Moving Into Planned Giving

Q. I’m a recent law-school graduate who works in the trusts and estates department of a law firm. I feel unfulfilled, even though I enjoy the core of my job — estate planning, planned giving, and so on. I would like to move into nonprofit planned-giving work, but would rather not start at the very bottom because I feel I am overqualified. Where should I be looking?

A. The answer somewhat depends on what you mean by “the very bottom,” says John C. Linfield, major gifts officer at Norwich University, in Northfield, Vt. Just having a law degree and some experience with estate planning does not make you an expert planned-giving officer, he says. There are a variety of insurance products and types of giving that would be new to most lawyers who help clients plan their estates. “You won’t need to start as an administrative assistant, but it doesn’t sound like you are really prepared to be a senior planned-giving officer or a director of planned gifts, any more than you are prepared to argue before the Supreme Court,” Mr. Linfield says.

Raising money through planned gifts depends as much on your ability to persuade and communicate with people as it does on your technical skills, he adds. Surely you’ve already developed some of the interpersonal skills you’ll need, such as listening to your clients and reading in between the lines, he says. But a planned-giving fund raiser needs to have more of a sales personality than does a lawyer, Mr. Linfield says: “You need to be able to convince a prospective donor that they will get more satisfaction out of supporting your organization than they will out of supporting their great-grandkids.”

So be sure to stress in your rsum and during interviews not only your technical expertise, but also the interpersonal skills that you’ve developed through interviewing clients, he says. Highlight any sales experience, he suggests, and any responsibility you’ve had in following up with clients after “deals” have closed. Fund raisers call this “stewardship.”

As for where you should begin your search, Mr. Linfield says you really have two choices: a major organization with a large fund-raising staff or a small organization that is just hiring its first fund raisers. “The larger organization may be willing to take a chance on you to take advantage of your legal training, and they can also more readily absorb your training costs,” he says. “The smaller organization just getting started may not be able to afford a fully trained fund-raising professional, and may likewise be willing to take a chance on you.”

To find your dream job, try following in the footsteps of Gregory Jones, director of development of the College of Veterinary Medicine, at the University of Missouri at Columbia, who was in exactly your shoes just four years ago.

After graduating from law school, he worked for two years in a private law firm doing estate planning, but sought to use his knowledge elsewhere. His first step — and one he suggests you follow — was to hire a career consultant. “I really did not have a good grasp of what options were available to me in the planned-giving field,” Mr. Jones says. The coach helped him revise his resumé, sharpen his interviewing skills, and assess his “market value.” Subsequently, Mr. Jones focused his efforts on finding a planned-giving position in higher education.

Once you’ve narrowed your focus, start rubbing elbows with the people who either have those jobs themselves or can help you get access to them, says Mr. Jones. He made contacts by attending a meeting of a local chapter of the National Committee on Planned Giving and later joined the national group. He also signed up with the Association of Fundraising Professionals to receive job listings from his local chapter.

Jean M. Martinho, vice president for planned giving at the American Cancer Society’s New England Division, in Framingham, Mass., advises that you also consider doing some volunteer work while you search for positions. “Many charities need estate-planning attorneys to conduct seminars or to be on their planned-giving advisory boards,” she notes.

Like you, Mr. Jones says he fully expected to start at the very bottom, but actually found out rather quickly that in the organizations he was considering, the “bottom” was usually only one or two rungs from the “top.” “Just remember that turnover is high and the demand for planned giving and major gifts officers exceeds supply,” he says. “Don’t worry about what level you start at. Just find an organization in whose mission you believe, do a great job, and advancement will quickly follow.”