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Senior Grants Associate Job Announcement

Heartland Fund is seeking a Senior Grants Associate. For a thoughtful, mission-driven professional, this position is an exciting opportunity to support new systems and processes in a rapidly growing multi-entity grantmaking organization and ever changing compliance environment.

Heartland Fund’s Senior Grants Associate supports the organization’s day-to-day grants management processes, with a focus on facilitating the full grants lifecycle, maintaining accurate records and documentation, supporting grants management system use, and helping ensure compliance across grantmaking activities. This role helps ensure grantmaking processes run smoothly, staff and grantees receive timely and effective support, and the grants management process reflects our organizational values. The successful candidate will be detail-oriented, collaborative, and able to manage multiple responsibilities while supporting both day-to-day execution and ongoing process improvement.

You will have an opportunity to help us enable equitable investment in rural communities, democracy, and climate solutions. This is a unique and dynamic position with opportunities for growth and impact as the Heartland Fund prepares to launch as an independent entity in 2027.

This is a remote position with a starting salary range of $75,650 - $89,000. The position includes a generous benefits package.

About the Organization

As a funder collaborative, the Heartland Fund scales investment, supports local leaders, and builds long-term partnerships with rural and Native organizations to create thriving places where rural working people can determine our own futures, strengthening the entire nation. Heartland's grantmaking and programmatic investments support rural people working to transform their lives and communities toward shared prosperity, a healthy climate, and stronger democracy. We invest in building local capacity for issue advocacy, community organizing, economic development and local jobs, climate solutions, civic engagement, and sustainable urban-rural coalitions. We prioritize racial justice in all aspects of our work. In addition to grantmaking, Heartland also supports rural leaders and organizations through convening, research, and communications and storytelling.

Heartland Fund has three programs:

• Rural Democracy expands nonpartisan civic participation and counters policies that harm our democratic institutions in places where rural action can define policy and democratic outcomes.

• Resource Rural (RR) mobilizes resources enabling rural communities to unlock public and private investment to create positive economic change in their communities.

• Rural Climate Partnership (RCP) supports hometowns across America to accelerate climate solutions and build healthy local economies.

Both RR and RCP programs help rural communities access public funding – through place-based technical assistance, local organizing, and a large-scale communications and narrative effort – to make a tangible difference in rural people’s lives and to advance climate mitigation and resilience.

Primary Duties & Responsibilities

The Senior Grants Associate works closely with program staff, grantees, and internal partners to support effective, compliant, and efficient grants management. This role is responsible for facilitating the full grants management lifecycle, maintaining accurate documentation and system records, supporting staff and grantees in the grants management system, and helping strengthen grantmaking processes and practices across the organization. The Senior Grants Associate reports to the Grants Management Officer.

Grants Administration & Compliance

• Facilitate the full grants management lifecycle and drive all aspects of pre- and post-award grant activities.

• Determine grantee organization eligibility and conduct due diligence on grant proposals.

• Draft grant agreement letters and help ensure grant files are complete and up to date.

• Track, review and follow up on narrative and financial reports and maintain other grantee related documentation.

• Confirm that grant status is accurately recorded in the grants management system (GMS), with necessary documentation and programmatic tagging.

• Coordinate with the Finance team to execute grantee payments and provide data for reporting.

• Coordinate with the Operations team, to help ensure legal and regulatory compliance.

Grants Management Systems Support & Process Improvement

• Serve as a guide in grants management processes and procedures, facilitating engagement and adoption of streamlined practices across the organization and identifying ways to further adopt trust-based grantmaking and learning practices.

• Help ensure the grants management system supports programmatic decision-making, budgets, learning, and grantmaking processes.

• Serve as GMS technical support resource.

Training, Collaboration & Team Support

• Support training and knowledge sharing for program teams, ranging from forecasting and pipeline development, to data analysis, to compliance.

• In partnership with the Grants Management Officer and team members, develop and implement new approaches to executing grantmaking strategies.

• Provide mentorship across teams and support consistent, effective grants management and data governance practices.

• Work with teams across the organization to prepare board, committee, and strategic partnerships materials, as needed.

Ideal Candidate Profile

The ideal candidate is a detail-oriented professional with at least five years of experience in grants management, who brings strong project management skills and comfort navigating complex, multi-stakeholder workflows. They can balance both day-to-day execution and ongoing process improvement.

Heartland Fund’s growing team takes pride in building an organizational culture rooted in learning, collaboration, racial justice, and a deep commitment to our mission. All staff are expected to provide leadership and vision to advance our mission, vision, and core strategies.

Qualifications

We realize that some great candidates may not have every single thing on this list. If you believe you would be a great fit for this role, we encourage you to apply.

Essential

• Minimum of four years of experience in the social sector, nonprofit, and/or mission-driven organization
• Knowledge of or experience with grants management, including grants management systems (Fluxx Preferred) and processes
• Advanced proficiency with technology platforms including Google Workspace (Docs, Sheets, Calendar, Drive) and video conferencing platforms (Zoom, etc.)
• Understanding of or ability to quickly learn the financial and regulatory environment for nonprofit and philanthropic entities
• Commitment to racial justice and equity
• Exceptional project management skills, and experience developing and completing complex projects
• Strong written and verbal communication skills and analytical thinking
• Highly collaborative with a partnership mindset
• Entrepreneurial and resourceful, a proactive and creative problem-solver

Desired

• Experience working in a philanthropic, fiscal sponsor, nonprofit intermediary, funder collaborative and/or other type of grantmaking organization

• Experience in a 501c3 and 501c4 multi entity organization or campaigns, including knowledge of lobbying and/or political activity compliance requirements applicable to charitable, advocacy, and/or social welfare organizations

• Experience providing training and user support for grants management systems (Fluxx Preferred)

• Demonstrated experience working effectively with colleagues of diverse backgrounds and perspectives:

  • Appreciation of the diverse cultural tradition of rural peoples.

  • Excellent customer service and interpersonal skills.

  • Comfort working with a range of individuals in nonprofit organizations, government, foundations, and private sectors.

• Working proficiency of a second language that is spoken in rural America

• Experience living and/or working in rural America is strongly preferred

Compensation & Job Design

This is a full-time, exempt position. The organization is virtual, and the position may work remotely from their home within the United States. The starting salary range is $75,650 - $89,000.

The comprehensive benefits package includes 100% employer-paid health, dental, and vision insurance for employees (and their families). Employees are able to enroll in a 401k retirement plan and are eligible for a 3% automatic contribution and up to a 3% employer match on 401k contributions. Employees are also eligible for pre-tax transportation benefits. Full-time employees will receive 120 hours of vacation time, 80 hours of health leave, up to 2 days of casual leave, and 20 hours of volunteer leave annually. Employees will also receive 13 paid holidays throughout the calendar year. Employees are eligible for 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave after 90 days of employment. All employees of Windward are required to complete timesheets.

Heartland Fund is a project of Windward Fund, a 501(c)(3) public charity that incubates new and innovative public-interest projects and grant-making programs. Windward Fund is committed to attracting, developing and retaining exceptional people, and to creating a work environment that is dynamic, rewarding and enables each of us to realize our potential.

Windward Fund’s work environment is safe and open to all employees and partners, respecting the full spectrum of race, color, religious creed, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, political affiliation, ancestry, age, disability, genetic information, veteran status, and all other classifications protected by law in the locality and/or state in which you are working.

The individual holding this position will also work part-time for a coordinated project, Rural Victory Fund, in Sixteen Thirty Fund, a 501(c)(4) organization, under a resource-sharing agreement between Windward Fund and Sixteen Thirty Fund. The responsibilities under that position will be overseen by Sixteen Thirty Fund.

Windward participates in E-Verify and will provide the federal government with employees’ Form I-9 information to confirm authorization to work in the United States. Job candidates and employees authorized to work may not be discriminated against on the basis of national origin or citizenship status.

Travel Requirements

This position requires occasional travel within the United States.

How to Apply

Applications will be reviewed and considered on a rolling basis. A limited number of screening calls and interview spots will be filled starting in October 2026, with a desired start date by December 2026. Early applications are strongly encouraged.