Grant Writing and Donor Management Officer

Stichting BirdLife Europe

Brussels, Belgium

BirdLife Europe is a Partnership of 45 nature conservation organisations with almost 3,000 staff, 1.9 million members and more than 6,000 reserves covering over 300,000 hectares in Europe, Central Asia and Israel. The European and Central Asian Division is an international team of permanent staff who collectively provide a wide range of experience and skills within the fields of ornithology, conservation, management, fundraising, advocacy, communication, administration.
BirdLife International is a global Partnership of conservation organisations that strives to conserve birds, their habitats and global biodiversity, working with people towards sustainability in the use of natural resources through global Partnership of over 100 countries. BirdLife Europe is the coordinating and servicing body of BirdLife International and acts as Regional Office.
BirdLife Europe, in Brussels, is looking for a Grant Writing and Donor Management Officer.

Overall purpose of the job:

The Grant Writing and Donor Management Officer is responsible for planning and managing all aspects of grants development and for producing strong and continuing philanthropic returns to the BirdLife Partnership.
In particular this person will prepare and submit funding applications and reports to institutional donors in order to expand and strengthen funding for the BirdLife Partnership, including secretariat operating costs.

MAIN DUTIES/WORK PROGRAMME RESPONSIBILITIES

General tasks

The Grant Writing and Donor Management Officer

• Develops grant proposals, inclusive of research, proposal writing, submission and reporting.
• Coordinates the planning, writing and review editing of assigned proposals, completes final proposal and support documentation, assuring timely submissions and appropriate follow-up.
• Generates and distributes accurate and timely reports on the status of related grants to senior management in BirdLife Europe
• Acknowledges all charitable contributions with appropriate written recognition.
• Utilizes database tools to capture prospective funder profiles, keeps track record of funding opportunities and proposals, arranges contacts, etc. Assure database is set up and maintained.
• Assists with the creation of grant budgets and budget reports.
• Determines grant administration requirements upon successful grant award, in coordination with BirdLife Europe admin and legal department
• Work with internal program and account managers to assure monitoring is established and carried out according to requirements.
• Prepares and files compliance/progress reports and assures information is accurate and timely for special audits required by appropriate agencies, assisting BirdLife Partners and staff in this area if needed
• Produces detailed multiannual fundraising plans, identifying areas for growth and development and outlining measurable objectives and review the success and achievements against agreed targets
• Helps develop BirdLife’s Partners fundraising capacity through innovative tools and new ideas, identifying suitable funding initiatives, calls for proposals etc.

Specific tasks

• Researches opportunities and submits applications to several European Union budget lines (especially environmental ones) for the BirdLife Europe Partnership and for other BirdLife global and regional programmes
• Secures the BirdLife Europe core funding application (LIFE+ “NGO operating grants” budget line), submitting high quality applications and reports within the agreed deadlines.
• Supports senior management in developing sponsorship or strategic partnership proposals to new Corporate donors whose priorities match those of BirdLife.
• Helps develop and implement concepts for BirdLife fundraising events in Europe, with special attention to Brussels, in collaboration with relevant BirdLife staff
• Participates in the BirdLife Fundraising co-ordination team and reports back to Senior management
• Participates in the day to day work of the organisation – such as reporting, attending team meetings, contributing to publications and taking a flexible approach to general administrative and support tasks.

Qualifications required:

PLEASE, READ THIS CAREFULLY: Before submitting your application take time to score your qualifications for this job. Remember to be honest, this is the best way to increase your chances to get the job. You need to score each required qualification from 0 to 3: 0 = I do not have this qualification, 1 = basic, 2 = good, 3 = very good). Then sum up the scores to obtain the total.

Before submitting your application, please answer to the following questions and you will know whether you are qualified enough to apply to this job:

Question: Do you score only 2 or 3 in qualifications from 1 to 9?

Answer: NO: you are not qualified enough to apply to this job
YES: please pass to the following question

Question: Is your total score above or equal to 70?

Answer: NO: you are not qualified enough to apply to this job
YES: you can apply for this job

If you are qualified to submit your application, please attach the next table with your scores to the cover letter.

Please consider that any application sent without individual and total scores or with any 0 or 1 in qualifications from 1 to 16 or with a total score of less than 70 will be automatically discarded.

Essential Qualifications (Score: 0 = I do not have this qualification, 1 = basic, 2 = good, 3 = very good) Score

Experience & Knowledge

1 Good general education – Relevant University Degree
2 Minimum 4 years of demonstrable knowledge and experience in grant writing and donor management for environmental non profit organisations
3 Proven record of successful applications from EU (in particular LIFE+ and other environmental budget lines), Trusts, Foundations and Corporations with a nature conservation, science and policy focus in particular
4 Working experience with environmental and nature conservation NGOs
5 Good understanding of EU nature conservation policy issues
6 Demonstrable experience in developing multiannual fundraising plans
7 Experience of researching funding opportunities from EU, Trusts, Foundations and Corporates
8 Solid knowledge of Programme Cycle Management, logframe and other project design tools
9 Knowledge about BirdLife work/programme

Skills & Abilities

10 Strong writing and communications skills with the ability to produce nature conservation grant applications and reports, with technical and policy components
11 Ability to manage many concurrent projects at one time
12 Ability to understand and generate budgets
13 Good team working skills, in particular in international/multicultural teams
14 High standard of computer literacy (Excel, Word, Power Point, Outlook and the Internet). Familiarity with electronic databases. Graphic design skills is a plus
15 Fast learning
16 Fluent in English. Additional languages are a plus (in particular one or more of these languages: French, German, Spanish and Russian)

Approach to work

17 Accuracy, precision, attentiveness to detail
18 Independence: demonstrable ability to create, prioritise and follow work plans with minimum supervision.
19 Flexibility and adaptability: ability to deal with multiple assignments, working under pressure, responsiveness to requests, follow-up of decisions
20 Openness: capacity to integrate new ideas and approaches
21 Ability and willingness to travel for work
22 Ability to understand administration requirements and meet deadlines
23 Willingness to work occasional evenings and weekends as required

Personal disposition

24 Commitment to nature conservation and to BirdLife mission
25 Strong self motivation and curiosity
26 Problem solving attitude
27 Assertiveness and confidence
28 Creativity both in thinking and in executing tasks
29 An individual with the dedication to meeting the challenges of developing successful applications and maintaining relationships with institutional donors

TOTAL

Salary Package:

Between 2900€ and 3300€ Gross/month depending on experience. Holiday allowance + 13th month as well as pension scheme and benefit.

How to apply:

Please submit a full CV and a comprehensive cover letter (including the qualification scores) setting out your reasons for applying for the post and outlining the qualifications experience knowledge and skills that you feel you can bring to the role. Please highlight both in the CV and the cover letter the amount of funds you have been able to raise over the last 5 years. Please note that without this information your application will be automatically discarded.
CV and cover letter (including the qualifications score) shall be submitted in English to europe@birdlife.org. Please name CV and cover letter in the following way: “your name CV grant writer” and “your name cover letter grant writer”. Deadline is the 16th October 2011 at midnight. Please consider that applications received after the closing date will be automatically discarded.

Possible interview days: 3 or 4 November 2011 (9am – 3pm)

Short listing and interviews:

Short listing is based on CV and cover letter. Successful candidates will be asked to attend face to face interviews and perform an additional test.
Please note that due to the large number of expected applications, only successful candidates will be contacted.