Director of External Engagement

Summary

Join World Relief, a global Christian humanitarian organization, and make a tangible difference in the lives of vulnerable populations. This senior-level leadership role centers on developing and leading a team that supports World Relief’s 16 U.S. Field Offices in enhancing brand awareness, forging new partnerships, and increasing community-based fundraising. The ideal candidate will develop and refine systems and processes for building community and church partnerships, acquiring and retaining donors, and coordinating fundraising campaigns. This remote position requires a deep passion for responding to global displacement crises and a commitment to supporting refugee and immigrant communities. The successful candidate will collaborate with various departments, build trust among stakeholders, and guide a national team dedicated to building competency in communications, marketing, and fundraising. This role involves supervising a team and fostering a Christian work environment.

Requirements

• Mature and personal Christian faith
• Committed to the mission, vision, and values of World Relief
• Desire to serve and empower the Church to impact vulnerable communities
• Able to affirm and/or acknowledge World Reliefs Core Beliefs , Statement of Faith , Christian Identity and National Evangelicals For the Health Of The Nation document
• Bachelors or Associates degree with 10+ years progressive experience in a  Communications, Marketing,or Development role
• Excellent phone, writing and interpersonal skills
• Ability to work with people from different backgrounds, cultures and views
• Computer proficiency, including Microsoft Office 365 Suite
• Extremely organized and detail oriented
• Ability to manage multiple deadlines and priorities
• A flexible working style. The nature of humanitarian work is always being prepared for the unexpected
• Passion for welcoming refugees and guiding them on a path to belonging in local communities
• Lived experience or prior work in refugee services or international development
• Public speaking and thought leadership experience

Responsibilities

• Lead, mentor and grow a high-performance team that will drive revenue results towards financial targets and move our national office network forward in its external engagement with the church, individual donors and the local community
• Advance our messaging, campaign, fundraising, and church engagement efforts across a diverse set of offices at different levels of competency in external engagement
• Identify and prioritize needs in collaboration with stakeholders, and deploying resources and efforts of the team
• Work closely with the marketing team to implement a communications plan that is compelling, values-driven, and attuned to diverse audiences (donors, churches, community leaders)
• Ensure a consistent, mission-centric brand across offices by maximizing World Relief marketing resources, content and messaging plans
• Ensure alignment of messaging across all digital and offline platforms
• In partnership with the marketing team and utilizing SED fundraising best practices, implement multi-channel fundraising strategies (major gifts, church-based campaigns, peer-to-peer fundraising, monthly giving, digital appeals, events)
• Lead a dual growth strategy focused on maximizing regional office fundraising effectiveness and elevating fundraising competency and progress in mid-sized and small offices
• Lead efforts to identify, cultivate, and retain high-value donors and partners
• Launch initiatives to grow recurring giving and donor lifetime value
• Collaborative with all key stakeholders to maximize contributions and competencies towards achieving our US office external engagement goals
• Provide a unifying influence toward balancing departmental and organizational priorities
• Strengthen and expand our network of local church and community partners
• Reflect a deep passion for the church that drives forward momentum
• Understand and leverage church leadership systems in order to promote and pitch church products and implement programs, processes and pitches that will support our local offices in engaging the church and building fruitful partnerships
• Create/modify/utilize scalable engagement models for local offices to mobilize communities and faith-based organizations
• Maximize training, tools, and systems that support localized outreach and volunteer engagement
• In partnership with the marketing team,  oversee local offices external engagement training, coaching, and toolkit use for donor relations, communications, and partnerships
• Inspire and build office collaboration through vision casting and galvanizing communication
• Promote knowledge-sharing through webinars, templates, playbooks, and peer learning cohorts
• Establish shared systems for tracking engagement, managing relationships, and reporting impact
• Optimize workflows and resources to drive efficiency and scale
• Collaborate with development and marketing to launch external engagement initiatives
• Launch new national campaigns, resource-sharing platforms, or collaborative initiatives to advance the mission
• Pilot creative engagement or fundraising approaches with high replication potential
• Collaborate with the SED team for effective fundraising elements
• This role is responsible for supervising others and includes responsibilities consistent with supervising employees, including but not limited to monitoring daily work activities, tracking and approving timesheets including approving time off, monitoring performance including entering goals, progress check-ins, and weekly or bi-weekly check-ins, documenting performance concerns, entering staff promotions, transitions, and separations in HRIS within required time frame
• Managers at World Relief are also considered spiritual leaders and are expected to lead staff in a manner consistent with our Christian values, including but not limited to praying with staff, leading devotionals, and fostering a Christian environment in interactions with staff throughout World Relief

Preferred Qualifications

• Proven senior-level experience managing cross-functional or distributed teams
• Ability to build consensus and lead through influence across a networked organization
• Strong strategic planning skills; data-informed decision-making
• Demonstrated ability to turn vision into executable plans and measurable results
• Exceptional storytelling and messaging skills
• Brand building across diverse communities
• Experience managing digital marketing and content strategy
• Track record of designing and leading successful fundraising campaigns. Experience with major gifts, church or community-based fundraising, and donor retention strategies
• Deep understanding of community mobilization, particularly through faith-based partnerships
• Cultural competency and experience working with or serving refugee or immigrant communities a plus
• Skilled in building systems, tools, and processes for scale
• Experience with CRMs, donor databases, and project management tools
• Creative thinker with a bias for action
• Experience piloting and scaling new initiatives in complex organizations

Benefits

• $95,000 - $105,000 a 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 including leadership and culture, program foundations and execution, and whole person health