Executive Staff Assistant
Opening Information
Post Date:08-30-2026
Department:University Advancement
Deadline:09-24-2026
Salary Range:Negotiable
Description
Provides direct executive and administrative support for the Associate Vice President of Principal Gifts (AVP), including strategic calendar management, correspondence, travel and expense coordination, meeting and event logistics, and fundraising and stewardship support. The position serves as a key point of coordination between the AVP and donors and prospects, University Advancement leadership, deans and academic leaders, development officers, and other internal and external partners. This position requires an organized, collaborative, proactive, experienced, flexible, and enthusiastic professional who possesses strong communication and customer service skills, is adept at preparing reports and executive materials, has strong attention to detail, can independently prioritize time-sensitive work, and can maintain highly confidential information.
Characteristic Duties and Responsibilities:
Executive and Administrative Support
- Manages the AVP's complex calendar in alignment with strategic priorities, including donor and prospect meetings, leadership meetings, travel, events, and internal commitments.
- Independently evaluates and prioritizes meeting requests, resolves scheduling conflicts, and ensures the AVP has appropriate preparation and travel time.
- Drafts, edits, proofs, and formats correspondence, presentations, agendas, itineraries, reports, and other executive materials.
- Interacts with donors and prospects, senior university leaders, deans, development officers, candidates, and external partners with a high degree of professionalism, integrity, personal warmth, and customer service.
- Maintains highly confidential files, records, and centralized electronic filing systems.
- Plans agendas and logistics for meetings and events led or attended by the AVP, including Principal Gift Prospect Strategy Meetings and Principal Gift Workgroup Meetings.
- Coordinates and assembles materials needed to prepare the AVP for meetings, travel, and events, including briefings, reports, presentations, packets, and background information.
- Makes travel arrangements and manages conference registrations; prepares requisitions and reconciles travel reimbursements.
- Manages and reconciles expenses for the AVP in alignment with MSU policies and supports Principal Gifts budget tracking and reporting in coordination with appropriate fiscal staff.
- Tracks the AVP's commitments, decisions, and action items; communicates follow-up responsibilities and deadlines and helps ensure timely completion.
- Collaborates with the Vice President for University Advancement staff, executive support colleagues, Principal Gifts staff, and campus partners to coordinate leadership meetings, central resources, ticket distribution, events, candidate searches, and other AVP priorities.
- Attends meetings on behalf of the AVP when requested and disseminates updates and action items as appropriate.
Development Support
- Schedules donor and prospect meetings on behalf of the AVP, including complex, multi-party meetings with university leaders and development teams.
- Initiates and coordinates briefing and donor meeting materials for the AVP, the Vice President for University Advancement, and other university leaders in collaboration with development officers and units.
- Tracks follow-up from donor meetings, including entering contact reports and proposals, coordinating post-meeting correspondence, and monitoring delegated action steps.
- Pulls and develops donor and prospect lists and development, fundraising, portfolio, and proposal reports for the AVP's review and analysis, coordinating with Prospect Development and Advancement Services as needed.
- Forecasts, monitors, and analyzes Principal Gifts team reports and constituency unit proposal and fundraising activity; schedules portfolio review meetings and prepares requested reports.
- Supports donor stewardship and acknowledgment activities, including the coordination of donor gift items and special handling or shipping at the direction of the AVP.
- Takes a proactive approach to working with the AVP to help ensure objectives and strategic plans are met.
Fiscal/Budget
- Provide fiscal officer responsibilities, including coordinating Principal Gifts annual budgets with the Executive Director.
- Forecast, monitor, and analyze team member reports and constituency unit proposal activity. Schedule portfolio review meetings for development officers, preparing reports as requested.
- Handle the creation of folders and manage the filing system for the Office of Principal Gifts.
Supervision: Reports directly to the Associate Vice President of Principal Gifts.
Interacts with: Principal Gifts staff, constituency deans and academic leaders, Advancement leadership, development officers, Advancement Innovation and Donor Solutions, Alumni Relations and Engagement, University Advancement Operations, and Spartan Athletics.
Responsibility for Health/Safety of Others
No assigned responsibility.
Impact on Programs/Services/Operations
Errors in the dissemination of information to the public or within the University could cause reputational damage, create a serious inconvenience to people within or outside the University, and adversely affect the development of support and goodwill for the University.
Work Environment
Standard office environment. The job requires moderate physical effort and involves sitting in place, viewing a VDT screen, or typing up to 70% of the time.
Qualifications
Knowledge normally acquired through a high school education with coursework in word processing, typing, shorthand, and grammar; five to eight years of related and progressively more responsible or expansive University work experience in maintaining account ledgers, word processing, spreadsheet, database, and presentation software; editing, composing correspondence, and taking dictation; or an equivalent combination of education and experience.
Desired Qualifications
- At least five years of related and progressively more responsible experience supporting senior leaders, including confidential office protocol and complex calendaring.
- Demonstrated ability to anticipate executive needs, independently prioritize competing and time-sensitive demands, solve problems, and work effectively under pressure.
- Excellent written communication, editing and proofreading, attention to detail, organizational, and customer service skills.
- Experience preparing executive-level correspondence, reports, presentations, meeting materials, and briefing documents.
- Advanced proficiency with Microsoft 365 products and experience with large databases and reporting tools; familiarity with Ascend/Salesforce, Cognos, and Enterprise Business System (EBS) is preferred.
- Experience in higher education advancement, fundraising, donor relations, or a comparable executive-support environment.
- Knowledge of University structure, policies, and procedures and the ability to maintain the highest level of confidentiality and discretion.
- Demonstrated ability to work successfully both independently and collaboratively in a fast-paced, team-oriented environment.
How to apply
Interested in joining the team at Michigan State University? For questions, contact Patricia Karam, Director of Talent Acquisition, at karampat@msu.edu. To apply, submit your application, resume, and cover letter at careers.msu.edu and reference position number 1156742.