7 Traits of Highly Effective Gift Officers

As the work of frontline fundraisers takes on new urgency, the role has evolved to demand more. We asked fundraising leaders and experts what they look for when hiring, and how that might be changing.

Versatility. Matt Hitchcock leads a team of six major-gifts professionals at KQED, a public-media outlet in San Francisco. The station doesn’t have analytics or big support teams, so the fundraisers do a little bit of everything, including prospect research and management of donor communications and events.

“They must have 360 degrees of skills,” says Hitchcock, senior director of major gifts.

How the Big-Gift Game Is Changing

As pressure grows, big-gift fundraising is changing.

Financial acumen. The complexity of charitable-giving vehicles means fundraisers must be at least familiar with stocks, cryptocurrency, and other noncash assets as well as giving instruments such as donor-advised funds and charitable trusts.

“Giving vehicles have changed so dramatically over the years that now you have to be a real pro to understand how to tap that for your donor,” says Melanie Buhrmaster, vice president of philanthropy at the Food Bank for New York City.

Personal finance experience helps, says Laura MacDonald, founder of the Benefactor Group consultancy. If a gifts officer doesn’t own stock, “talking to a donor about their portfolio is a very abstract and uncomfortable notion.”

Tech and data literacy. Fundraisers are increasingly mining publicly available data about potential donors. At bigger organizations, they team up with analytics pros to shape donor-engagement strategies using industry research and data on individual prospects.

OhioHealth, a health-care system, increasingly deploys predictive modeling and artificial intelligence. Its gift officers also must take experiences with donors and their own impressions into account, says Simon Bisson, vice president of philanthropy. “The information that they glean directly from the donor is often more accurate and more valuable than the data that exists from a screening tool or something else.”

Artificial intelligence is also playing an increasing role. “The people who can improve and ideate by using AI — they are winning the game,” says Christine Bork, chief development officer at the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Collaboration skills. Once seen as lone wolves, gifts officers are now part of teams that include prospect researchers, data professionals, and donor-communication and stewardship officials. Even at small organizations, the fundraiser is partnering with finance and program staff to provide donors with information and experiences.

At Cumberland Heights, which operates addiction-treatment centers in Tennessee, a recently hired gifts officer spent days in conversations with staff before meeting a single donor. It’s the gift officer’s job to help clinicians and caregivers see their role in fundraising, says Kyle Williams, director of philanthropy. “It’s much more than just going to dinner with some philanthropists and asking them for money.”

Strategic focus. As gifts become more complex, fundraisers must match the donors’ interests with the organization’s vision and then line up all the internal constituencies and information needed to illustrate impact. “They have to put together a journey for that donor that really pulls them in,” says Sarah Krasin, managing partner at CCS Fundraising.

Willingness to change. The conventional approach to raising big gifts — identify prospects, cultivate, ask, steward, repeat — doesn’t apply anymore, says Ron Goines, managing director at the Drug Policy Alliance.

Goines looks for hires “willing to unlearn everything that they have learned.”

Love for people. Candidates who will care about donors make the best fundraisers, says Ruth Maffa, executive director of development at Brandeis University. “They’re genuinely relationship oriented,” she says. “That’s something you were looking for 10 or 12 years ago, and it’s something that you’re always looking for.”