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Major Gifts Officer
Island Institute
Rockland, ME, USA
USD 71,276-99,807 / year
Posted on Mar 31, 2026
The Major Gift Officer (MGO) is passionate about the mission of the Island Institute and contributes to the organization by growing philanthropic revenue from individual donors and family foundations. The MGO works as an integral member of the Philanthropy team, meeting both individual and team fundraising goals.
Key responsibilities include the development and implementation of strategies for the cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship of a portfolio of individual donors with the capacity to make five-to seven-figure gifts, towards the attainment of the organization’s annual and long-range fundraising goals.
This position is based at the MGO’s home office, and the MGO is expected to work out of the Rockland office five times a month. The Major Gift Officer reports to the Director of Philanthropy – Individual Giving.
Qualifications Required:
- Bachelor’s degree and a minimum of four years’ related work experience in fundraising, with two in major gifts.
- Proven experience cultivating relationships, soliciting, and stewarding a portfolio of individual donors with the capacity to give at the five-to seven-figure level.
- Proven experience securing major gifts to meet quantified fundraising goals.
- Excellent verbal and interpersonal communication skills; able to speak about the organization’s work in an articulate, professional, and compelling manner.
- Strong writing skills; able to effectively convey the organization’s mission, priorities, and programs in a variety of formats (solicitation letters, gift proposals, and reports).
- A team player committed to working in a collaborative environment.
- Highly organized and able to meet firm deadlines.
- Proficiency in Salesforce or a similar database, including data entry for actions and moves management.
- Proficiency in Microsoft Word, Excel, Outlook and PowerPoint
- Ability to work extended hours, events, and weekends, as needed.
- Ability to travel to off-site locations, including by boat and plane.
Qualifications Desired:
- Three to five years’ experience as a major gift officer.
- Experience developing major gift proposals.
- Experience developing a pipeline of individual donor prospects, from identification to solicitation.
- Knowledge of the Maine coast, in particular the year-round island and remote coastal communities that comprise the Island Institute’s constituency.
Essential Functions and Responsibilities:
- Manages a portfolio of 100-150 major donors and major donor prospects, conducting all aspects of relationship qualification, cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship.
- Works closely with the Philanthropy team to set and meet fundraising targets for assigned donors and share donor strategies.
- Travels regularly throughout Maine for donor meetings and events.
- Creates written donor strategies and maintains an updated track of tasks and touchpoints in Salesforce and SharePoint.
- Secures annual and multi-year gift commitments of $10,000 or more from individual donors and family foundations to meet annual and multi-year fundraising targets.
- Identifies, researches, and cultivates new prospect relationships.
- Stewards major donor relationships including individuals with family foundation connections, including writing of reports and proposals.
- Assists on events to engage, cultivate and steward individual donors. Works with volunteers to implement stewardship events designed to cultivate new and current prospects in their portfolio.
Physical Demands and Work Environment
The physical demands and work environment characteristics described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.
- Physical demands: While performing the duties of this job, the employee is required to sit, enter data using computer keyboard and mouse, stand, walk, bend over occasionally, and move about the office space as well as between building floors. There is no requirement to lift and/or move weights of more than 10 pounds.
- Work environment: This position requires occasional presence at the Island Institute headquarters building in Rockland. The noise level in the work environment is usually minimal. There will also be the occasional requirement to travel to island and coastal communities by car, ferry, and boat. Evening and weekend hours will be necessary on occasion for events.
The pay range for this position is $71,276-$99,807, based on experience. Most initial offers are made below the midpoint of the range and are based on factors such as relevant experience, skills alignment and internal equity.
While there is no deadline for submitting your application, the application period will close when the position is filled. Contact Susan Haversat at shaversat@islandinstitute.org if reasonable accommodation is required to complete the application.