Fundraising Manager – Direct Giving & Major Donors

About the Job

Avnei Chein is a nonprofit supporting people and families in acute mental health crises. The work is urgent and, without overstatement, often lifesaving. Delivering this work requires a highly skilled, deeply committed professional team—and sustaining that team requires consistent, reliable funding.

This role exists to provide stability and momentum by securing the financial resources the organization needs to operate at full strength.

We are seeking a results-driven Fundraising Manager whose primary responsibility is to initiate donor contact, secure introductions, and confidently make direct funding asks. This is a hands-on, execution-focused role for someone who can step in quickly and begin generating fundraising momentum.

This role carries direct responsibility for asking for money and closing gifts, not for designing fundraising strategy or infrastructure.

This is not a long-cycle cultivation, branding, or event-led fundraising position. The role prioritizes timely, well-prepared asks over extended cultivation or internal optimization work. The ideal candidate is comfortable moving efficiently from first contact to ask, is energized by closing gifts, and measures success by funds raised—not by activities planned.

• Lead and personally execute fundraising efforts, with a primary focus on individual and major donor asks
• Proactively identify, pursue, and engage prospective donors, with the explicit goal of securing meetings and making direct funding requests
• Confidently move donors from first contact to first-time and follow-up asks, without extended pre-cultivation cycles
• Leverage warm introductions, existing networks, and leadership connections to accelerate donor engagement
• Persist through rejection and delayed responses while maintaining momentum and disciplined follow-up
• Collaborate with organizational leadership to ensure fundraising asks align with immediate programmatic and operational needs
• Represent Avnei Chein in donor meetings and targeted fundraising conversations (in person and online)
• Maintain accurate and up-to-date donor records and communications in the CRM system
  

Branding initiatives, large-scale events, and long-term cultivation strategies are led by other members of the team. This role is not responsible for initiating, planning, or driving those efforts, but may be asked to provide limited, fundraising-relevant input when such initiatives are already underway, as needed to support fundraising conversations.

Grant research and applications are supported by this role but are not its primary focus. The Fundraising Manager is expected to contribute substantively to grant opportunities without allowing proposal work to displace direct donor engagement and fundraising asks.

Within the first 90 days, the Fundraising Manager is expected to:

• Actively engage prospective and existing donors through direct outreach and warm introductions
• Secure and conduct donor meetings with a clear fundraising objective for each conversation
• Make direct funding asks, including first-time asks
• Close initial donations and/or establish clearly defined next-step commitments toward closing
• Build a working donor pipeline focused on near- and medium-term giving opportunities
• Demonstrate momentum by moving prospects from introduction to ask without prolonged pre-cultivation
• Demonstrate measurable fundraising progress appropriate to ramp-up stage (e.g., closed gifts, verbal commitments, or proposals in active consideration)
• Maintain clear documentation of outreach, conversations, asks, and outcomes in the CRM

Success in this role is measured primarily by donor engagement that leads to asks and gifts—not by planning activity, event execution, or branding work.

• Minimum 3 years of fundraising experience, with a proven track record of securing donations
• Demonstrated comfort and effectiveness in making direct asks across platforms and settings
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills in English (Hebrew an advantage)
• Self-starter who takes initiative, maintains momentum, and operates independently
• Ability to move prospects from initial contact to ask within short to medium timeframes
• Comfortable operating without pre-existing donor lists or institutional pipelines
• Genuine passion for mental health and the mission of Avnei Chein
• Willingness to travel to the US and Canada a few times per year for donor meetings and fundraising
  

• Existing relationships within Jewish communities, particularly in North America
• Experience working with international donors or diaspora communities
• Familiarity with Monday.com or other donor/fundraising management systems, with the ability to work effectively in existing systems and contribute practical input on improvements where helpful