account changes) across multiple gift officers. Travel and expense management as needed. Possesses knowledge of appropriateness, timing and urgency.

Administrative Support – 20%

Donor moves management administrative support, patient schedule monitoring and lookup, calendar and meeting schedule management (external and internal stakeholders) across multiple gift officers or professional staff.