Director of Alumni Relation

Reporting to the Director of Advancement, the Director of Alumni Relations leads Deerfield’s efforts to keep its 12,000+ alumni and friends meaningfully connected with the Academy and with each other, in support of overall institutional advancement efforts. The director provides vision and strategic direction to ensure robust high-quality programs and services that educate, inspire or otherwise engage the Academy’s diverse constituents in the U.S. and around the globe. 

Responsibilities Include:

Vision and Programming

• Plan and execute (and supervise Alumni Relations staff in planning and executing) in-person and virtual offerings, which may include such things as: on- and off-campus class, affinity, and regional gatherings; mentoring and career networking opportunities; shared-interest or -identity programs; service projects; alumni awards; and other activities that enrich community members’ intellectual, professional, and personal lives, and connect them with Deerfield.
• Oversee alumni Reunions event on campus ensuring success measured by achievement of overall goals and creation of an engaging event which fulfills the goal of meaningfully engaging alumni with Deerfield.
• Collaborate closely with Director of Advancement to ensure that alumni engagement strategies and plans effectively support Advancement fundraising programs’ objectives and needs.
• Recruit, train, and manage alumni volunteers to help develop and implement engagement initiatives. Provide leadership and guidance for Alumni Relations staff who also manage volunteers.
• Oversee and manage the Executive Committee (EC) of the Alumni Association, supporting its president in developing annual strategic objectives and ensuring that the EC’s work supports Deerfield Academy’s mission and institutional priorities and enhances the efforts of the Alumni Relations staff. This includes recruiting new members, ensuring that the group’s composition always represents the diversity of Deerfield’s alumni constituency.
• Lead a proactive, responsive and strategic institutional approach to alumni engagement, resulting in measurably increased alumni affinity for Deerfield and its mission.
• Ensure continuing collection and analysis of demographic and psychographic data to gauge program’s responsiveness to evolving needs and interests of multiple sub-constituencies. Identify metrics with which to measure degrees of alumni engagement over time, and use that information to refine and develop new programs and services.
• Continually refine Advancement’s supportive role in facilitating staff, faculty and student interactions with alumni, thereby building meaningful connections for alumni with each other, with students (as appropriate), and with Deerfield.
• Collaborate with faculty and administrators (academic departments, Communications, Admission Office, Student Life Office, Center for Service and Global Citizenship, etc.) to set and oversee parameters for alumni-student interaction through internships, mentoring, career advising, student alliance advising, etc. Optimize alumni engagement to best serve Deerfield’s curricular and co-curricular objectives.

Staff Management

• Supervise the work of the Alumni Relations staff to ensure continuing creativity and fresh thinking, awareness of campus culture and industry trends, and adherence to Advancement Office practices as well as institutional guidelines and standards.
• Lead a service-oriented culture that is responsive to constituents and collaborative with Deerfield colleagues.
• Effectively manage overall work performance of Alumni Relations team members, including review and development of individual job skills.
• Lead staff as a hands-on project creator, implementor, and evaluator. Lead by example through active participation in weekend and evening activities on- and off-campus.
• Work with Human Resources in the hiring process for new Alumni Relations employees, according to the Academy’s stated Best Practices in Hiring.
• Oversee orientation and training of new Alumni Relations staff.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree required
• 5-7 years of experience in secondary or higher education or related non-profit experience that includes knowledge of best practices for constituent engagement
• Ability to manage and motivate staff and volunteers
• An open and collaborative leadership style
• Event planning experience
• Excellent verbal and written communication and organizational skills
• High level of attention to detail
• Ability to work independently and as part of a team
• A high level of integrity and a strong work ethic
• Demonstrated commitment to diversity and inclusion and to serving the needs of a diverse community
• Ability to manage, and sensitivity to, highly confidential information
• Proficiency with MS Office Suite, integrated databases, email marketing programs, and willingness to learn specialized software for scheduling, project management, and event management
• Ability and willingness to travel (approximately 10% of work time)
• Close visual acuity to analyze data and figures and to view a computer terminal
• Ability to sustain substantial movements of the wrist, hands and/or fingers
• Ability to occasionally lift, carry, push, pull or otherwise move objects up to 10 lbs
• Ability to occasionally stoop, kneel or reach
• Demonstrated commitment to diversity and inclusion and to serving the needs of a diverse community

**SIGN-ON BONUS**

The successful candidate will receive a $1,000 sign-on bonus ($500 paid at time of hire and $500 paid at the end of 90 days of employment.