Associate Director, Global Retention

BACKGROUND

Over the past 80 years, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) has developed unparalleled expertise in responding to emergencies and helping uprooted communities to rebuild. Founded in 1933 at the request of Albert Einstein, the IRC offers lifesaving care and life-changing assistance to refugees forced to flee from war or disaster.

The International Rescue Committee UK is part of the IRC global network, which has its headquarters in New York and London. The IRC is on the ground in more than 40 countries, providing emergency relief, relocating refugees and rebuilding lives in the wake of disaster. Through 22 regional offices in cities across the United States, the IRC also helps refugees resettle in the US and become self-sufficient.

 The IRC is committed to a culture of bold leadership, innovation in all aspects of our work, creative partnerships and, most crucially, accountability to those we serve. The IRC is a tireless advocate for the most vulnerable.

 IRC UK

Our European headquarters, IRC UK, was established in London in 1997 to support the organization’s global activities and particularly to diversify its donor base and to better advocate with European policymakers on behalf of the people we serve. Since its establishment IRC UK has grown rapidly and is now acknowledged for its high-quality project management, technical expertise in governance and rights and economic recovery, and innovative thinking on early recovery and gender-based violence. IRC-UK comprises approximately 180 staff. The IRC also has offices in Berlin, Bonn, Brussels, Geneva and Stockholm.

 CONTEXT, MASS MARKETING

IRC's Mass Markets department, part of the External Relations Unit, is responsible for the global delivery of circa USD $80m, of predominantly unrestricted funding, contributing to a total of circa $USD240m that the International Rescue Committee currently raises in total from the private sector. The Mass Markets department plays an important strategic role in the creation of IRC’s brand, awareness and support for its advocacy goals. The IRC's strategy centers on its ambition to continue to improve the scale and effectiveness of IRC programs worldwide with evidence of what works best to impact people’s lives in conflict and fragile settings. The fundraising pillars of the External Relations Unit comprises colleagues and teams delivering marketing, account management, leadership gifts, board liaison, corporate partnerships, brand stewardship and communications to support this work. These colleagues are primarily located in the USA at present – but IRC plans to significantly expand its global fundraising footprint. Other colleagues within IRC are also deeply engaged with private funding & partners – in particular within Europe, US Resettlement and field programmes – and we need to work in close integrated collaboration to ensure best use of resources and highest impact for IRC.

The Purpose of the Role

As Associate Director, Global Retention you report to the Senior Director, Supporter Experience & Retention and will work in close collaboration with colleagues across the globe in the UK, Sweden, Germany, South Korea, the US and our remote markets. In this role and reporting to the Senior Director, you will provide strategic as well as hands on support to mass marketing country teams in the day-to-day development and delivery of their retention activity with the aim of achieving enhanced retention and increasing life-time value (LTV). This will be across multiple channels and platforms including email, SMS, telephone, mail, the website (through appropriate content) and digital channels. In addition, this post holder will be the global focal point and support to markets on the development of their supporter service functions to donors.

 While covering all supporter segments and audiences/profiles within mass marketing, the post holder will have a special focus throughout on key segments, those being sustainers and mid value donors.

 KEY ACCOUNTABILITIES

 RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Drive IRC’s retention strategies to improve retention and LTV.
• Provide hands-on support to markets in creating retention strategies and in operationalizing and executing campaigns such as for example campaigns to convert cash donors to sustainers, upgrade sustainers, reactive donors, obtain additional cash donations from sustainers and such.
• In supporting markets in the development and delivery of the above campaigns, assist them develop and implement tests while contributing overall to a testing culture.
• Support the markets in the development of their supporter services strategies and delivery of an optimized supporter services function.
• Support the markets in the development and use of telemarketing as a key part of our retention strategy. Be responsible for the hiring and management of any telemarketing consultants including their scope of work.
• Assist in the development and monitoring of global reporting, KPI, data and analysis required for the delivery of optimized supporter retention. Work closely with colleagues in the analytics team to deliver appropriate and accurate reporting.
• Work in close collaboration with the Senior Officer, Global Retention on their focus area which is supporter journey development.
• Assist in developing new and engaging content for our supporters including on our website and for all supporter retention areas. Work in close collaboration with other support colleagues to do this as well as with markets.
• Help in the recruitment/procurement of any global agencies/consultants/firms working on retention lead the delivery of plans/SOW. Support markets on their own local procurement activities.
• Coordinate with colleagues in Comms on brand to ensure any retention campaigns have brand appropriate content.
• Coordinate with colleagues in International Partnerships & Philanthropy (IPP) on supporter engagement campaigns with corporate brands. Recent partners include for example: TripAdvisor, Airbnb and Google.
• Coordinate with IT for needs related to the development of retention activity. Work in close collaboration on all platforms as required (including Salesforce) to ensure IRC can deliver effective retention – be that related to donation processing, reporting, analysis including reports and processes needed by local offices to deliver fundraising activities.
• Work proactively and in a collaborative fashion with colleagues in External Relations (ER0) and throughout IRC, especially those critical to delivering retention programs, including Communications, Advocacy, Legal and Finance, Procurement, IT, Business Operations, Resettlement Asylum & Integration (RAI), International Philanthropy and Partnerships (IPP) and USA Philanthropy.
• Take on special projects as assigned by the Senior Director, Supporter Engagement and Retention.
• Keep up to date on trends both in NGOs and the commercial sector. Import best practices, benchmarks and KPI that we can use to track our performance against others.

 PERSON SPECIFICATION

Essential Experience:

•  Experience of both developing retention strategies and hands on execution.
• Experience working on retention programs across a variety of channels, including email, SMS, mail and telephone, including multi-channel fundraising both online and offline
• Working in fundraising programs directly and/or in a support role and ideally both.
• Use of retention metrics, data, KPI and analysis
• Hiring and managing the work of external agencies, freelancers and consultant

 Skills and Knowledge

• Strategic thinking and approach to retention
• Predisposition towards simple and practical solutions which can be rolled out across multiple markets
•  Interpersonal skills, collegial and collaborative with an ability to work in a support role
• Excellent project management skills
• Understanding of systems and processes required for managing retention programs including of CRM databases (such as SalesForce), email platforms and the like.
• Good written and verbal communication
• Ability to work in a multi-cultural environment and willingness to work across time zones.
• Different type of giving including sustainers (regular donors)
• Donor centric approach to retention
• Language Skills: English (fluent). No additional languages are necessary but German, Swedish or Korean would be an advantage.
• Experience of sustainer programs (i.e., regular giving)

 Desirable Experience:

• Previous experience of working in a support capacity.
• Experience of working in Supporter Services
• Experience of working in an international humanitarian NGO.
• Exposure to or knowledge of Face-to-Face fundraising

 Candidates must have the right to work in the UK.

 The application deadline is 13th December 2022.

 IRC UK strives to be an equal opportunities employer. IRC UK is committed to equality of opportunity and to non-discrimination for all job  applicants  and  employees,  and  we  seek  to ensure  we  achieve diversity  in  our  workforce  regardless  of  gender,  race,  religious  beliefs, nationality, ethnic/national origin, sexual orientation, age, marital status or disability.

IRC UK welcomes applications from all candidates, including underrepresented groups and refugees who have the right to work in the UK.

IRC UK will ensure that individuals with disabilities are provided reasonable adjustments to participate in the job application and/or interview process, and for essential job functions if appointed to a role. Please contact us if you may need such adjustments. 

If you have any questions or need assistance with the online recruitment process, please contact the IRC UK HR team at applications@rescue-uk.org

#IRC-Europe