The Institute for Nonprofit News (INN) is a rapidly growing network of more than 450 nonprofit news organizations across the U.S dedicated to serving the public’s need to stay informed and engaged. As the only journalism support organization designed to support the broad nonprofit news field, INN provides members with important infrastructure and capacity building resources, training, leadership development, convenings, research and coaching that helps members grow their business operations, revenue and audience. Among these initiatives include NewsMatch, an unparalleled matching campaign and capacity building program that is transforming community support for nonprofit news; our Rural News Network, composed of 80+ INN newsrooms serving rural communities; and our Emerging Leadership Council, a cohort of INN newsroom leaders.
Under the supervision of the Chief Development Officer (CDO), the Institutional Giving Manager will handle grant writing, prospecting, reporting and some project management tasks for INN from institutional funders, including both restricted (program/project) and unrestricted support as well as NewsMatch.
Primary responsibilities:
Grant Writing and Development: (50%)
- Write first drafts of grant proposals, letters of inquiry, and reports to foundations—including foundations, corporations, and other philanthropic institutions—in support of INN and NewsMatch
- Gather required support materials from stakeholders and peers, including budgets, biographies, research, among other materials.
- Collaborate with INN staff and NewsMatch partners to document and maintain files with updated language for various initiatives and programs.
- Ensure all requests, reports, and other communications meet the quality standards of journalism funders.
- Coordinate with program staff and INN’s Finance Director to create grant project budgets.
- Prepare detailed donor profiles and funder briefing material for INN Dev team, CEO, program leads, and attend solicitation and stewardship meetings as needed.
- Prepare other funder communications, as needed.
Grant Prospecting: (15%)
- Identify and qualify funding sources for INN and NewsMatch. including foundations and corporations, to expand the base of national and regional funders to support INN, NewsMatch, and other INN initiatives.
- Assess potential funding opportunities for INN and NewsMatch with program staff and CDO
- Gather and analyze donor and funder data for actionable insights from philanthropy publications, foundation databases, foundation websites, and internet searches.
- Monitor philanthropic trends and funding opportunities , especially related to journalism and media, and share articles and trends around foundation thinking and priorities.
Grant Coordination and Management (35%)
- Oversee the grants calendar and timeline of grant needs for INN and NewsMatch in Salesforce and Asana.
- Contribute to prospect pipeline management, including cultivation and solicitation timing and tactics.
- Maintain CRM database (Salesforce) including tracking all aspects of grant opportunities, deliverables, funder information and contacts, and activities. Work with INN systems admin to develop reports, dashboards and queries for Dev team and CEO.
- Serves as the primary point of contact for foundation relationships during the request, development and reporting process for INN. Maintain accurate and detailed prospect and contact records in Salesforce
- Work closely with INN program staff and finance director to track grant funded deliverables to ensure that projects are meeting stated goals and reporting requirements.
- Use Salesforce and Asana to prepare monthly progress reports for Dev team
Skills and qualifications :
We’re seeking a self-motivated, responsive and highly organized manager with strong writing, editing and analytic skills, who is comfortable as well as building relationships with people both internally and externally at many levels of experience and in many roles. Because this is a fully remote position, this person needs to be comfortable balancing working independently while also being a proactive communicator with the rest of the Development team.
You will be a good fit with:
- A minimum of 3 years work experience in relevant fundraising activities and a proven track record of accomplishment in this area.
- Exceptional writing, editing, and proofreading skills, as well as ability to synthesize a range of information into tight summaries and compelling proposals.
- Proficient in identifying institutional funding sources and in grant research.
- Highly organized and systematic thinker with experience in CRM (Salesforce preferred) and project management systems
- Prior experience with spreadsheets, word processing, and presentation/deck software (Google
- Workspace preferred) as well as messaging platforms (Slack preferred)
- Excellent communication, interpersonal, and organizational skills, including collaborating with team members across an organization
Preferred qualifications: the above plus…
- Passionate about journalism, accurate information sources, and democracy.
- Familiarity with the practice, ethics and writing styles of journalism or willingness to learn to produce grant reports for journalism funders.
- Demonstrated success writing and securing grant proposals for awards in the 5-7 figure range from major national and regional foundations.
- Working knowledge of grant research resources, such as Candid / Foundation Directory.
- Prior experience and/or comfort with working in a fully remote environment
We expect the successful candidate to be stronger in some qualifications listed above than others; we are committed to helping our future colleague expand their skills.
About INN
As the core organization supporting a network of 450 independent member newsrooms, the Institute for Nonprofit News is identifying and accelerating changes that will transform the media sector into a true public service. INN’s vision is to build a nonprofit news network that ensures all people in every community have access to trusted news. To that end, we pursue our mission of providing education and business support services to our nonprofit member organizations and promoting the value and benefit of public-service and investigative journalism. INN programs help these news organizations develop revenue and business models to support strong reporting, collaborate on editorial and business innovation, share services and advance the diverse leaders who are forging a new future for news.
About the team
This role reports to the Chief Development Officer and sits within the Development team, which also includes a Director of Development, NewsMatch. This role will work closely and often across INN’s teams, especially with our Collaborations, Program Growth, NewsMatch, Communications and Finance/Operations teams. The Development team also connects regularly with journalism funder community, Press Forward, and The Miami Foundation, which is the fiscal sponsor of NewsMatch, and our board.
Compensation and conditions
INN provides employer-sponsored benefits including medical, dental, vision, and retirement plans, short term disability insurance, vacation and sick time, and a generous parental leave policy. This role will be expected to travel at least once a year for a staff retreat. The salary range for this position is $65,000-80,000 depending on relevant experience.
We value diversity, work with transparency and do everything we can to give back to the journalism and nonprofit communities (read more about our team values). INN is an equal opportunity employer and we’re actively seeking to increase diversity in our own operation and across the field of journalism. We encourage applications from communities traditionally underrepresented in news media, nonprofits, or philanthropy.
The position is remote and can be based anywhere with strong wifi. Preference given to candidates located in Central Time or Eastern Time Zones.
TO APPLY: Please submit a resume and cover letter using this form. All applications must be submitted using the form; emailed applications will not be considered. Applications will be evaluated on a rolling basis until the position is filled, but we encourage applicants to apply as early as possible.