Reporting to the Director of Development, the Grant Specialist will play an important role in maintaining and increasing grant funding to enable Gladney to provide services to meet clients’ evolving needs. The Grant Specialist will steward existing grantors to increase overall retention and giving levels, while also focusing on new grantor identification.

The Grant Specialist will work closely and collaboratively with the Director of Development to implement a grant writing/project management plan that is based on Agency strategy and with the Development team to achieve the organization’s goals and objectives, including executing a 4M+ fundraising annual budget, 500K+ of which is grant funding.

Responsibilities

• Manages and stewards an established group of public, family, and corporate foundation grantors.
• Researches new public, family, and corporate foundation grant opportunities.
• Drafts and compiles grant applications, stewardship reports, and supporting documents.
• Submits grant applications and stewardship reports.
• Manages relationships and communications with grantors as appropriate.
• Creates and maintains digital records in donor database for all grant applications and communications with grantors.
• Creates and maintains common grant application supporting documents.
• Runs, analyzes, and interprets program reports with client service and demographic data (and calculates statistics).
• Runs grant reports to self-audit digital grant records and track approved/denied/submitted/upcoming grants and reporting requirements.
• Communicates with Development and Accounting teams to explain the restriction and coding for each grant.
• Collaborates with Accounting team to create program and region-specific budgets and ensure compliance.
• Maintains the Agency’s online charity profiles.
• Collaborates with the Director of Development and the Development team to make decisions regarding annual philanthropic strategies.
• Maintains a clear understanding of the agency and its strategic direction.
• Cultivates and maintains positive relationships with other Development staff members, with Accounting staff members, and with program staff throughout the organization, in order to maximize foundation relationships and philanthropic giving to the organization.
• Meets or exceeds established annual fundraising goals and metrics.
• Connects with other grant professionals and learns about grantors through community networking opportunities, such as funders forums and fundraising professional meetings.
• Assists with other fundraising and development activities as needed.

 Skills Required

• Strong writing and communication skills, with the ability to articulate complex concepts in a clear and concise manner.
• Ability to synthesize narrative information and analyze client data to present the most relevant and compelling grant applications and stewardship reports for each foundation.
• Knowledgeable about nonprofit financial documents and accounting-minded.
• Detail-oriented, process-minded, and extremely organized.
• Curious, critical thinker—thinks of and asks the next question.
• Strong work ethic with project management skills of planning ahead, establishing priorities, and managing time effectively, in order to meet deadlines.
• Strong analytical, research, and math skills.
• Demonstrated interpersonal, verbal, listening, and written communication skills to share organization’s mission, vision, and goals with clarity, passion, and persuasion.
• Must possess positive energy, have a client-focused attitude, be self-motivated, and be able to consistently contribute towards a positive work and team environment.
• Ability to build effective relationships and earn trust.
• Ability to work both independently and collaboratively.
• Solution-focused. Notices trends/challenges/successes, thinks creatively, and adjusts strategies and processes accordingly.
• Ability to work well with diverse groups of constituents and colleagues.
• Highly skilled in utilizing Microsoft Office 365 and grant management platform.

 Minimum Qualifications

• 2 years+ of grant writing/project management experience.
• Demonstrated success managing a portfolio of grantors and receiving four and five-figure level grants.
• Ability to use data and CRM systems to set grant fundraising strategy and priorities, measure outcomes, and drive superior performance.

If you are interested, please complete the online application here. Thank you!