Director of US External Engagement - 2025381

Medium; Towson (MD); Remote; USD 95,000 - 105,000; Full time

Job summary

A global humanitarian organization is seeking a senior leader for communications and fundraising to enhance brand awareness and community engagement. The position requires deep commitment to Christian values and significant experience in communications and marketing. The ideal candidate will develop strategies for fundraising and community partnerships and lead a national team. Competitive compensation of $95,000 - $105,000 annually.

Benefits

Competitive benefits package

Employee discount program

Qualifications

• 10+ years of experience in communications, marketing, or development.
• Mature and personal Christian faith.
• Ability to work with diverse communities.

Responsibilities

• Lead and mentor a national team to drive revenue results.
• Develop multi-channel fundraising strategies.
• Oversee external engagement training and coaching.

Skills

Excellent writing skills

Interpersonal skills

Flexible working style

Strategic thinking

Education

Bachelor’s or Associate degree

Tools

Microsoft Office 365

Job description

Overview

Are you a person of compassion? An advocate for justice? Someone who stands up for the rights of the vulnerable and speaks out for the marginalized, the exploited and the forgotten? Do you believe in our calling as Christians to welcome the least of these and love our neighbor?

If you answered ‘yes’, World Relief, and millions of people around the world need you.

At this pivotal moment in time, we are rapidly expanding and growing our team to meet the increasing needs of our world. We are looking for people who want to use their gifts and talents to make a real and tangible difference in our world and the lives of the suffering.

If you’re looking for a purpose-driven career in which you can grow your talents, while also standing up for the rights of the vulnerable, we want you to join us today.

Organization Summary

World Relief is a global Christian humanitarian organization whose mission is to boldly engage the world’s greatest crises in partnership with the church. The organization was founded in the aftermath of World War II to respond to the urgent humanitarian needs of war-torn Europe. Since then, for 80 years, across 100 countries, World Relief has partnered with local churches and communities to build a world where families thrive and communities flourish.

Today, organizational programming focuses on humanitarian and disaster response, community strengthening and resilience, and refugee & immigrant services and advocacy.

Position Summary

This position requires a deep passion for responding to the global displacement crises and a longing for the refugee and other vulnerable immigrant communities in the U.S. to flourish as God intended. At its core, this role is centered on developing and leading a team that supports World Relief’s 16 U.S. Field Offices in improving brand awareness, forging new partnerships with churches and other community actors, and increasing community-based fundraising. We are seeking a high-capacity communications, marketing and/or development leader who can work effectively across departments, build trust among stakeholders and shape an external engagement strategy across our network of offices for sustained growth. This senior leader will guide a national team dedicated to building competency in these areas, growing brand awareness and multiplying fundraising efforts that will support our local office network. The ideal candidate will develop and refine systems and processes that each office can utilize to build community and church partnerships, acquire and retain donors and coordinate fundraising campaigns that continue to exceed revenue goals. He or she will also launch new initiatives to share resources and knowledge that will help move the whole network forward in our mission and vision. This position will work remotely under the supervision and support of the Chief Advancement Officer and in close collaboration with the development and marketing teams. This position will also have a secondary reporting relationship to the SVP of US programs and have functional alignment with, and membership on, the US programs leadership team, in order to assure excellent collaboration and coordination with our US programs teams.

Role & Responsibilities

Responsibilities include (highlights):

• Lead and mentor a high-performance, national team to drive revenue results and advance external engagement with the church, individual donors, and local communities.
• Advance messaging, campaigns, fundraising, and church engagement across multiple offices with varying levels of external engagement readiness.
• Collaborate with stakeholders to identify needs and deploy team resources; work with the marketing team to implement a compelling, values-driven communications plan for diverse audiences.
• Ensure a consistent, mission-centric brand across offices by maximizing World Relief marketing resources and messaging plans; align messaging across digital and offline platforms.
• Develop and implement multi-channel fundraising strategies (major gifts, church-based campaigns, peer-to-peer, monthly giving, digital appeals, events) in partnership with the marketing team.
• Lead a dual growth strategy to maximize regional fundraising effectiveness and elevate competency in mid-sized and small offices.
• Identify, cultivate, and retain high-value donors and partners; grow recurring giving and donor lifetime value.
• Collaborate with US Programs, Advocacy, and Advancement to maximize external engagement goals; strengthen local church and community partnerships.
• Create scalable engagement models for local offices to mobilize communities and faith-based organizations; maximize training, tools, and systems for outreach and volunteer engagement.
• Oversee external engagement training, coaching, and toolkit use for donor relations, communications, and partnerships; promote knowledge sharing through webinars and playbooks.
• Establish shared systems for tracking engagement, managing relationships, and reporting impact; optimize workflows and resources for scale.
• Collaborate with development and marketing to launch external engagement initiatives and national campaigns; pilot creative engagement approaches with replication potential.
• Supervise staff activities, timesheets, performance management, and HR processes in line with World Relief policies; lead staff in a manner consistent with Christian values.

Job Requirements

• Mature and personal Christian faith; commitment to the mission, vision, and values of World Relief.
• Desire to serve and empower the Church to impact vulnerable communities; able to affirm World Relief’s Core Beliefs and Statement of Faith; alignment with National Association of Evangelicals’ health guidance document.
• Bachelor’s or Associate degree with 10+ years progressive experience in Communications, Marketing, or Development.
• Excellent writing, phone, and interpersonal skills; ability to work with diverse communities.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office 365; highly organized with strong attention to detail; ability to manage multiple deadlines.
• Flexible working style; humanitarian work requires adaptability; passion for welcoming refugees and helping them belong in local communities.
• Lived experience or prior work in refugee services or international development; public speaking and thought leadership experience.

Preferred Qualifications

• Leadership and management experience across cross-functional or distributed teams; ability to build consensus and lead through influence.
• Strategic thinking and analytical skills; data-informed decision-making; ability to turn vision into executable plans.
• Marketing & Communications expertise: storytelling, brand building, and digital marketing experience.
• Fundraising acumen: track record designing and leading campaigns with major gifts and donor retention strategies.
• Community and Faith Engagement: experience with faith-based partnerships and refugee/immigrant communities.
• Process and Infrastructure Development: building systems, tools, and processes for scale; CRM and donor databases experience.
• Innovation and Change Leadership: creative thinker with a bias for action; experience piloting new initiatives.

Compensation: $95,000 - $105,000 per year

World Relief offers a competitive benefits package and employee discount program for full-time and part-time employees.

World Relief is honored to be recognized with the Gold-level Cigna Healthy Workforce Designation for exceeding the core components of our well-being program.

Legal and Inclusion Statements

Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

We are proud to be an EEO/AA employer M/F/D/V. We maintain a drug-free workplace and perform pre-employment substance abuse testing.

For World Relief staff, strong commitment to the mission, vision, and values of World Relief is essential, and Christian faith is a prerequisite for employment, based upon United States federal guidelines provided in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.