Development Associate - Rhodes Trust : Job Details

Development Associate

Rhodes House in central Oxford, hybrid working

Permanent

Full-time

Circa £40,000 per annum

We have a fantastic opportunity for a Development Associate to join the Rhodes Trust, Oxford. This role is a key role within a fast-paced Development team at the Rhodes Trust; particularly focused on supporting donation management, the delivery of a donor recognition and stewardship matrix and development database management. We are looking for the successful candidate to start with us as soon as possible.

About the Rhodes Trust

The Rhodes Trust is an educational charity which offers Rhodes Scholarships to exceptional students from around the world to come and study at the University of Oxford. Our mission is to build a better world through global fellowship programmes that develop and connect compassionate, innovative, and public-spirited people committed to solving humanity’s challenges.

In recent years, we have also partnered with several other remarkable organisations to create the Mandela Rhodes Foundation, the Atlantic Institute, the Schmidt Science Fellows, RISE and Oxford Next Horizons.

The role

This is an excellent opportunity for someone with entry level experience in donor relations and data management and wishing to expand their knowledge and involvement with this key aspect of an international Development operations. The Rhodes Trust wishes to invest in its employees and expects to offer training in areas which will enhance the postholder’s skills for the role.

The role will be responsible for;

Donation Management

• Execute the day-to-day operation of the Rhodes Trust’s Gift Registry, ensuring that global gift/pledge and notification processes for all our philanthropic income streams are accurately coordinated alongside the delivery of first-class donor care and support.
• Work with Relationship Managers to coordinate bespoke donor gift agreement processes, supporting the close of major gifts.
• Work with Relationship Managers to coordinate bespoke pledge reminder letters.

Donor Stewardship

• Actively support the team in the writing and delivery of gift acknowledgement letters within 72 hours of gift receipt.
• Support the Rhodes Trust’s major donor recognition programme across our leadership giving streams and platforms, including donor engravings in Rhodes House, the Honour Roll of Donors, and the Rhodes Trust website.
• Manage special projects related to donor stewardship across all giving streams from annual, to major giving, to planned giving. This includes existing programs such as donor birthday

cards and condolence letters, but there is also opportunity to think creatively about new ways to ensure every donor at the Trust feels involved and appreciated.

• Support the major donor reporting processes.

Database Management

• Become fluent in our Development database (Salesforce) and serve as the first point of contact on the team for report requests related to financial, donor, and Campaign data.

Essential skills, experience and qualifications:

• Team player with a positive approach to new challenges and a strategic outlook.
• Relevant development experience in the higher education sector or similar.
• Proactive, focused and organised, with excellent attention to detail.
• Experience of gift management and donor report writing.
• Ability to work well under pressure, prioritise work and meet deadlines.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Excellent IT skills, including experience with Microsoft packages (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook).
• Knowledge of and experience with databases.
• A degree of literacy in webpage editing and social media tools.

Desirable:

• An undergraduate degree is desirable

Benefits of working here

We are a global organisation and we use our deep connections across the world to bring together people of different backgrounds and viewpoints. We encourage our staff to challenge each other’s thinking and generate new ideas.

• 30 days annual leave (pro rata) plus 8 bank holidays
• Competitive pension scheme
• Generous family leave schemes
• Private health insurance
• Employee Assistance Programme
• Personal development opportunities
• Additional benefits, such as free access to the University's gardens, parks, libraries and museums, and University staff discounts in shops across Oxford.
• Cycle to work scheme
• Electric car scheme

If you would like to find out more, please click ‘apply’ to view the full job description and to find the link to apply. Please send us your CV and a covering letter. Please note, this advert will close on Friday 29 August 2025.

If you have any issues with submitting your application, please email the Recruitment team.

The Rhodes Trust is an equal opportunity employer. We warmly welcome applications from talented people of diverse backgrounds and appoint without regard to age, disability, gender, gender identity, gender reassignment, sexual orientation, pregnancy or maternity, parental status, marital or civil partner status, race, colour, ethnic or national origin, nationality, religion or belief.