AVP, Philanthropy Communications and Donor Relations

Join the transformative team at City of Hope , where we're changing lives and making a real difference in the fight against cancer, diabetes, and other life-threatening illnesses. City of Hope's growing national system includes its Los Angeles campus, a network of clinical care locations across Southern California, a new cancer center in Orange County, California, and treatment facilities in Atlanta, Chicago and Phoenix. Our dedicated and compassionate employees are driven by a common mission: To deliver the cures of tomorrow to the people who need them today.

City of Hope's mission is to "turn hope into reality." Focused on eliminating cancer and diabetes and other
life-threatening illnesses, City of Hope has established itself as a world-class leader in transforming the future of health. Raising the philanthropic resources to fuel its leading-edge research, its exquisite and compassionate clinical care, and its advancement of biomedical education and training, is a vital component of the City of Hope model of success. Each member of the Office of Philanthropy is a stakeholder in this work, with personal accountability for his/her role in building a successful future of delivering new cures, treatments and education.

The Associate Vice President of Communications will partner with senior leaders to conceptualize transformative giving concepts for prospects with the capacity to give $10 million - $100 million+ and will lead a communications team focused on proposal development, cases for support and strategic initiatives in philanthropy.

The associate Vice President of Communications will report to the Vice President of Donor Experience and Philanthropy Marketing Communications to communicate key messages to a donor audience and to ensure that messaging is consistent across all channels.

The successful candidate will be a highly-skilled writer, editor, strategist and communications leader who is equally comfortable engaging in strategic conversations with gift officers, interviewing enterprise leaders and senior faculty, writing compelling white papers, editing the work of other writers, and overseeing the work of designers and videographers.

As a successful candidate, you will:

Transformative Philanthropy

• Work with enterprise leaders and senior philanthropy staff to help shape transformative giving concepts for prospects with the capacity to give $10 million to $100 million+.

• Collaborate with principal and transformative gift fundraisers on proposal planning for complex gifts; write and oversee the writing of white papers, letters, stewardship materials and proposals to engage our highest-level donors and prospects.

• Oversee the development of videos, publications and other creative content to support high-impact stewardship plans.

Major and Principal Giving

• Work with major and principal gift fundraisers to develop plans for proposals and other communications materials that support efforts to engage individual donors and cultivate meaningful, long-term commitments; write and oversee the writing of proposals and other solicitation materials.

• Working with senior philanthropy leaders, oversee the development of gift opportunities (at the $100,000 to multi-million-dollar level), proposal templates, gift officer toolkits, boilerplate language and other resources that can help gift officers advance gift conversations and ultimately secure significant gifts.

Strategic Initiatives

• Oversee the development of cases for support, concept papers, presentation materials, videos, digital content and messaging to support strategic initiatives in philanthropy, in collaboration with senior philanthropy leaders, select faculty, and communications consultants and partners.

• Play a key role in developing and disseminating key messages for strategic initiatives in philanthropy, working in coordination with senior philanthropy staff and communications consultants, strategists and agencies. Help ensure that messaging is consistent throughout proposals, white papers, case materials, publications and other communications vehicles.

• Develop training materials, as needed, to help gift officers learn about key messages, gift opportunities and strategic initiatives.

Communications Leadership

• Play a leading role in communicating City of Hope's vision, priorities and differentiating qualities to a donor audience.

• Lead a team to develop a wide range of content to foster a culture of philanthropy for transformative, principal and major gifts.

• Supervise and provide guidance and feedback to a team of writers and project managers

• Hire and oversee freelance writers, graphic designers and videographers as needed.

• Collaborate with communications consultants, strategists and brand engagement agencies.

• Edit the writing of colleagues and freelance writers for style, grammar, content and messaging.

• Partner with colleagues on scripting for videos and events, as requested.

• Oversee the tracking of writing projects with support from a Strategic Project Administrator. Carefully monitor timelines, work assigned to freelance writers and graphic artists, information outstanding, and other project elements to ensure that projects are completed in an efficient and timely way.


Your qualifications should include:
Bachelor's degree, advanced degree preferred or equivalent experience
Significant experience (7+ years) in the management of communications functions with emphasis on capital campaigns.
Experience in managing effective teams, engaging constituencies, and working with faculty and institutional leaders.
Experience in building communications for healthcare programs (research, clinical or community-based).

Campaign experience required.

City of Hope employees pay is based on the following criteria: work experience, qualifications, and work location.

City of Hope is an equal opportunity employer.

To learn more about our Comprehensive Benefits, please CLICK HERE