Position: Vice President, Development

Organization: Every Mother Counts (EMC)

Location: New York, NY

Reporting Relationship: Founder & President

Website: https://everymothercounts.org/

Every two minutes, a woman dies from complications of pregnancy and childbirth—that’s more than 800 preventable deaths every day around the world. For each death, 30 women experience a life-threatening complication or life-long disability. Most global maternal deaths can be prevented by ensuring that everyone has timely access to quality, respectful, and equitable maternity care. Every Mother Counts (EMC) is a global nonprofit organization founded with the sole purpose and mission to make pregnancy and childbirth safe for every mother, everywhere.

Founded by Christy Turlington Burns in 2010, the organization was born to inform, engage, and mobilize new audiences to take action and raise funds that support maternal health programs around the world. Today, EMC has an $8.6M operating budget and invests in organizations rooted in the communities where they work as local teams are critical to identify and develop effective, appropriate solutions to improve maternal health. The organization supports local, community-based partners in underserved and historically marginalized communities that are delivering high-impact, cost effective, person-centered initiatives. Most critical to EMC’s mission is their prioritization of the needs of individual mothers. The organization strives to ensure that each person is informed of their options, has a voice in their own care, and has access to quality support.

Since its inception, EMC has invested more than $31M through grants and public education that support models of care across 16 countries including the United States, Guatemala, Haiti, Tanzania, and Bangladesh. As maternal death rates have been steadily on the rise in the United States, despite spending more money per capita on maternal health than any country in the world, EMC doubled its grantmaking in the U.S. since 2020.

In addition to investments in community-led models of care, EMC is committed to diversifying the healthcare workforce, and mobilizing for change through policy and advocacy efforts. Through collaboration with key policymakers, practitioners, and community members, the team identifies priority maternal health issues and advocates for change. EMC’s program and policy efforts are complemented by our compelling storytelling, which is at the core of the organization’s founding. Some of EMC’s most impactful films include:

• No Woman, No Cry

• Giving Birth in America series

• Con Madre

• Delivering Hope

For additional information on the organization and its impact click here.

The Vice President of Development (VPD) will join as the organization implements the strategy for its next chapter. The growth and sustainability of development operations and outcomes is critical to EMC’s growth and success. The VPD will report directly to the Founder & President, a fierce maternal health advocate, and lead a team of mission-driven staff to drive a development strategy that advances EMC’s mission, impact, and outcomes. This leader will play a critical role in building upon strong existing relationships across institutional foundations, corporations, and individuals. It is also expected that the new leader will expand opportunities with foundations, corporations, and individuals—both existing and new.

The Vice President will be a nimble leader who has strength of character and tenacity for achieving the EMC mission: making pregnancy and childbirth safe for every mother, everywhere. The successful candidate will embody an executive gravitas and clear potential to play a broader leadership role as the organization evolves.

The Vice President of Development will work directly with the President and senior leadership team to help shape the organization’s future. As a member of the senior leadership team, the VPD is charged with seizing near-term opportunities for revenue, engagement, and awareness, while also building infrastructure, capacity, and reputational capital for long-term sustainability. Joining a committed, high-performing group of colleagues, the Vice President of Development will:

• Secure new philanthropic support from individuals, corporations, and foundations to support EMC’s mission, impact, and outcomes and plan for future growth sustainability.

• Cultivate new and existing external relationships, uniting a diverse and passionate movement to raise funds that support maternal health programs around the world.

• Lead the design and development—with the input of the President and other organizational leaders—of a comprehensive strategy that will cultivate and steward the financial resources and voices needed to advance the critical work of EMC.

• Oversee the development of and track proposals and reports for all foundation and corporate fundraising.

• Embed principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion within all of EMC’s development activities.

• Nurture and effectively steward long-term and trusted relationships with key stakeholders, such as board members, funders, volunteers, and advocates, and high net worth donors.

• Serve as an empathetic and effective manager with a demonstrated track record of operational excellence in previous roles.

• Empower and develop talent. Be an active and effective communicator known to be honest while providing constructive feedback and delegation.

• Promote intra- and inter-departmental teamwork and collaboration.

• Navigate multiple priorities, knowing when to shift direction and focus while also skilled at making practical, long-term decisions in a timely, thoughtful way.

 

The successful candidate will bring equity focused values alignment, intellectual curiosity, a steady presence, and strategic and outcome-oriented leadership to advance EMC. Additional ideal qualifications include:

• Track record of experience managing relationships and teams to secure high-value, multi-year donations across different donor types (e.g., individual, institutional, major gifts, etc.).

• Extensive experience in a development role with expertise in rebuilding or evolving an organization’s infrastructure and operations.

• A strategic thinker with the vision, capacity, and experience to understand and balance a complex array of needs and serve as a thought partner to the Founder & President.

• Ability to serve as an ambassador for the organization and participate in external events to increase visibility, credibility, and market brand, and develop strategic partnerships to further increase community awareness and expand philanthropic support.

• Intuitive planner with a demonstrated ability to set priorities, develop and implement thoughtful, clear, action-oriented growth strategies for EMC.

• Inspirational leader with experience leading creatively and collaboratively through change management.

• Ability to quickly come up to speed on EMC’s programs, value proposition and capabilities.

• Collaborative leader with ability to expand opportunities for cross-collaboration and partnership across teams in a seamless way, which supports the overall fundraising and branding work, both internally and externally.

• Depth of strategic planning and visioning experience with ability to implement donor cultivation and fundraising events and budget management with emphasis on shared accountability.

• Ability to exercise sound judgment, make timely decisions, and advise staff on multiple projects, priorities, and deadlines.

• Have a proven record of visible and effective management approaches and the demonstrated ability to build, coach, motivate and retain a solid team of professionals focused on impact, operational excellence, accountability, and efficiency.

• Possess a proven ability to work collaboratively as part of a team and interest in building an organizational culture that values personal connection and face-to-face interaction.

• Display excellent and versatile oral and written communications skills including the ability to summarize detailed information.

• Passion for and demonstrated commitment to maternal and reproductive health; alignment with EMC ethos and culture.

• Experience in a growth-stage environment, and willingness to "roll up sleeves" to create and implement new systems, processes, and tools.

Annual base pay range: $165-185K.

Every Mother Counts has provided a compensation range that represents its good faith estimate of what the organization may pay for the position at the time of posting.