Senior Director, Enablement Solutions

Description

Senior Director, Enablement Solutions

Department: Lawrence Development

Reports to: Vice President, Strategy

FLSA Status: Exempt

The anticipated salary for this position starts at $136,500+. The final pay will be determined based on several factors, including qualifications, experience, education, and years within the job or industry, with a strong emphasis on maintaining internal equity. 

Who we are and what we’re about:

KU Endowment is an independent, nonprofit organization and the official fundraising foundation for the University of Kansas. We partner with donors in providing philanthropic support to build a greater KU.

As an employee of KU Endowment, you’ll witness firsthand the power of our donors’ generosity. You will join a talented and fun group of people who are inspired to help KU through the support of loyal alumni and friends. This support fuels excellence, enabling students and faculty to develop innovative programs and research that distinguish the university. We connect the philanthropic passions of donors with the needs of students, faculty and programs – and everyone benefits.

People are engaged. Purpose is ignited. Lives are changed.

Why Join Us?

As a key leader at KU Endowment, you’ll play a pivotal role in shaping the future of philanthropic engagement and institutional advancement. This is an opportunity to build capacity, inspire excellence, and drive meaningful impact for students, alumni, and the broader university community.

What we are looking for:

The Senior Director, Enablement Solutions serves as a trusted internal strategic advisor and solution consultant to executive leadership and key business stakeholders across the advancement organization. 

This role understands complex business challenges, conducts structured discovery, identifies opportunities for improvement, and designs practical solutions that improve fundraising effectiveness, stakeholder experience, organizational efficiency, and business outcomes. 

The leader operates at the intersection of strategy, fundraising, business process, technology, Salesforce, data, organizational change, and enablement. 

The primary clients are executive leaders, advancement leaders, fundraisers, business process owners, academic stakeholders, and other enterprise partners. The role moves from Business Challenge ? Discovery ? Diagnosis ? Business Case ? Prioritization ? Solution Design ? Implementation ? Adoption ? Measurable Outcome. 

The individual in this position is expected to embrace KU Endowment’s stated core values – passion for KU, partnership with donors, perpetual support for KU, and a people-centered approach – and demonstrate support for them through professional interactions and activities. 

What’s a typical day look like?

Executive & Stakeholder Advisory

• Serve as a trusted advisor to executive leadership and senior business stakeholders.
• Build trusted relationships across Advancement, academic leadership, finance, IT, marketing, analytics, and other enterprise functions.
• Translate complex operational and technology concepts into clear executive-level recommendations.
• Facilitate difficult conversations and build alignment among stakeholders with competing priorities.

Business Discovery & Problem Definition

• Conduct stakeholder interviews and discovery workshops.
• Map current-state processes, systems, roles, data flows, and decision points.
• Identify pain points, redundancies, bottlenecks, risks, and opportunities.
• Distinguish symptoms from root causes and define business requirements and desired outcomes.
• Identify dependencies across people, process, technology, data, and governance.

Solution Design & Business Architecture

• Ensure technology enables the solution rather than defines the solution.

Salesforce & Technology Advisory

• Serve as a business-facing Salesforce and technology strategist for Advancement.
• Maintain strong working knowledge of Kindsight Ascend, Salesforce CRM / Education Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Commerce Cloud, Data Cloud, Experience Cloud, Flow, AI / Agentforce, analytics, integrations, and data architecture.

Business Case & Value Creation

• Translate opportunities into compelling business cases for executive decision-making.
• Articulate the business problem, strategic opportunity, stakeholder impact, current-state friction, future-state vision, recommended solution, alternatives, investment, technology and organizational implications, risks, dependencies, benefits, ROI / value realization, and implementation roadmap.

Business Process Optimization

Technology & Business Solution Roadmaps

• Partner with IT, Product Owners, Salesforce teams, Data / Analytics, and business leaders to create actionable roadmaps.

Change Management & Adoption

• Ensure solutions are successfully adopted—not merely implemented.
• Lead stakeholder readiness, change impact assessment, communications, training strategy, adoption planning, user feedback, executive sponsorship, resistance management, and measurement.

Program & Project Leadership

• Work with the Project Management team to provide strategic oversight for complex cross-functional initiatives.

Executive Presence & Communication

• Executive Leadership: frame the business problem, options, recommendation, investment, and expected outcome.
• Business Stakeholders: synthesize what was heard, diagnose what is happening, and recommend a solution.
• Fundraisers: explain how solutions improve the work and enable stronger donor relationships.
• Technology Teams: translate needs into functional requirements, dependencies, business rules, and capabilities.
• Project Teams: establish solution, scope, decision framework, and definition of success.

What’s required to be considered:

• Bachelor’s degree required. Preferred fields include Business, Finance, Marketing, Information Systems, Computer Science, Organizational Development, Communications, Nonprofit Management, Higher Education Administration, or a related discipline.
• 8–15+ years of progressively responsible experience.
• Management consulting, sales, sales engineering, solution consulting, business transformation, strategy, revenue operations, fundraising operations, Salesforce consulting, enterprise technology, or comparable experience. 
• Experience working with senior executives and leading complex cross-functional initiatives.
• Demonstrated success translating business needs into technology-enabled solutions. 

What separates the best from the rest?

• Higher education, healthcare, nonprofit, fundraising, or another complex enterprise environment strongly preferred. 
• Salesforce or enterprise CRM experience strongly preferred; Salesforce certification or consulting experience preferred. 

Physical Requirements:

• A valid driver’s license. 
• Must have access to reliable transportation to travel between multiple locations for training, donor meetings, networking, events and/or work-related activities.
• Must be able to respond quickly and effectively to directions and safety hazards.
• This job operates in a professional office environment. This role routinely uses standard office productivity machinery such as computers, keyboards and a mouse, laptops, phones, photocopiers, filing cabinets and fax machines. 
• This is largely a sedentary role; however, some filing is required. This would require the ability to move files, open filing cabinets and bend or stand as necessary.
• The ability to observe details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
• The person in this position frequently communicates with donors, colleagues, students, and general public. Must be able to communicate with others effectively.
• Physical effort/lifting, medium up to 20 pounds.
• Minimal travel requirements can include the following, evenings, weekends, and out of town overnights for professional development and vendor visits. 

KU Endowment is committed to providing reasonable accommodation to qualified individuals to enable them to perform the essential functions of the job as regulated by ADA. If you require accommodation for any part of the application process or during employment, please contact [email protected] to discuss your needs.

We’ve got you covered:

KU Endowment offers a competitive salary with an excellent benefit package including: 

• 100% employer-paid pension plan
• Health, dental, and vision insurance
• 401(k) and Roth 401(k) matching program
• Section 125 flexible benefits 
• Generous paid leave including holidays, personal and sick leave
• Volunteer and community engagement opportunities
• Paid Parental Leave
• Life, AD&D, short- and long-term disability insurance
• Legal & ID Theft protection
• Critical Illness
• Accident and Hospital Indemnity insurance 
• KU education assistance 
• Free parking

Sounds good, right? What’s next?

Please include your resume and cover letter when applying for this position on our website at https://www.kuendowment.org/careers.

Questions regarding this vacancy may be addressed to:

Human Resources

KU Endowment

PO Box 928

Lawrence, KS 66044-0928

Email: [email protected]

Review of applications begins immediately and continues until the position is filled. Because of the sensitive nature of KU Endowment business and the importance of our reputation with donors, KU Endowment conducts a comprehensive review of applicants. By submitting your application, you authorize us to conduct reference checks and a review of available public information. Employment is contingent upon background and reference checks that KU Endowment finds acceptable.