Fundraising and Partnerships Officer

This role is for someone who wants to work in a team to secure funding for programmes that deliver social impact. You will identify opportunities at the intersection of beneficiary needs, Seefar’s capabilities and donor interest. You will be responsible for implementing our fundraising strategy by helping identify new opportunities, driving proposal development, identifying partners, supporting the implementation of our donor engagement strategy and developing appropriate fundraising tools and materials.

You will be part of Seefar’s Programme Engagement Team, which is responsible for external communications, fundraising and marketing. Other members of the team have a focus on: strategic branding, marketing; graphic design; proposal development and project management.

You can be based anywhere in the world and occasional travel will be required. Seefar has been a remote-working organisation since 2014.

You will start on a full-time, 12-month consulting contract with a fee range of USD 4,800 – 5,800 per month. Success will enable the possibility of a long-term role.

Job Description

We are a social enterprise with a mission to work with vulnerable people to build a better future. We work in East Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, East Africa, North Africa, the Sahel and Europe. For more information about us, please visit our website.

Seefar’s income is a mix of grants and commercial contracts. These range in value from $30,000 to $3,000,000.

To succeed in this role, you must be motivated to work hard to generate funding from donors and clients who may not immediately recognise the opportunities that you see. It is likely that you have:

• 3-5 years of experience in proposal development, donor engagement and fundraising. We place particular value on a track record raising funds from government donors in Europe and North America
• Knowledge of how donors in the international development sector make decisions, with a particular interest in migration, livelihoods and education.
• Experience developing and submitting proposals.
• Excellent listening skills as part of your broader influencing skills.
• Excellent written and spoken English.

Responsibilities

The following are the primary responsibilities of the role, with estimated allocations of time and attention.

Identify opportunities and develop proposals: 70%

• Tracking funding opportunities, prioritising and sharing with colleagues.
• Lead or support the preparation of concept notes and proposals.
• Develop partnerships and consortiums
• Track and prioritise external contacts and prepare for external engagements, such as presentations, reports and meetings.
• Prioritise donors based the likelihood of successful funding and complementarity between their objectives and Seefar’s programme competencies.
• Liaise with donors and internal project teams to scope research.
• Monitor and influence the internal pipeline of research and project results to support external fundraising.
• Participate in meetings with people that influence donor funding decisions.
• Organise or attend seminars, workshops and conferences that have relevance to Seefar’s reputation and fundraising.
• Manage and develop external resources to support fundraising, for example graphic design or IT contractors.

Support donor engagement and external communications: 25%

• Pursue our donor engagement strategy through communications and marketing materials.
• Maintain and increase the depth of our relationships with existing donors, including by tracking interactions with donors and opportunities for communication arising from our project delivery.
• Maintain and develop communication tools that support Seefar’s branding, such as our website and social media channels.

Global Management: 5%

This role is part of Seefar’s global management team. You will:

• Contribute to global strategy.
• Cooperate with other areas of the Seefar to communicate substantive and administrative information that supports organisational management overall.

Your role will require you to travel. These examples are drawn from someone at your level over the course of a year in Seefar:

• Two meetings of the global management team, one in August 2023 and one in February 2024.
• A meeting of Programme Engagement personnel in Paris.
• Presenting at a conference in Austria.
• Attending donor meetings in Brussels and Berlin.
• Visiting projects and donors in the Balkans, Jordan, and Nigeria.

Working with Seefar

Current and former personnel have noted the points below as positive features of Seefar’s work environment and culture:

• The Enterprise combines entrepreneurialism with a focus on social impact.
• You work with highly diverse people and across a diversity of contexts.
• There is a high level of trust that supports you to work autonomously.
• The people in the Enterprise encourage innovation and experimentation.
• Achieving results is prioritised over rigid structures and workflows.
• You are never bored and always challenged.

Current and former personnel have noted the points below as negative features of Seefar’s work environment and culture:

• Collaborating with geographically dispersed teams requires flexibility and patience.
• Working remotely can make you feel isolated and so requires you to invest time in communication.
• Travel schedules can sometimes be heavy.
• It can be fast paced so you need to be productive and able to prioritise effectively.