Development Coordinator
Coordinating the moving parts of a nonprofit's fundraising calendar, you keep events, campaigns, mailings, and donor records running across the year. The operational layer that lets gift officers focus on relationships.
What it's like to be a Development Coordinator
Most weeks tend to involve event production, campaign logistics, and database hygiene — venue calls for the gala, segmenting mailing lists for an appeal, reconciling pledge schedules in the CRM. You might find yourself building a run-of-show one day and pulling a constituent report the next. Throughput shows up in events delivered, appeals mailed, and clean donor records.
What's harder than people expect is how much hinges on data accuracy — a wrong salutation in a major-gift letter can be expensive, and a missed renewal cycle can lose a loyal donor. Variance across employers is wide: a large hospital foundation has specialized roles and big-event teams; a smaller nonprofit may have you running development, communications, and a piece of programs.
People who tend to thrive here have a producer's instinct for logistics and a hostess's instinct for donors. CFRE eligibility builds over years. The trade-off is evening and weekend events during peak season and the steady undercurrent of fundraising targets that always feel one quarter behind.
Where this role sits in the broader career landscape — and where it can take you.
Roles like this one sit within a broader occupational category. The numbers below reflect that full landscape — helpful for context, but your specific experience will depend on level, specialty, and where you work.
How this category is changing
Skills & Requirements
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