Competition Number: J1026-0048

Position Title: Executive Director, Alumni Engagement & Annual Giving

Position Number (Final): 00509220

Vacancy Type: New Position

Employee Group: Managerial & Professional

Job Category: Advancement/Fundraising

Department or Area: Alumni Engagement

Location: Kingston, Ontario, Canada (On-site)

Salary: $126,000.00 - $173,000.00/Year

Grade: 12

Hours per Week: 35

Job Type: Permanent (Continuing)

Shift: 7 Monday - Friday

Number Of Positions: 1

Date Posted: November 6, 2026

Closing Date: January 3, 2027

Additional Information

This position offers a remote work arrangement for candidates located within approximately three hours of Kingston, Ontario. The successful candidate should be available to travel to campus as needed to support meetings & team collaboration.

COVID 19 On-Campus Requirements

Prior to May 1, 2022, the University required all students, faculty, staff, and visitors (including contractors) to declare their COVID-19 vaccination status and provide proof that they were fully vaccinated or had an approved accommodation to engage in in-person University activities. These requirements were suspended effective May 1, 2022, but the University may reinstate them at any point.

About Queen's University

Queen’s University is the Canadian research intensive university with a transformative student learning experience. Here the employment experience is as diverse as it is compelling. We have opportunities in multiple areas of globally recognized research, faculty administration, engineering & construction, athletics & recreation, power generation, corporate shared services, and many more. We are committed to employment equity and diversity in the workplace and welcome applications from individuals from equity seeking groups such as women, racialized/visible minorities, Indigenous/Aboriginal peoples, persons with a disability, persons who identify in the LGBTQ+ community and others who reflect the diversity of Canadian society.

Come work with us!

Applicant Guidance & Information

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Job Summary

Reporting to the Associate Vice-Principal (Strategic Engagement), the Executive Director, Alumni Engagement & Annual Giving provides strategic and operational leadership for Queen’s alumni engagement portfolio, including Alumni Engagement, Volunteer Programs, and Annual Giving. The Executive Director is a senior strategist responsible for developing and delivering an integrated approach to lifelong alumni engagement that strengthens alumni connection to Queen’s University while overseeing annual giving strategies that engage alumni and other supporters of the university, in philanthropy. The Executive Director is accountable for advancing the alumni journey, beginning with the student experience and continuing throughout alumni life, and is accountable for how different forms of alumni participation—including experiential engagement, volunteer involvement, and philanthropy and giving—work together to strengthen lifelong relationships with Queen’s. With Queen’s alumni living and working around the world, the incumbent ensures that programs, volunteer opportunities, reunions, annual giving, and other forms of participation respond to the interests and needs of diverse alumni communities and provide meaningful opportunities to connect with Queen’s regardless of geography.

The Executive

Director is accountable for translating strategy and insight into programs and activities and for the delivery, evaluation, and continuous improvement of the portfolio’s work.

The Executive Director serves as the senior strategic liaison to the Queen’s University Alumni Association (QUAA) Board, working in partnership with alumni volunteer leadership to advance shared priorities. Working collaboratively across Advancement and the university, the incumbent brings a deep understanding of alumni needs, interests, behaviours, and experiences to institutional priorities and works closely with Advancement Communications & Experiences and Development to strengthen alumni engagement and longer-term philanthropic relationships.

As a member of the Strategic Engagement leadership team, the Executive Director contributes to the strategic direction and performance of Advancement and provides senior leadership and counsel on alumni engagement, volunteer participation, annual giving, and their role in building lifelong relationships between Queen’s and its alumni.

Travel within and outside of Canada is required. Work on evenings and weekends are occasionally required.

DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

- Develops and champions a coherent Alumni Engagement strategy that integrates experiential, volunteer, communications, and philanthropic engagement to strengthen lifelong relationships with Queen’s and create intentional pathways toward deeper participation, connection, and giving.
- Provides strategic and operational leadership for the Alumni Engagement portfolio, encompassing Alumni Engagement, Volunteer Programs, and Annual Giving, establishing clear priorities, objectives, measures, and accountabilities aligned with Advancement and university priorities and allocating resources accordingly.
- Leads the development, implementation, and continuous improvement of an integrated approach to the alumni journey, beginning with student experience and strengthening relationships from the student experience through successive stages of alumni life and creating intentional pathways toward deeper engagement, volunteer participation, philanthropy, and giving.
- Develops and delivers a comprehensive portfolio of alumni programs and initiatives that respond to diverse alumni interests, life stages, communities, and geographies, and strengthen alumni understanding of and connection to Queen’s mission, impact, and priorities. Ensures Queen’s global alumni community has meaningful opportunities to connect with the university and with one another through relevant in-person, digital, and other forms of engagement.
- Ensures Alumni Engagement, Volunteer Programs, and Annual Giving work as an integrated portfolio, with alumni programs, volunteer opportunities, reunions, and giving strategies reinforcing one another and contributing to lifelong engagement and a broad culture of philanthropic participation.
- Provides strategic leadership for Annual Giving, including reunion giving, establishing strategies that increase participation, develop habits of giving, and create effective pathways between broad-based alumni engagement and longer-term philanthropic relationships.




- Works closely with Development to strengthen donor pipeline and support institutional and campaign priorities.
- Provides strategic leadership for alumni volunteer engagement, including the QUAA, branches, networks, and other volunteer-led models. Serves as the senior strategic liaison working with alumni volunteer leadership to advance shared priorities and strengthen meaningful opportunities for alumni service and participation. Ensures appropriate approaches to volunteer support, recognition, and stewardship.
- Defines the alumni engagement objectives, priority audiences, desired outcomes, and strategic content priorities that inform alumni communications, publications, digital channels, and experiences. Works closely with Advancement Communications & Experiences to leverage its communications, marketing, digital, editorial, and events expertise while retaining accountability for the alumni engagement objectives these activities support.
- Builds a portfolio culture in which strategy and execution are closely connected, ensuring teams translate priorities and insights into high-quality programs and activities. Determines when initiatives should be delivered directly by portfolio teams and when partnership with other Advancement functions will strengthen their effectiveness, scale, or impact. Oversees the delivery, evaluation, and continuous improvement of portfolio initiatives.
- Uses alumni, engagement, giving, demographic, and market insights to understand alumni needs and behaviours, identify opportunities, develop programs, and evaluate effectiveness. Establishes meaningful measures of the breadth and depth of engagement and uses results to guide investment, improvement, innovation, and the evolution of the portfolio while monitoring relevant trends and leading practices.
- Builds strong partnerships across Advancement and the university, including with Development, Advancement Communications & Experiences, faculties, schools, and student-facing units, to create coordinated opportunities for alumni engagement and philanthropy and to ensure alumni perspectives inform relevant institutional priorities.
- Maintains meaningful connections with alumni and key volunteers to stay attuned to evolving interests, perspectives, and engagement needs, identifying and advancing strategic opportunities to deepen alumni relationships with Queen’s.
- Serves as a trusted advisor and university-wide resource and liaison on alumni engagement, volunteer participation, and annual giving, providing expertise to volunteers, alumni, the Office of Advancement, senior university officials, allied professionals and other partners. Fosters a collaborative, integrated approach to alumni and philanthropic engagement that encourages flexibility, responsiveness, and effective partnership across Advancement and the university.
- Researches, coordinates, and prepares internal and external communications, briefing notes, research profiles, activity reports, and accountability reports to support strategic decision-making and constituent engagement.
- Develops and maintains an in-depth knowledge of the university’s activities, priorities and needs in both teaching and research. Applies this knowledge in matching the interests and needs of prospective alumni with the strategic needs of the university.
- Helps develop a process to sustainably identify “big ideas” for consideration by alumni and volunteers.
- Motivates and organizes a broad range of influential strategic alumni relationships, volunteer leaders, and university senior administrators, who assist in securing engagement and philanthropic commitments.
- Establishes timely and appropriate stewardship and recognition of alumni and volunteers in accordance with sound Advancement practices.
- Ensures accurate and timely recording of alumni and volunteer engagement information in the Advancement database to support relationship management, reporting, and evaluation.
- Measures and analyzes initiatives to assess effectiveness and impact, conducts periodic competitive audits and performs ongoing environmental monitoring to gauge program effectiveness. Reports findings and implements changes in strategy as required.
- Reviews progress against short and long-term goals on a regular basis with the Associate Vice-Principal. In consideration of progress-to-date, takes a lead role in identifying and implementing further opportunities and strategies that may have arisen to meet goals.
- Prepares annual budget documents.
- Builds, develops, and leads an outstanding high-performance team of Advancement professionals, fostering an inclusive, collaborative, and engaging work environment that values diversity, equity, and inclusion.
- Plans, prioritizes and manages work of employees, providing strategic and tactical advice, guidance and coaching.
- Identifies the need for staff resources, participates on staffing committees, and makes effective recommendations regarding employee selection.
- Manages performance by establishing performance standards, reviewing and evaluating performance, and conducting formal performance reviews and talent reviews on an ongoing basis.
- Assesses staff training and development needs and ensures that employees receive training required to improve and sustain successful performance.
- Investigates, addresses and resolves employee/labour relations issues, including disciplinary matters.
- Acts as a back-up during the AVP (Strategic Engagement) absence, providing leadership and representing Strategic Engagement within the university community.
- Represents the Office of Advancement on university-wide committees ensuring understanding and adoption of Advancement policies and procedures.
- Undertakes other duties as assigned in support of the unit and/or department.

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS:

- University degree.
- Minimum 10 years of progressive experience and demonstrated success in a senior leadership role managing integrated, multi-channel alumni and volunteer engagement programs, with a focus on building meaningful alumni, volunteer, and donor relationships, preferably in a large, complex, and institutionally relevant setting.
- Demonstrated ability to inspire and raise alumni sights, articulate aspirational goals and institutional priorities, and effectively support strategic alumni engagement, volunteer participation, and philanthropic opportunities, with a strong understanding of alumni and donor journeys and effective stewardship and recognition practices.
- Proven track record in strategy development and implementation, project planning, budget and revenue forecasting, program analysis, and meeting objectives.
- Proven ability to effectively build and manage diverse and complex volunteer relationships and partnerships that advance shared priorities and strengthen meaningful opportunities for alumni participation and service.
- Proven leadership, management, and relationship building experience,



with a demonstrated ability to promote inclusion and effectively organize, motivate, and direct professional staff, volunteers and colleagues to achieve objectives; and work effectively with senior leadership and across a complex, matrixed organization.
- Comprehensive knowledge of relevant federal and provincial legislation and strict adherence to ethical fundraising standards affecting charities and charitable status.
- Understanding of the administrative, academic and governance structures of the university environment and the challenges faced by post-secondary institutions.
- Demonstrated success using data, insights, and evaluation to inform strategic decisions, develop programs, and assess effectiveness of alumni engagement initiatives, combined with demonstrated ability to develop and deliver strategic communications across diverse channels and to write and edit clear, compelling content for a range of audiences and purposes.
- A valid G-Class driver’s license and passport with no travel restrictions are required.
- Satisfactory Criminal Record and Judicial Matters Check required.
- Consideration may be given to an equivalent combination of education and experience.

SPECIAL SKILLS:

- Stand behind Advancement’s core values of integrity, inclusivity, accountability, collaboration, and service. A strategic, innovative and collaborative integrator who successfully seeks and fosters synergies and partnerships in a complex, matrixed, multi-constituent environment. Analyzes complex situations; provides clear, focused leadership and advice on multi-channel alumni engagement initiatives for Queen’s; identifies optimal approaches to win cooperation from diverse audiences; and makes sound decisions with sensitivity to the political environment and to the reputation of the Office of Advancement and Queen’s.
- Balances respect for traditions, with the ability to bring new ideas and challenge assumptions. Adept and adaptable, and an excellent change manager capable of placing objectives in a larger organizational context and translating strategic priorities into tactical activities and success.
- Capacity to build consensus and influence direction and outcomes.
- Persuasive and creative communication and presentation skills that allow success both within the campus environment and in the field. Exceptional writing, editing and verbal communications skills.
- Recognizes diversity of abilities and adapts content, tone, medium, and style to audience to be inclusive.
- Strong organizational, problem solving, and project management skills, with the ability to effectively prioritize and lead multiple complex initiatives, align resources and partners around key objectives, and deliver high-quality results within established timelines.
- Ability to embrace change to effectively translate objectives into strategic alumni engagement solutions.
- Strong analytical research skills, with the ability to strategically use information gleaned through market research, audience insight, analytics, and performance data to improve and enhance annual giving, alumni, and volunteer engagement initiatives to target audiences. Adept at matching the interests of the alumnus/donor with the strategic needs of the institution.
- Recognized leader at managing long-term and productive relationships with diverse constituents including volunteers, donors, colleagues and senior university administrators.

DECISION-MAKING:

- As a senior member of the Strategic Engagement leadership team, and in collaboration with the AVP (Strategic Engagement), leads in strategic discussions, making decisions on direction that influence the department and the Office of Advancement more broadly.
- Determines content for annual and long-term plans and strategies based on sound fundraising and alumni engagement principles and an integrated approach to the alumni journey, aligned with Advancement and university priorities. Oversees plans to ensure established targets are met, and philanthropic revenue to the university is maximized.
- Identifies, develops, and implements optimum strategies to build and strengthen alumni and volunteer engagement between the university, its current and future alumni.
- Identifies the best way to engage and align partners in support of engagement strategies and shared institutional priorities.
- Assesses issues/priorities and provides expert guidance to senior administrators and other staff on strategic planning issues, and annual giving, alumni engagement, and volunteer programs. Determines appropriate courses of action in response to emerging issues, opportunities, and changing alumni, volunteer, and institutional needs, in consultation with senior leadership and relevant partners. Determines appropriate approaches to future relations with volunteers, alumni, and other constituents in collaboration with ALT.
- Determines how to appropriately represent Queen’s interests, values, and priorities in engagement strategies and relationships. Determines the most effective implementation of innovative volunteer and alumni engagement strategies to manage sophisticated relationships to maximize benefit to the university.
- Determines optimum strategic use of university leadership, including the Chancellor and the Principal, and/or top university volunteers in fundraising and engagement strategies, and to resolve disputes.
- Recognizes when to call on other staff members in Advancement to take advantage of their expertise and ensure coordinated approaches. Determines when issues require escalation, consultation, or broader institutional input.
- Determines and implements necessary strategies to measure and benchmark the effectiveness of initiatives.
- Monitors portfolio performance and determines adjustments to priorities, resources, and approaches to ensure effective and timely delivery of strategic objectives.
- Evaluates job candidates and makes effective recommendations on suitable hires.
- Decides and/or makes effective recommendations regarding transfers and promotions.
- Evaluates employee performance and decides on appropriate training or coaching to address lack of proficiency in carrying out responsibilities, or remedial action for staff disciplinary situations.
- Assesses investigation outcomes of grievances and makes effective recommendations on appropriate course of action or next steps on grievances.
- Makes effective recommendations on level of discipline up to discharge and probationary termination.

Employment Equity and Accessibility Statement

The University invites applications from all qualified individuals. Queen's is strongly committed to employment equity, diversity, and inclusion in the workplace and encourages applications from Black, racialized persons, Indigenous people, women, persons with disabilities, and 2SLGBTQI+ persons. In accordance with Canadian Immigration requirements, priority will be given to those who are legally eligible to work in Canada. The University provides support in its recruitment processes to all applicants who require accommodation due to a protected ground under the Ontario Human Rights Code, including those with disabilities. Candidates requiring accommodation during the recruitment process are asked to contact Human Resources at [email protected].

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📌 Executive Director, Alumni Engagement & Annual Giving (Kingston)
🏢 Queen's University
📍 Kingston