Senior Manager - Institutional Fundraising and Partnerships

Job Description
Role: Senior Manager – Institutional Fundraising and Partnerships
Location: Remote/Pune
About The Apprentice Project (TAP)
In India, 100 million children from low-income communities grow up without access to the 21st-century skills they need to thrive, from emotional intelligence and digital literacy to everyday money management. This gap leads to limited opportunity, intergenerational poverty, and rising mental health concerns.
At The Apprentice Project (TAP), we are building an ambitious model for education equity using AI, immersive learning, and multilingual content to help students unlock confidence, creativity, and real-world skills.
Fundraising and partnerships are central to TAP's ability to deliver impact at scale. The Fundraising and Partnerships team works closely with donors to build long-term, values-aligned relationships that support our vision of reaching one million children over the next few years. As TAP continues to scale its impact, institutional fundraising will play a critical role in enabling our growth and long-term sustainability.
About the Role
We are looking for a fundraising professional to lead and strengthen TAP's foundation and institutional funding portfolio.
The role requires someone who can independently cultivate, convert, and manage relationships with global foundations, grant making organisations, family philanthropies, and other institutional donors. The successful candidate will be responsible for driving opportunities through the full fundraising lifecycle, from donor qualification and cultivation to proposal development, grant management, reporting, and renewal.
This is a strategic fundraising role that combines relationship management, donor engagement, proposal strategy, and institutional fundraising expertise.
The Senior Manager – Institutional Fundraising will report to the Head of Fundraising and Partnerships and will work closely with TAP's senior leadership team to strengthen and grow the organisation's institutional funding portfolio.
Experience
6–8 years of experience in fundraising, institutional partnerships, foundation fundraising, philanthropy, or resource mobilisation.
Proven experience working with global foundations, grant making organisations, family philanthropies, and institutional donors.
Demonstrated success in securing grants and building long-term funding partnerships.
Experience managing the full institutional fundraising lifecycle, from donor qualification and cultivation through grant management and renewal.
Experience engaging with senior stakeholders, including foundation leadership, program officers, philanthropists, and nonprofit leadership teams.
Skills and Capabilities
Cultivation and Relationship Management: Ability to build and manage relationships with foundations, institutional donors, and program officers, and effectively move opportunities through the fundraising pipeline.
Strategic Donor Qualification: Strong judgement in assessing donor fit, prioritising opportunities, understanding decision-making processes, and identifying pathways to funding.
Proposal Strategy: Ability to shape compelling funding propositions, align organisational priorities with donor interests, and coordinate internal stakeholders to develop strong and competitive proposals.
Foundation Intelligence: Strong understanding of the institutional funding landscape, including foreign funder priorities, funding trends, application processes and philanthropic decisionmaking.
Grant Writing and Communication: Excellent written communication skills with experience developing concept notes, grant proposals, donor communications, and funding applications.
Reporting and Compliance: Experience managing grant reporting requirements, donor stewardship, due diligence processes, compliance requirements, and post-award relationship management.
Why This Role Matters
This role will play a critical part in helping TAP build a sustainable and scalable institutional fundraising engine.
The successful candidate will help us:
Convert foundation and philanthropic opportunities into long-term funding partnerships.
Strengthen and grow our institutional fundraising pipeline.
Improve conversion rates across qualified funding opportunities.
Deepen relationships with institutional funders.
Strengthen proposal quality, grant management, and renewal outcomes.
Build a robust foundation for long-term fundraising growth.