Head of Development Operations

About Us

We are a world-class visitor attraction and leading science research centre. We use the Museum's unique collections and our unrivalled expertise to tackle the biggest challenges facing the world today. We care for more than 80 million objects spanning billions of years and welcome more than five million visitors annually and 16 million visits to our website.

Today the Museum is more relevant and influential than ever. By attracting people from a range of backgrounds to work for us, we can continue to look at the world with fresh eyes and find new ways of doing things.

We employ 1100 staff in a variety of roles, all united by our vision of a future where people and planet thrive. We need everyone to have the passion and drive to help us with our mission to create advocates for our planet and inspire millions to care about the natural world.

Diversity and inclusion matter to us.

Our vision is of a future where both people and the planet thrive. Diversity is one of our core values and we strive to build a workplace where everyone feels a sense of belonging. All new staff who join us learn about the importance of diversity and inclusion to the Museum and how to contribute to creating an inclusive environment.

We know we have more to do, but we are committed to ensuring that everyone who works at the Museum feels they can thrive and feel valued and respected.

About the role

We're looking for a strategic and delivery-focused leader to join us as Head of Development Operations, playing a pivotal role in shaping how we connect with and grow our supporter base.

At the heart of this role is the opportunity to help deliver the NHM150 capital campaign: a major, multi-year fundraising initiative supporting the Museum's long-term ambitions. Working closely with the Director of Development, you will bring together campaign strategy, events and stewardship to create a seamless, insight-driven supporter journey.

You will lead teams spanning Development Operations and Special Events, ensuring the systems and processes behind our fundraising are robust, scalable and effective. From overseeing campaign pipelines, reporting and forecasting, to ensuring compliance and operational excellence, you will enable high-performing fundraising at scale.

You will also shape and deliver an outstanding supporter engagement strategy, including a high-profile events programme ranging from major institutional moments to intimate donor experiences. Your work will ensure every interaction with the Museum is meaningful, consistent and designed to deepen relationships and inspire long-term support.

As part of the Development Senior Leadership Team, you will play a key role in setting direction, aligning priorities and ensuring the Museum is well positioned to secure transformational philanthropic support.

This is a 1-year fixed term contract with the possibility of becoming permanent.

About you

Are you a strategic leader who enjoys building the systems, insights and experiences that underpin successful fundraising? If you thrive on turning data into action, shaping campaign strategy and delivering high-impact supporter engagement, this could be the role for you.

You bring significant experience leading operations, data or campaign support within a fundraising environment, ideally including major capital campaigns. You are confident managing complex pipelines, developing segmentation strategies and using insight and analytics to drive performance.

You are equally comfortable operating at a strategic and operational level, whether setting direction, improving systems, or ensuring delivery through high-performing teams. You have experience leading and developing teams, managing budgets and working with senior stakeholders, including Trustees and campaign boards.

If you are motivated by creating exceptional supporter experiences, building strong relationships and delivering fundraising impact at scale, you will thrive in this role.

Thriving at the Museum: the way we work

We are proud to work at the Museum and have identified the qualities we all need to embody to reach our shared ambition. This sits alongside the Museum's values and forms the framework for the way we work.

Find out more here

What we offer

• 27.5 days holiday plus 8 bank holidays (full time equivalent)
• Generous defined contribution Natural History Museum Pension Scheme (employer contribution 4 - 10%)
• Season ticket, bicycle and rental loan
• Life insurance
• Free admission to our exhibitions and many other paid exhibitions at museums, galleries and institutions across London and the UK.
• Staff discount at our Museum shops and cafes
• We offer a wide variety of training initiatives and opportunities to build skills. Investing in staff development is important to us, and we are ambitious about helping staff to grow and fulfil their potential.
• Affordable membership to the Civil Service Sports Council which offers a range of benefits including an extensive list of special offers and reduced entry fees at a selection of cinema chains, theme parks, theatres, retailers and supermarkets. It also provides entry to up to 300 English Heritage sites and other national treasures. For more details, visit
• Membership to our Sports and Social Association (for a small fee), which includes access to our in-house gym and clubs such as football, softball, table tennis and tennis and classes in Middle Eastern dance, yoga and Tai Chi

Hybrid working

We are working towards a vision where both people and planet thrive, and nothing gives a greater connection with this, than seeing first-hand, the visitors, scientific research and collections that all of our work is inspired by and working side by side with the teams delivering the visitor experience and events. We also recognise the benefits and flexibility that hybrid working brings. We operate a hybrid working model that requires regular, weekly attendance for this role, with the precise pattern of days on site and worked from home to be agreed with your manager.

How to apply

If this sounds like you, please apply below by clicking on Apply for job.

Please note that as part of our commitment to anonymised shortlisting, panels do not view CVs during the recruitment process. If you choose to upload your CV, our system will automatically pull information from your CV into our application form. We advise you to double-check your application form data before submitting as the tool may interpret CVs differently.

We're delighted that many of our vacancies attract a high level of interest. To ensure that every application receives the time and careful consideration it deserves, we closely monitor the number of applications we receive. In some cases, where interest is particularly high, we may close a vacancy to new applications ahead of the advertised closing date. Taking this approach helps us manage the process efficiently while maintaining a fair and thorough shortlisting process for all candidates. We therefore encourage early applications where possible.

Closing date: 23:59 on 5th April

Interviews expected: w/c 13th April

Please note that this role does not qualify for Museum sponsorship so the successful postholder will need to have a valid right to work in the UK at the point of offer.