Senior Manager, Development & Communications

AfriThrive; Washington (District of Columbia); On-site; USD 75,000 - 85,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental, and vision coverage

Paid time off and holidays

Employee benefits package

Job summary

AfriThrive is seeking a Senior Manager, Development & Communications to lead day-to-day fundraising, marketing, donor engagement, and public relations, reporting to the CEO as a Leadership Team member. You will build a diversified fundraising strategy across foundations, government, corporate partners, individuals, and events; manage a growth-oriented team and external partners to maximize impact.

The role requires strong writing, relationship-building, and strategic execution to advance

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent plus nonprofit fundraising experience.
• 5+ years in nonprofit development, fundraising, or communications.
• Proven success securing foundations, government, corporate, or individual funding.
• Strong writing, storytelling, and verbal communication skills.
• Experience supervising staff and leading cross-functional teams.

Responsibilities

• Develop and execute a diversified fundraising strategy across foundations, government, corporations, healthcare institutions, individuals, sponsorships, and other opportunities.
• Build and manage a qualified fundraising pipeline with clear revenue targets, priorities, ownership, and next actions.
• Lead institutional fundraising, including prospect development, funder cultivation, proposals, grants management, reporting, and stewardship.
• Ensure major proposals and funding opportunities are accurately positioned, compelling, and timely.
• Establish fundraising goals and track progress, opportunities, and risks.

Skills

Fundraising strategy

Donor cultivation

Proposal writing

Team leadership

Storytelling/writing

Cross-functional collaboration

CRM & donor management

Education

Bachelor's degree

Tools

CRM

Donor management systems

Job description

Supervises: Development & Communications staff, consultants, and vendors

Status: Full-Time, Exempt

Salary Range: $75,000-85,000 annually, commensurate with experience

The Senior Manager, Development & Communications reports to the CEO and serves as a member of AfriThrive's Leadership Team. The Senior Manager leads the organization’s day-to-day development and communications functions, working across the organization to ensure that development, fundraising, marketing, communications, donor and sponsor engagement, and public relations efforts are strategically aligned with AfriThrive's mission, goals, strategic plan, and brand standards.

WHO WE ARE

AfriThrive is a growing nonprofit advancing health equity and food security for immigrant, refugee, and underserved communities. We use food as a tool to improve health, preserve culture, strengthen communities, and build more resilient local food systems.

Across the Greater Baltimore-Washington region, our work spans healthy food access, Food as Medicine, sustainable agriculture, youth development, and community engagement. As AfriThrive enters its next stage of growth, we are strengthening our leadership, partnerships, and systems to diversify revenue, deepen our impact, and expand our reach.

POSITION SUMMARY

The Senior Manager, Development & Communications reports to the CEO and serves as a member of AfriThrive's Leadership Team. The Senior Manager leads the organization’s day-to-day development and communications functions, working across the organization to ensure that development, fundraising, marketing, communications, donor and sponsor engagement, and public relations efforts are strategically aligned with AfriThrive's mission, goals, strategic plan, and brand standards.

Who You Are

You are an experienced development and communications professional who understands that successful fundraising is built on relationships, trust, compelling stories, demonstrated impact, and disciplined execution.

You are both strategic and hands-on. You can develop a fundraising strategy, cultivate a donor, strengthen a major proposal, coach a team member, assess a pipeline, shape a compelling organizational story, and help leadership determine where to focus next.

You are a strong writer, compelling storyteller, skilled relationship builder, and effective people manager. You enjoy building teams and systems, improving processes, and creating accountability. You are comfortable taking ownership of a growing function while collaborating effectively across an organization.

Most importantly, you are energized by the opportunity to translate meaningful community impact into sustainable resources, partnerships, and opportunities for growth.

What You Will Do

• Develop and execute a diversified fundraising strategy across government, foundations, corporations, healthcare institutions, individuals, sponsorships, and other opportunities.
• Build and manage a qualified fundraising pipeline with clear revenue targets, priorities, ownership, and next actions.
• Lead institutional fundraising, including prospect development, funder cultivation, proposals, grants management, reporting, and stewardship.
• Ensure major proposals and funding opportunities are strategically positioned, compelling, accurate, and timely.
• Establish fundraising goals and track and report progress, opportunities, and risks.

Grow Donor & Funder Relationships

• Develop strategies to acquire, cultivate, retain, renew, and upgrade individual donors, including recurring and prospective major donors.
• Build and manage a portfolio of priority donors and prospects with clear cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship strategies.
• Lead fundraising campaigns and appeals, including Giving Tuesday, year-end giving, recurring giving, and other initiatives that grow individual and unrestricted revenue.
• Partner with the CEO and Board to cultivate and solicit priority donors and prospects, including opportunities for significant and transformational gifts.
• Develop and grow corporate and institutional partnerships through philanthropy, sponsorships, employee engagement, workplace giving, in-kind support, and other strategic opportunities.
• Build and manage corporate and sponsorship pipelines and create compelling partnership opportunities aligned with AfriThrive's mission and programs.
• Lead fundraising strategy for signature events, including sponsorship development, donor cultivation, revenue generation, and post-event stewardship.
• Evaluate fundraising campaigns and events based on revenue, costs, donor acquisition, relationship development, and return on investment.

Lead Communications, Brand & Storytelling

• Develop and execute an integrated communications strategy that advances fundraising, partnerships, visibility, and AfriThrive's brand.
• Translate AfriThrive's programs, data, and community impact into compelling stories and messages for diverse audiences.
• Oversee donor communications, digital and social media, website content, annual reports, fundraising materials, and organizational storytelling.
• Lead media relations and ensure consistent, effective organizational messaging across external platforms.
• Strengthen AfriThrive's visibility and thought leadership through media, speaking engagements, strategic content, and other opportunities.

Strengthen Development Operations & Systems

• Build and strengthen Development & Communications systems, processes, policies, tools, and workflows that improve efficiency, accountability, collaboration, and sustainability.
• Ensure disciplined use of CRM and development systems for donor and prospect management, grants tracking, stewardship, relationship management, and fundraising analytics.
• Maintain clear opportunity stages, ownership, next actions, deadlines, revenue projections, and reporting across the development pipeline.
• Partner with Finance & Administration on proposal budgets, revenue projections, reconciliation, reporting, compliance, and the financial sustainability of funding opportunities.
• Leverage technology, data, automation, and appropriate AI tools to strengthen prospect development, donor engagement, communications, analytics, and team efficiency.

Lead the Team & Strengthen Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Lead, coach, and develop Development & Communications staff and manage consultants and vendors with clear expectations and accountability.
• Collaborate across Programs, Finance, Impact & Innovation, Community Engagement, and leadership to translate organizational priorities into funding and partnership opportunities.
• Build effective processes for gathering program data, budgets, impact stories, and other inputs needed for fundraising and communications.
• Build a collaborative, high-performing team with strong ownership, quality, and follow-through.
• Provide strategic recommendations to the CEO on fundraising, communications, donor engagement, and emerging opportunities.

Collaborate with the CEO and business development partners to turn strategic relationships and introductions into partnerships and revenue opportunities.

• Support Board engagement in donor cultivation, introductions, sponsorships, and fundraising.
• Represent AfriThrive with funders, donors, corporate, healthcare, government, philanthropic, and community partners.
• Build strategic relationships that strengthen AfriThrive's visibility, partnerships, and long-term support.

What You Bring

• Bachelor's degree or an equivalent combination of education and relevant professional experience.
• At least 5+ years of progressively responsible experience in nonprofit development, fundraising, communications, institutional giving, or related work.
• Demonstrated success securing foundation, government, corporate, or individual funding and developing competitive proposals and funding requests.
• Experience with individual giving, donor cultivation, fundraising campaigns, corporate partnerships, sponsorships, or fundraising events.
• Exceptional writing, editing, storytelling, presentation, and verbal communication skills.
• Experience supervising and developing staff, managing consultants, or leading complex cross-functional initiatives.
• Strong relationship-building, project-management, organizational, analytical, and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to manage multiple priorities and deadlines while maintaining high standards for quality, accuracy, and follow-through.

Preferred

• Experience leading or helping lead an integrated Development & Communications function.
• Demonstrated success cultivating major donors and securing significant philanthropic, government, corporate, or institutional support.
• Existing relationships within the Maryland and Greater Washington philanthropic, corporate, healthcare, government, or nonprofit communities.
• Experience with media relations, digital communications, fundraising analytics, and donor engagement technology.
• Experience in food security, healthcare, public health, agriculture, health equity, food systems, or community-based organizations.

The salary range for this position is $75,000-85,000 annually, commensurate with experience and qualifications.

AfriThrive offers a competitive benefits package, including employer-paid medical, dental, and vision coverage, paid time off, sick leave, personal days, paid holidays, and other employee benefits.