SENIOR DIRECTOR OF CLIENT PARTNERSHIPS– POSITION PROFILE

 

Reports to:

Managing Director of Client Partnerships

Management Responsibilities:

No direct line management responsibilities, matrixed teams

OVERVIEW:

The Stott Group is a woman-owned and women-led strategy and development practice working with visionary leaders and organizations committed to creating lasting social change. We are creative, nimble, and highly strategic fundraising experts with decades of development and leadership experience in the social and private sectors. We believe in the power of philanthropy to change the world.

Since our start in 2015, the Stott Group has worked with many organizations driving impact nationally and abroad. We’ve raised hundreds of millions of dollars, identified thousands of highly qualified funder targets, and provided deep expertise and industry know-how to our clients on organizational development, funder strategy, board engagement, and everything in between.

Our values shape everything we do, from how we engage with our client partners to how we support each other as a team. We care deeply about the world and are committed to working with organizations solving society’s most pressing social issues. We hold ourselves to the highest standards in delivering excellence for our clients rooted in our values of purpose, inclusivity, curiosity and trust, and we prioritize a warm, collaborative and inclusive culture for our team.

THE OPPORTUNITY:

The Senior Director of Client Partnerships is a day-to-day engagement lead on our client work — the person our clients call first, and the one accountable for the execution, quality and strategic substance of what we deliver. This is a senior individual contributor role with no direct reports. Your focus is client leadership and the work itself. We work in a matrixed structure: you will lead the engagement teams on your accounts — setting direction for Managers, specialists, and contractors and holding the quality bar — while formal people management, performance, and career development sit elsewhere.

This role is deliberately scoped to concentrate on what senior strategists and fundraisers do best. You will own the strategic direction and authorship of client deliverables while partnering with a Manager of Client Partnerships, who owns workplans, timelines, and the operational engine of every engagement. Depending on the complexity of the engagement and client needs, specialists and contractors may join your client teams, and you will set direction for their work as part of leading the engagement. Above you, a senior leader serves as a strategic backstop and escalation point on client accounts. That structure exists so you can go deep on client strategy and relationships rather than splitting your attention across execution logistics and people management. Team composition is deliberately fluid. We staff each engagement to what the client actually needs rather than to a fixed template, which means the mix of Managers, specialists, contractors, and senior leadership around you will shift from client to client — and sometimes within the arc of a single engagement.

Increasingly, our work begins upstream of fundraising. Organizations come to us at moments of growth, transition, or plateau, and the path to increased revenue often runs through a sharper organizational strategy first — a clearer theory of change, a revised strategic plan, a rethought team structure, or a more effective board. You will work across both: the organizational strategy that sets direction, and the development and revenue work that funds it.

We are looking for someone operating at a genuinely senior advisory level — able to hold a senior leader’s confidence, provide a clear point of view to an ambiguous situation, and lead an engagement with real independence. No day will look the same, and a successful candidate will bring deep fundraising expertise alongside a ‘no problem too big, no question too small’ attitude. We are a small firm in a growth moment, which means the person in this role helps build the thing while running it. You will shape how we work, not just work within it — and you will do that in an environment where the systems are still being written and decisions move quickly.

RESPONSIBILITIES
Client Engagement Leadership
  • Serve as the day-to-day engagement lead and primary point of contact for assigned clients, typically leading four to five engagements simultaneously.
  • Build trusted relationships across the client partnership — not only with the primary contact, but with executive leadership, board members, and program staff.
  • Design client engagement strategies and scopes of work, and lead engagements through to completion.
  • Bring a clear point of view to ambiguous client decisions rather than presenting a menu of options; diagnose the underlying problem before prescribing a solution.
  • Anticipate client questions, concerns, and inflection points before they surface, and adjust the engagement’s direction proactively.
  • Exercise independent judgment on the majority of engagement decisions, escalating to senior leadership when the stakes, ambiguity, or relationship risk genuinely warrant it.
Strategy + Deliverable Authorship
  • Develop and author client deliverables — development plans, campaign readiness assessments, strategic plans, cases for support, organizational assessments, and donor-facing materials that are built off templates and highly tailored to meet clients’ needs.
  • Translate strategic recommendations into implementation plans the client’s team can realistically execute, and coach client staff through that execution.
  • Support organizational strategy work where the engagement calls for it, including strategic planning, theory of change, revenue forecasting, and team development.
  • Conduct and interpret analysis of client donor, revenue, and fundraising data to ground recommendations in evidence.
  • Own the quality of the work product on your engagements, ensuring deliverables meet the Stott standard before they reach the client.
Collaboration + Firm Contribution
  • Partner closely with the Manager of Client Partnerships on your engagements — providing direction and content while respecting their ownership of workplans, timelines, budgets, and operational delivery.
  • Work with specialists and contractors brought onto engagements, with clear ownership of decision-making at role intersections.
  • Communicate clearly and proactively with firm leadership, calibrating the right level of detail for the audience — what a Partner needs to make a decision differs from what a peer needs to stay coordinated.
  • Contribute to building the firm itself — the standards, templates, methodologies, and shared knowledge that make excellence repeatable. In a firm our size, senior people build the infrastructure they use.
  • Support renewal conversations on the client relationships you hold and contribute to proposals and scoping for new opportunities.
QUALIFICATIONS + CORE COMPETENCIES
  • A minimum of 10 years of experience in development, fundraising, or nonprofit revenue strategy, preferably in a nonprofit or mission-driven setting.
  • Experience leading or managing development programs or key revenue channels of one — major gifts, institutional giving, campaigns, or planned giving — with a proven track record of meeting and exceeding revenue goals.
  • Experience contributing to organizational strategy work such as strategic planning, theory of change, or board development, and connecting that work to revenue outcomes.
  • Consulting or client-facing advisory experience or demonstrated ability to translate in house expertise into advising multiple organizations at once.
  • Demonstrable experience working directly with Boards of Directors and senior leadership teams, including board development, governance dynamics, and engaging board members in fundraising and strategy.
  • Executive presence and credibility with senior stakeholders; able to hold the room when a recommendation is challenged and to represent the firm’s judgment without a Principal present.
  • Exceptional communication skills — able to explain complex or ambiguous situations in plain, confident language, deliver difficult news directly rather than vaguely, and adapt tone for staff, board, and funder audiences.
  • Strong client service orientation, with an instinct for anticipating client needs before they are voiced.
  • Experience creating and implementing donor engagement strategies, from cultivation to solicitation to stewardship.
  • Experience with qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis.
  • Resourceful self-starter with high dependability, strong attention to detail, excellent organizational skills, and a personal commitment to excellence.
  • Genuinely energized by a small, entrepreneurial environment — comfortable with ambiguity, quick to test and iterate, and willing to sometimes do the necessary work alongside the strategic to move everyone forward.
  • Superior problem-solving skills, with the ability to proactively identify both roadblocks and potential solutions.
  • The ability to excel in a collaborative, dynamic, and fast-paced virtual work environment, managing competing demands, clients, and deadlines while ensuring quality control.
  • Flawless ethical standards, confidentiality, and personal integrity, demonstrating self awareness and dependability at all times.
  • Proficiency in the Microsoft Office Suite, G-Suite, Dropbox, and project management software (e.g., Slack); openness to AI-enabled tools in client and internal work.
  • A commitment to social causes, progressive values, equity, and inclusion.
SALARY AND BENEFITS

The Senior Director of Client Partnerships role has a salary range starting at $145,000 depending on location and experience. The Stott Group offers a comprehensive benefits package, including 100% employer-covered health plans, 401k employer match, potential for employee bonus, and generous vacation and paid time off policies.

WORKING AT THE STOTT GROUP

This is a full-time exempt virtual position, with a preference for candidates based in Washington, DC or Minneapolis, MN. There is flexibility in this role, yet the ability to be responsive to requests across different time zones is required, with core work hours occurring during Eastern Time or Central Time. The Senior Director of Client Partnerships will be expected to meet in person and travel 4-6 times a year for client meetings and in-person team retreats.

HOW TO APPLY

Please send your resume to [email protected], noting “Senior Director of Client Partnerships” in the subject field. Cover letters are also welcomed and encouraged.