The Role
Own and grow a portfolio of 50–100 major-donor prospects, personally execute high-touch solicitation and stewardship, translate technical work into donor-facing narratives, generate pipeline, and collaborate with leadership to close six- and seven-figure gifts.
Summary Generated by Built In
We are seeking a Director of Major Gifts to join our Development team as a high-impact individual contributor. In this role, you will be the primary engine for high-net-worth and charitable institutional engagement, ensuring that Signal has the resources necessary to sustain and scale our technology.
This is not a role for a backend administrator; it is a role for a builder and a closer. You will own the full lifecycle of major giving—from identifying prospects to closing six-and-seven-figure commitments. Reporting into the President, you will work directly with Signal leadership to translate complex technical challenges into compelling philanthropic narratives.
Key Responsibilities
- Portfolio Management: directly own, manage, and grow a portfolio of 50-100 qualified prospects and donors with the capacity to give $50k–$1M+ annually.
- Strategic Solicitation: Personally execute high-touch cultivation and solicitation strategies. You will be "in the room" (virtually or physically) asking for the gift and represent Signal in many related conversations.
- Narrative Development: Translate Signal’s product, technical roadmap, and strategic engagement work into urgent, accessible, and inspiring cases for support tailored to non-technical, high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs) and charitable institutions.
- Pipeline Generation: Proactively research and identify new prospects within the technology, privacy, civil liberties, and other relevant ecosystems.
- Donor Stewardship: Design and execute bespoke stewardship plans that keep major donors informed on how their capital is protecting free expression and privacy globally.
- Leadership Collaboration: Partner with Signal’s leadership team to prepare them for donor meetings, ensuring their time is leveraged effectively for the highest-impact conversations.
What You Bring
- Proven Experience: 8+ years of frontline fundraising experience, with a track record of personally closing 6-figure+ gifts and grants - ideally in the technology sector.
- Independent Mindset: You are comfortable working autonomously without a large support staff. You enjoy the thrill of unearthing new prospects and picking up the phone.
- Mission Alignment: You understand the modern landscape of digital privacy, surveillance, and large technology conglomerates. You can articulate why Signal’s non-profit model is essential for a healthy internet.
- Exceptional Communication: You are a writer and a speaker. You can synthesize complex ideas about encryption and open-source software into emotional, human-centric stories.
- Financial Savviness: Proficiency with financial basics, modern donor management systems and remote collaboration tools.
What We Offer
- We’re fully distributed. This means you can work anywhere within the US. And we travel a few times throughout the year so you can get to know your colleagues in person.
- Excellent healthcare, vision, and dental with all premiums covered.
- Our 401(k) plan matches your contributions (without any vesting period) up to $20,500.
- We're stable and driven by our privacy mission as a not for profit. This means we’re capable of focusing on what is best for users without distractions or compromises.
- Feel good about what you do. Signal is building core infrastructure for truly private digital communications globally. We don’t participate in the surveillance business model, and we are proud of the integrity and transparency of our work.
- Salary range based on experience: $170,000 - 200,000, not including a generous quarterly merit-based bonus structure.
Signal Messenger is an equal opportunity employer. All applicants will be considered for employment regardless of race, color, national origin, religion, sex, age, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, veteran or disability status.
At Signal, trust and mutual respect are foundational to our culture, as are empathy and transparency in how we interact as an internal team and with the world around us. We are committed to creating a work environment that is supportive, challenging, and that draws on people from a variety of backgrounds. Diverse perspectives and backgrounds are critical to delivering on our core purpose of protecting free expression and enabling secure communication around the globe.
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The Company
What We Do
Privacy is possible. Signal Messenger makes it easy. At Signal, our goal is to develop open source privacy technology that protects privacy rights, promotes free expression and enables secure global communication. We believe that private messaging should be simple and ubiquitous. Signal combines state-of-the-art security and end-to-end encryption with the features that users expect in a modern messaging application. Millions of people use Signal every day to speak freely, and a growing list of organizations have integrated the open source Signal Protocol into messaging platforms that support billions of users. Working on Signal is an opportunity to become part of a diverse group of people who are passionate about privacy. As a nonprofit organization, Signal Messenger is uniquely positioned to focus on its mission in an environment where users will always come first. Our team is growing quickly, and we encourage candidates from a diverse set of backgrounds to apply. [email protected]
