Development Marketing & Communications Director

“If we can get one child adopted into a loving family, all our work will be worth it.”

– Dave Thomas

Join us as we champion our mission to dramatically increase the number of adoptions of children waiting in North America’s foster care systems. We’ve helped to find safe, permanent homes for more than 16,000 young people across the United States and Canada, but our mission is not complete. Invest your career in making a difference and join the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption’s team.

We offer a supportive workplace where you can make an impact. We are dedicated to creating a diverse, inclusive and equitable work environment for Foundation staff, while advocating for measurable change toward racial equity within the child welfare system.

We are seeking a Development Marketing and Communications Director to help shape and execute an integrated communications strategy that engages individual donors and corporate partners in support of the Foundation’s mission. Based in Dublin, Ohio, this role offers an exciting opportunity to collaborate across internal teams and with external partners to develop communications, build awareness, inspire engagement and support the Foundation’s fundraising goals. If you are a strategic communicator with exceptional writing and content development skills, strong creative judgment and a passion for turning ideas into compelling content, we encourage you to learn more and apply.

Key Deliverables:

1. Collaborate with marketing and communications and development department leads to create messaging and materials that engage current and prospective individual donors and corporate partners interested in raising funds and awareness for our mission; serve as a liaison, collaborating with internal teams to determine valued opportunities for partners that expand the Foundation’s reach and impact
2. Inform communications strategies to engage the employees, clients/customers and networks of corporations that have named the Foundation as its signature charity. Serve as the liaison to Wendy’s® U.S. marketing and communications teams and agency partners and provide content for internal and external channels, paid and earned media, social, fundraising campaigns and materials align with the Foundation’s brand standards
3. Oversee the partnerships communications manager’s work to create print, video and digital materials that help corporate partners (e.g., Wendy’s of Canada, Wendy’s suppliers, Roof Maxx and others) to engage clients, customers, networks and/or followers in fundraising campaigns, events and other ways to get involved
4. Oversee the development marketing associate director’s work to create digital and print fundraising campaign materials (e.g., mailings, appeal emails, fundraising ads, text messages) and stewardship communications (e.g., annual report, newsletters, impact reports and other special projects) in collaboration with the development team as well as external agency partners
5. Utilize HubSpot and other data sources to assess the effectiveness of development marketing communications and inform recommendations and priority growth areas to ensure the highest ROI. Contribute to quarterly marketing reports and scorecards for board and committee meetings

What You Bring:

• Undergraduate degree in communications, journalism, marketing or related field
• 10+ years of experience in marketing and communications that support partnerships, events and/or fundraising
• Experience utilizing best practices in developing an integrated marketing and communications strategy, leveraging, print, email, web and organic social media channels, to advance an organization’s mission and fundraising goals
• Advanced knowledge of effective digital advertising, cause marketing, audience segmentation, organic and paid search and search/generative engine optimization strategies to improve engagement, acquisition and retention outcomes across development and corporate partnership campaigns
• Exceptional interpersonal skills and high emotional intelligence to effectively build and earn trust with internal teams and external partners

Our Benefits

At the Foundation, our team is committed to providing unwavering dedication to change the journey for children lingering in foster care. We value each member of our team and we are committed to taking care of you. Beyond joining our talented team and the opportunity to make a difference, we are proud to offer our employees a competitive compensation and benefits program, including:

1. Flexible, hybrid schedule arrangement for most positions allowing employees to choose to work from home up to two days a week
2. First day of hire medical, dental and vision insurance coverage for you and your family
3. Employer-funded health reimbursement account (HRA). The HRA is a tax-advantaged account, funded solely by the employer to help you pay for medical expenses.
4. Employer-paid basic life insurance, short-term disability and long-term disability
5. Eligibility for a 403(b)-retirement match program up to 5%
6. Adoption-Friendly Workplace providing financial benefits and paid time off for adoptive parents
7. Generous paid time off, including paid holidays, paid personal, vacation and sick days as well as parental leave, adoption leave and foster care leave
8. A connected team environment that embraces a commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion
9. Career advancement opportunities and continued education
10. A comprehensive offering of additional voluntary benefits!

The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption is an equal employment opportunity employer and does not discriminate against any employee or applicant based on race, color, religion, religious beliefs, political affiliation, creed, HIV/AIDS status, ethnicity, sex, age, national origin, ancestry, disability, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, marital status, familial status, veteran/military status, predisposing genetic characteristics, domestic violence victim status, prior arrest or any other category protected by applicable law. Any employee who engages in such conduct is subject to disciplinary action, up to and including discharge.