Associate Director of Funder Partnerships

OVERVIEW

The North Carolina Local News Lab Fund (the Fund) is a pooled fund working to build a more inclusive news and information ecosystem in North Carolina. Through the application of a race, class and systems analysis, the Fund supports efforts to ensure everyone in North Carolina can find and trust useful news and information they need to thrive. To do that, we fund community-serving organizations with an emphasis on filling reporting gaps, expanding distribution, and telling a complete story of North Carolina's diverse and resilient communities.

To date, the North Carolina Local News Lab Fund has invested more than $5 million in 50+ organizations and counting. In addition to its own grantmaking, the Fund mobilizes additional philanthropic resources to support its mission and its network. Alongside funding, the Fund engages in intentional ecosystem strengthening, through building the core strength of its grant partners, weaving statewide networks through convenings and matchmaking, and providing advice and counsel to a broad array of organizations and leaders who make up the philanthropic news and information landscape.

In 2024 the Fund became home to the state-based affiliates of Press Forward, Press Forward North Carolina and Press Forward Charlotte. Through this partnership, the Fund is expanding its leadership team and seeks nominations and applications for an Associate Director of Funder Partnerships to grow and strengthen its impact in Charlotte and North Carolina’s philanthropic community. The new Associate Director of Funder Partnerships (ADFP) will activate new local funders to increase investment in the organizations and infrastructure that will ensure more people in Charlotte and North Carolina can find, trust, and use the news and information they need.

Working alongside the Fund’s Director and the Associate Director of Field Building, the ADFP will contribute to and ensure the integration of the work in Charlotte to the Fund’s statewide strategies. The ADFP will also manage key operational functions and liaise closely with the Fund’s fiscal sponsor, NEO Philanthropy.

CORE RESPONSIBIITIES

As one of three full-time members of the Fund’s staff, the ADFP will play an essential role in advancing the Fund’s mission and helping to translate that mission into concrete strategies and tactics within Charlotte. They will hold the following responsibilities:

Funder Cultivation & Organizing

• Design and implement events for funder learning, case-making, and sharing stories of local impact in Charlotte and across our network.
• Identify and cultivate Charlotte-based and serving funders around the imperative of ensuring Charlotte residents have access to accessible, credible, and trusted news and information.
• Seed and nurture a community of Charlotte-based funders who share the Fund’s objectives and engage in collective action in coordination with the Fund’s statewide network.
• Work with the Director and Advisory Board to set and achieve fundraising goals to drive the Fund’s Charlotte-based work.
• Support stewardship of funding partners, from formal reporting to informal communication, learning, and relationship building.

Network Weaving & Capacity Strengthening

• Convene and connect grantee and ecosystem partners to share knowledge, align efforts, and strengthen relationships.
• Contribute to the Fund’s grantee supports in collaboration with the Associate Director, Field Building, and connecting with aligned funding.

Strategy

• Partner with the Director to adapt and tailor successful statewide coalition building and funder activation to Charlotte.
• Bring emergent learning from the field, particularly Charlotte, to the Fund’s Advisory Board, funders, and other stakeholders for shared meaning-making and planning.
• Assist the Director in sharing the Fund's vision, mission, and theory of change to the field in-person and online.

Grantmaking & Grants Management

• Participate in and support the Fund’s participatory grant selection process.
• Help to steward grant reporting, lifting up key insights and data from the portfolio's work to strengthen future grantmaking and fundraising.
• Contribute to the ongoing refinement of the Fund’s grantmaking process to ensure it reflects a trust-based and equitable philanthropic practice.

Operations & Organizational Effectiveness

• Contribute to and implement processes and structures to effectively steward and report on the Fund’s existing gifts.
• Identify process improvements and design innovations to strengthen, simplify, and standardize how the Fund communicates impact through reporting to the Fund’s network of funders.
• Partner closely with NEO Philanthropy to ensure timely execution of financial and administrative functions, in service to grantee, funder, vendor and other stakeholder needs.

KEY QUALIFICATIONS

While no one candidate will embody all the qualifications enumerated below, the ideal candidate will possess many of the following professional and personal abilities, attributes, and experiences:

• A self-starter, who can work independently and create structures/plans with incomplete information. Entrepreneurial and expansive thinker.
• A seasoned fundraiser with experience cultivating and stewarding funders around a shared mission or goal.
• Deep connections to and strong relationships within the Charlotte mission-driven community.
• Demonstrated commitment to DEI and creating equitable structures that center community voice and perspectives.
• Highly relational and understands how to build trusted and mutually accountable partnerships.
• Systems thinker, who understands the disruptive potential of philanthropy.
• Strong project manager, who can toggle across multiple projects.
• Deep understanding of the operational and capacity needs of community-based organizations.
• Interest or experience in the news and information landscape.
• Effective and confident communicator, both written and oral.
• Strong learning orientation, with background experience in program evaluation and continuous improvement.
• Multi-lingual (Spanish preferred)

LOCATION & TRAVEL

Although the Fund is a remote-first workplace, the Associate Director is expected to reside in or near Charlotte where they will be expected to attend meetings and events at least three days a week (or more, if needed) as well as travel throughout the state periodically as appropriate. Access to a vehicle is required and travel for in-person meetings up to 20% in state and 5% out of state is expected.

SALARY & BENEFITS

The salary range for this position is $90,000 - $100,000, with fully paid medical, dental, vision, and life insurance. The Fund offers a 4.5 day work week, 15 days of annual paid vacation time (increases to 20 after one year of employment), accrued paid sick time, and 13 paid holidays and a 4% 401k match. Additionally, the Fund’s offices close at the end of the year for approximately two weeks.