Executive Director, Marketing

Lucile Packard Foundation for Children's Health•Palo Alto, CA

3h•$285,000 - $305,000•Hybrid

About The Position

The Executive Director, Marketing provides strategic leadership for the Foundation’s marketing function, setting its direction, priorities, and operating model for integrated, data-driven marketing strategy and execution. The role builds a cohesive, high-performing team and drives coordinated, targeted, measurable engagement across audiences, channels, and fundraising priorities. It reports to the Chief Marketing & Communications Officer. The Executive Director directly manages the Associate Director, Marketing; Senior Associate Director, Marketing; and Senior Director, Community Fundraising & Children’s Fund. The role establishes shared priorities, provides coaching and strategic context, and aligns marketing work with Foundation-wide priorities and fundraising objectives. It has a dedicated focus on marketing strategy for Board, Transformational and Principal Gifts, and Grateful Patient Family audiences. The Executive Director also ensures Community Fundraising and Children’s Fund work is integrated with the Foundation’s broader audience, brand, channel, data, and fundraising strategies, while empowering the Senior Director to lead strategy and execution for those areas. The position is hybrid, with an expectation of working an average of eight days per month in the Palo Alto office; the successful candidate will be based in the Bay Area. Remote work within the U.S. may be considered for an exceptional candidate, with compensation adjusted by geographic region. The anticipated hiring range is $285,000–$305,000, with a target starting salary of $285,000; final compensation depends on qualifications, experience, and other job-related factors.

Requirements

A bachelor’s degree in a related discipline and/or equivalent experience.
10+ years of experience in marketing, marketing communications, direct response, fundraising marketing, or a similar field, including significant people-leadership experience.
Demonstrated experience setting and leading integrated marketing strategy across channels, audiences, and programs, and translating organizational priorities into strategy and measurable outcomes.
Experience analyzing donor, campaign, or customer data and translating it into strategy, metrics, and business insights.
Strong aptitude for using AI tools in marketing and comfort evaluating and adopting emerging AI-enabled tools.
Excellent written and oral communication skills, including the ability to build a compelling, audience-centered case across channels.
Strong people-leadership skills, including experience managing and developing senior professionals or functional leaders and building high-performing teams.
Experience serving as a strategic partner to senior leadership and influencing decisions about strategy, investment, audience engagement, and performance.

Nice To Haves

Experience leading marketing transformation, organizational change, or development of an integrated and scalable marketing operating model.
Experience with marketing automation platforms such as HubSpot and CRM or donor database systems.
Experience with AI-enabled marketing tools, personalization engines, and testing or experimentation programs.
Experience with Grateful Patient and Family programs, healthcare, or higher-education fundraising or marketing.
Experience building or scaling in-house marketing capability to reduce dependency on outside agencies.

Responsibilities

Shape the Foundation’s broader marketing strategy and priorities in partnership with senior leadership, translating organizational and fundraising goals into strategies, investments, and measurable outcomes.
Lead integrated marketing strategy across channels and audience segments, coordinating data-informed touchpoints that are consistent with the Foundation’s brand and mission.
Lead, develop, and manage the marketing team, establishing clear priorities, decision rights, expectations, and shared goals.
Set marketing strategy for Board, Transformational and Principal Gifts, and Grateful Patient Family audiences, advising senior fundraising leaders and coordinating personalized engagement with broader fundraising priorities.
Champion a digital-first operating model, using print and direct mail for audiences and moments where data indicates they are most effective.
Establish audience segmentation and journey frameworks that make communications coordinated, relevant, and tailored across channels and programs.
Advise Foundation leaders on audience strategy, marketing opportunities, channel investment, and integrated engagement.
Build and evolve marketing capabilities, identifying the skills, tools, processes, and resources needed for a modern, high-performing function.
Establish continuous-improvement practices for digital marketing, automation, AI, testing, personalization, and analytics, translating them into scalable capabilities and measurable impact.
Define marketing goals, KPIs, measurement practices, and reporting that connect marketing activity to fundraising and organizational outcomes.
Use performance data and audience insights to guide strategic priorities, channel choices, investments, and resource allocation.
Set strategic direction and governance for marketing automation, including drip programs, dynamic content, segmentation, personalization, and testing.
Set the strategy for external marketing partnerships and vendors, ensuring investments deliver measurable impact and strong return on investment.
Identify emerging marketing trends and tools and lead discovery and planning for relevant system upgrades and scalable solutions.
Manage the Senior Director, Community Fundraising & Children’s Fund, providing expectations, coaching, performance feedback, strategic context, and support.
Review and align Community Fundraising and Children’s Fund audience goals, operating plans, budgets, resource needs, and performance with Foundation priorities.
Hold the Senior Director accountable for results while empowering that leader to own strategy, programs, people leadership, and execution.
Ensure Children’s Fund fundraising and marketing strategy is integrated with the Foundation’s audience, brand, channel, digital, and data strategies.
Identify opportunities to strengthen Community Fundraising and Children’s Fund engagement, and make or elevate significant resource, risk, and cross-functional decisions.
Partner with senior leaders across fundraising and the Foundation to align marketing strategy, audience priorities, campaigns, and investments with organizational goals.
Build cross-functional alignment where audiences, channels, or marketing responsibilities intersect.
Influence organization-wide decisions about audience engagement, fundraising priorities, and marketing resources using a data-informed perspective.
Maintain strong vendor relationships, including with direct mail, digital, and automation platform providers, and ensure outstanding ROI.

Benefits

Generous leave, including PTO, holidays, Summer Fridays, and a sabbatical after seven years of employment.
Annual bonus opportunity.
Retirement plan with employer match.
Premium medical and dental coverage.
FSA and dependent care FSA.
Employer-paid life insurance.
Legal services plan.
Commuter benefits, including CalTrain Go Pass Program.
Four-week paid maternity and paternity leave for new parents.
Home office and mobile phone stipend.
Remote employees have frequent opportunities to visit the Palo Alto headquarters.