Director of Membership

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Supervisory Responsibilities
• Directs and manages staff responsible for providing membership support and membership operations.
• Provides direct reports with professional development opportunities including training, coaching, work direction, motivation, feedback and recommendations for rewards and corrective action; conducts performance reviews.
• Ensures the department is appropriately staffed to meet its objectives and leads recruiting and selection efforts when vacancies arise, focusing on bringing in talent aligned with EDUCAUSE’s mission and goals.
• Learns, coaches, and develops the Membership team, fostering accountability, inclusion, and continuous improvement.
• Supervises contractors, outside vendors, and member volunteers providing outsourced services solutions that support the department.
• Member Prospecting and Retention
• Develops and executes membership growth and retention plans grounded in market analysis, segmentation, and a clearly articulated member lifecycle.
• Oversees acquisition, onboarding, renewal, and everboarding strategies that reinforce membership as a progression over time.
• Leads strategies to expand the member base by entering new markets and increasing penetration within existing segments.
• Leads the governing team responsible for assuring the paywall decisions reflect the organizational principles for member-only value.
• Pairs with internal stakeholders to support implementation of new or evolving dues models, ensuring operational readiness and clear member communication.
• Uses performance data, feedback, and predictive insights to identify churn risks, growth opportunities, and priority audiences.
• Provides strategic direction for targeted outreach campaigns, sector-specific messaging, and recruitment and renewal strategies grounded in market insights.
• Defines strategic lifecycle priorities, retention indicators, and audience engagement objectives in partnership with Marketing and organizational stakeholders.
• Membership Strategy and Planning
• Develops and maintains a comprehensive membership strategy aligned with EDUCAUSE’s organizational goals for growth, engagement, and long-term sustainability.
• In consultation with the Vice President, establishes annual and multi-year membership business objectives for membership counts, financial goals, and member experiences.
• Leads initiatives that integrate membership value drivers into membership communications.
• Aligns membership priorities with professional development, research, conferences, publications, and other enterprise initiatives.
• Operations, Infrastructure, and Operational Excellence
• Provides leadership and oversight for membership operations, systems, processes, and service delivery.
• Provides strategic oversight for EDUCAUSE “member only” initiatives and oversees governance and operational execution of paywall work.
• Safeguards membership infrastructure is scalable, efficient, and prepared to support personalization, analytics, and future AI-enabled capabilities.
• Oversees effective use and continuous improvement of the AMS/CRM and related platforms.
• Establishes and enforces standard operating procedures, service standards, and internal controls.
• Leads operational modernization initiatives that improve productivity, reduce manual effort, and enhance data reliability.
• Develops action and work plans to ensure alignment between strategy and execution.
• Member Outreach, Engagement, and Experience
• Lead member outreach activities to welcome new members, provide onboarding support, and provide ongoing education of the value of membership.
• Lead special programs and services to grow and maintain member engagement.
• Attend events (EDUCAUSE’s events and external, industry-related events) to serve as a brand ambassador, participate in recruitment and onboarding activities, and contribute to enhanced member experience activities.
• Develop, mature, and maintain new and existing member engagement efforts.
• Collaborate with other business units and community leaders to develop new outreach strategies and identify opportunities for continuous improvement of outreach and engagement work.
• Supports development and implementation of engagement maturity models and early-warning indicators that inform proactive outreach and retention strategies.
• Budget, KPIs, and Data
• In consultation with the Vice President, leads membership dues revenue forecasting, dues modeling, and budget planning in collaboration with Finance and the Vice President.
• Sets membership strategies based on historic association data, trend data, and forecasting to inform member dues and annual budget scenarios.
• Serves as departmental budget manager.
• Advise the executive lead for membership in developing annual membership dues budget.
• Create policies around rules and exceptions for on-demand member dues invoices carefully documenting any special pricing agreements.
• Maintains key performance indicators related to growth, retention, engagement behaviors, revenue, and member satisfaction.
• Champions member data integrity, governance, and integration to ensure readiness for benchmarking, analytics, and AI-augmented business intelligence.
• Partners with data, research, and technology teams to define membership-related metrics and reporting needs.
• Uses dashboards and analytics to support data-informed decision-making, growth strategies, and engagement optimization.
• AI-Informed Responsibilities and Applications
• Use artificial intelligence strategically and responsibly to advance member expansion, engagement, insight generation, and operational excellence.
• Identify and champion AI use cases that improve personalization, predict churn and growth opportunities, enhance decision-making, and reduce manual operational work.
• Ensure AI adoption aligns with EDUCAUSE values, data governance standards, member privacy expectations, and ethical principles.
• Model AI literacy and responsible experimentation within the Membership team and contributes membership leadership to enterprise AI initiatives, pilots, and governance efforts.
• Service and Support
• Represent EDUCAUSE in a professional manner at all times.
• As a departmental liaison with employees, members, volunteers, volunteer groups, and clients.
• Supports members in a manner that facilitates their growth, engagement, and enhances their EDUCAUSE experience.
• Complies with data quality standards; adheres to data governance policies, procedures, and processes for ensuring data integrity.

Qualifications

• Education and Experience
• Required: Bachelor’s degree.
• Required: 10-15 years of progressive experience in membership, association management, or a related field, with demonstrated leadership responsibility.
• Required: Prior experience leading teams and managing complex operations or programs required.
• Preferred: ASAE’s certificate in Association Management or CAE.
• Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities
• Strategic thinking and business acumen at a functional leadership level.
• Advanced financial, analytical, and operational management skills.
• Ability to build positive and productive relationships with a focus on meeting the needs of members and co-workers.
• Demonstrated AI literacy, including the ability to apply AI thoughtfully to membership growth, engagement, and operational decision-making.
• Ability to lead change initiatives, oversee complex membership programs and projects, and effectively manage competing priorities while ensuring successful execution, stakeholder engagement, and measurable outcomes.