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Program Officer-Marsabit
General Position Summary
The Program Officer will be responsible for technical oversight and management of the livelihoods, Natural Resource Management and Resilience activities, peace and social reconciliation activities, and capacity building of consortium members on Mercy Corps proven assessment modes and program methods. S/he will define implementation strategies in coordination with the Program Coordinator and consortium team. The Program Officer will train staff, partners, and community groups, providing them with technical assistance; and ensuring that common strategies and approaches are applied consistently in all communities. S/he will coordinate closely with the PaQ team to ensure that systems are in place to track, analyze, and report results. The Program Officer will keep abreast of changing contexts and integrate new ideas and approaches as appropriate, seek additional technical assistance as needed, and ensure effective working relationships with collaborating agencies. S/he will work closely with our partners LPI, ALCHA, and PC and look for opportunities to link programming and clients with their programming and programming across the LMS.
Essential Responsibilities
PROGRAM MANAGEMENT
- Contribute to teamwork plans and guide successful implementation of proven assessment and models and Learning activities, ensuring teams follow work plans so activities are on time, on target, and within the approved budget, and program deliverables achieve the desired impact.
- Provide technical guidance on safe space, and community models and ensure that interventions are responsive to stakeholders and consistent with Mercy Corps’ relevant program guidelines, principles, values, quality standards, and strategic plan. Ensure that interventions are evidence-based and adhere to adaptive management principles.
- Assist in the development of technical curricula, entrepreneurship, business, and life skills.
- Engage community members (community representatives, teachers, religious leaders, government officials, and gatekeepers) to support and inform program activities.
- Contribute to teamwork plans and guide successful implementation of conflict management and natural resources management activities, and income generating activities including linkages for cross-border trade initiatives, access to finance and working capital, and climate-smart agriculture initiatives ensuring activities are on time, target, and within the approved budget, and program deliverables achieve the desired impact.
- Integrate community approaches, gender sensitivity, and capacity building into all activities as appropriate. Certify all interventions adhere to Mercy Corps’ Gender Policy, Do No Harm principles, and beneficiary accountability standards.
COMMUNITY AND COUNTY GOVERNMENT ENGAGEMENT
- Conduct community mobilization and sensitization meetings.
- Identify and engage community leaders to sensitize and establish buy-in
- Link with relevant county government departments such as Gender and Social Services for group registrations, and financial and material support.
- Conduct community mobilization and sensitization for cross border-conflict, climate resilient, income generation.
- Facilitate planning meetings and workshops with government, NGO, private sector, and community partners to revise plans and promote partner acceptance/buy-in.
- Support local government initiatives to develop appropriate policies related to NRM Conflict management and climate change.
PARTNERSHIP
- Link women to other traders, markets, financial institutions, public and private institutions.
- Facilitate planning meetings and workshops with government, NGO, private sector, and community partners to revise plans and promote partner acceptance/buy-in.
- Link-local committees, organized groups, and businesses, and or traders to relevant local government departments, cross-border traders, financial institutions, and other development partners.
- Establish collaborative partnerships with other development partners working on rangelands, NRM, and conflict.
PROGRAM MONITORING
- Monitor and track the progress of safe space groups.
- Support the development of customized monitoring and evaluation tools.
- Collect monitoring data from partners and organized groups and submit it to management.
- Support assessments, evaluations, and monitoring surveys including support in the development of Scopes of Work, survey tools, training and management of data collectors, report writing, and facilitating results discussion.
- Support the PaQ team in developing appropriate monitoring tools for the income-generating activity process, NRM, and conflict management.
- Support participatory community-based monitoring with the government where initiatives are taking place – organize and coordinate capacity building about community-based monitoring, including experience sharing.
- In coordination with the PaQ team, monitor the implementation of activities through regular field visits and assessments to ensure program quality and impact.
- Support the Project Coordinator in the preparation of the weekly, monthly, and quarterly reports.
- Document approaches, successes and lessons learned.
COORDINATION
- Coordinate with procurement, logistics, security, finance, administration, and human resources teams to ensure operational systems support field activities.
- Support operations team to facilitate procurement of goods and services related to program activities.
TEAM MANAGEMENT
- Participate in recruitment and training of program facilitators.
- Promote accountability, communicate expectations, and provide constructive feedback informally and formally via regular one-on-one and performance reviews.
- Support the orientation of Community Facilitators at the field level
- Conduct himself/herself both professionally and personally in such a manner as to bring credit to Mercy Corps and not jeopardize its humanitarian mission.
- Other duties as assigned.
Accountability
Reports Directly To: Program Coordinator
Works Directly With: Director of Programs, PAQ team, finance and operations teams, Partner Organizations, and broader MM-CBRM team
Accountability to Participants and Stakeholders
Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our program participants, community partners, other stakeholders, and to international standards guiding international relief and development work. We are committed to actively engaging communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring, and evaluation of our field projects.
Minimum Qualification & Transferable Skills
- Minimum of 5 years’ experience working with NGOs/CBO’s in civic engagement, livelihoods, and education;
- Degree in Community Development, Economic Development, Business, Agriculture, Rangeland management, NRM or Livestock or related field
- Should have knowledge of quantitative and qualitative data collection, and reporting techniques and should understand and be able to apply basic measures of central tendency and spread.
- Commitment to working with Women, Girls, youth, and vulnerable groups in need, regardless of race, tribe, religion, or gender.
- Competent in building networks, strong problem-solving skills, and ability to influence with effective listening, persuasion, negotiation and other techniques.
- Understanding of working with local partners and commitment to working with the greater LMS team
- Good problem-solving, written, and oral communication skills.
- Strong written and spoken English and Swahili.
- Local language skills required;
- Demonstrated attention to detail, ability to follow procedures, meet deadlines, and work independently and cooperatively with team members.
Senior Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability & Learning (MEAL) Officer – Marsabit
The Position
The Senior Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability, and Learning (MEAL) Officer position plays a key role in Mercy Corps’ Program quality assurance, accountability, documentation, and learning team specifically supporting the MM-CBRM program. The position holder will support the program in planning and execution of monitoring and evaluation activities, ensuring quality following accepted standards, and providing essential feedback for learning, accountability, and decision-making. The Senior MEAL officer will be responsible for providing internal capacity building for program staff on monitoring and evaluation activities as well as review and development of necessary tools that feed into the needs of Mercy Corps and donor reporting requirements.
Essential Responsibilities
STRATEGY INPUT AND OVERSIGHT
- Support development and implement monitoring and evaluation tools.
- Play key role in the development of intervention designs, sector strategies and M&E frameworks.
- Support inputs into program review documents.
- Support the refining of the program logic and approaches, to adequately incorporate Monitoring Evaluation and Learning (MEL) considerations
- Lead the design, testing and rolling out of all MEL system components for the MM-CBRM
RESULT BASED MONITORING & EVALUATION
- Validating and verifying core indicators against the different sources of information.
- Review, validation, and analysis of incoming results data from grantees;
- Visit sites and partners to collect supplementary data, stories and conduct qualitative research both independently and in teams.
- Work with the Program Manager and other staff to ensure that activities are implemented on plan and progress towards targets is not compromised through regular planning and review meetings;
- In conjunction with the PaQ team, s/he will plan, coordinate and supervise all assessments and evaluations for the MM-CBRM This will entail development of Scopes of Work, development of survey tools, trainings and management of data collectors, report write and facilitating results discussion (or recruit and supervise evaluation consultants where necessary);
- Coordinate reporting with consortium partners, specifically tracking deadlines, ensuring adherence to monitoring formats and requirements, ensuring reporting quality and accuracy, and periodic report writing, editing, and submission.
- Develop Data Quality Assessment Plan
- Actively participate in any additional evaluation M&E activities including but not limited to baseline surveys, mid-term, end line surveys, evaluations, household’s surveys
- Ensure adherence to program management minimum standards in carrying out his/her duties, advising and supporting other staff in the same as required.
LEARNING
- Regularly document and share all learnings from program implementation.
- Maintain an up to date database that reflects progress and program indicators.
- Facilitate regular reflection and analysis of program monitoring information that feeds into programming and learning, for adaptive management – Contribute to learning/research agenda
CAPACITY BUILDING
- Build the capacity of grantees to develop and maintain an excellent M&E system;
- Support timely production of weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual donor reports based on agreed performance indicator.
- Build the capacity of all relevant team members to implement program-monitoring tools, accurately enter program data into relevant databases, and enable them to develop excellent reports and other documents
- Facilitate regular reflection and analysis of program monitoring information that feeds into programming and learning, for adaptive management – Contribute to learning/research agenda
PROGRAM ADVISORY
- Maintain an active advisory role with the program team to help guide them towards robust and relevant data collection.
- Actively participate in all implementation, providing advice and feedback for quality results at any point.
- Establish and maintain strong working relationships with partners and government departments.
- Participate in on-going MEL advisory and support for all MM-CBRM program staff and local partners;
- Advise and support the process of testing and adopting relevant technologies for improving the efficiency of the program’s MEL function. This will include supporting rollout of Mobile Data Collection (Ona), GIS/GPS technologies for Mapping, and managing MCK’s internal data management platform TolaData.
OTHER
- Conduct himself/herself both professionally and personally in such a manner as to bring credit to Mercy Corps and to not jeopardize its humanitarian mission.
- Other duties as assigned.
Supervisory Responsibility
Enumerators from time to time.
Accountability
Reports Directly To: Country MEL focal.
Works Directly With Project Coordinator, Program Officer, PaQ team, Director of Programs
Accountability to Participants and Stakeholders
Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our program participants, community partners, other stakeholders, and to international standards guiding international relief and development work. We are committed to actively engaging communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.
Minimum Qualification & Transferable Skills
- Must hold at least a bachelor’s degree in social science, Statistics, Business administration or relevant field
- At least 4 years of program monitoring and evaluation experience
- Should understand concepts and demonstrate skills in monitoring and evaluation, project cycle, results chain and frameworks, participatory monitoring
- Should be able to design and implement surveys, have knowledge of commonly used probability and purposive sampling techniques
- Must have good writing and analytical skills
- Should have knowledge of quantitative and qualitative data collection and reporting techniques. S/he should understand and be able to apply basic measures of central tendency and spread
- In addition to Microsoft Excel, the incumbent should demonstrate fluency in the use of at least one data management software including MS Access, SPSS, and STATA.
- Must be fluent in both spoken and written English.
Project Coordinator – Marsabit
General Position Summary
The MM-CBRM Project Coordinator is responsible for working closely with other partners in the consortium to 1) enhance capacities for formal and informal cross-border stakeholders in conflict prevention and management and social cohesion with particular focus on women and youth; 2) enhance access to income-generating opportunities and shared natural resources for borderlands and community members. The Project Coordinator will ensure the overall implementation of the Mercy Corps role in the program, including ensuring the quality and impact of the interventions. S/he will ensure that the program is implemented on scope, time, and budget. The Project Coordinator will liaise with a diversity of internal and external stakeholders throughout program implementation to ensure that the team is driving transformational change in the target counties. In addition to a strong technical understanding of resilience-building, natural resource management, and conflict management/peacebuilding, the Project Coordinator will bring an in-depth understanding of local partner capacity building.
Essential Job Responsibilities
STRATEGY AND VISION
- Play a key role in developing the program strategy and direction for Kenya by prioritizing and organizing actions and resources to achieve objectives.
- Contribute to the program’s learning and influencing agenda, working with relevant team members to integrate and advance learning, adaptation, and advocacy within both the program and Mercy Corps more broadly
- Recognize opportunities for innovative action and create an environment where alternative viewpoints are welcomed.
- In collaboration with relevant Mercy Corps team members, represent the program in key forums and donor meetings.
- Identify, build, and manage collaborative partnerships with relevant international and local agencies active in relevant technical fields, including donors, other organizations, local authorities, and local partners. Attend relevant coordination forums to identify synergies.
PROGRAM MANAGEMENT
- Provide strategic leadership and oversight for MM-CBRM program activities, in partnership with key program stakeholders, including local and international partner organizations, local civil society organizations, local and national government officials, other international agencies on the ground, and key donors.
- Ensure programme implementation is on time, target and budget, using effective M&E systems to reach desired impacts, and develop mechanisms for targeted research to inform programme design and implementation.
TEAM MANAGEMENT
- Lead in the structuring of Mercy Corps team roles and responsibilities for the delivery of cohesive program interventions, oversee their activities and provide continuous technical support, capacity building, and quality assurance.
- Regularly coordinate with program staff and support departments to ensure smooth planning, preparation, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation of program activities.
- Contribute to country team-building efforts, help team members identify problem solving options and ensure the integration of all team members into relevant decision-making processes.
- Promote accountability, communicate expectations, and provide constructive feedback informally and formally via regular one one-on-ones and performance reviews.
- Create and sustain a work environment of mutual respect where team members strive to achieve excellence.
- Hire, orient, and lead team members as necessary.
OPERATIONS MANGAGEMENT
- Oversee the smooth flow of routine program support functions (e.g., finance, administration, logistics) about MM-CBRM and ensure compliance with Mercy Corps and donor policies and procedures.
- Ensure that any procurement is completed, documented, and delivered to the end-user promptly, ensuring that items procured meet the specifications of the end-user while adhering to donor and Mercy Corps procurement guidelines.
- Oversee database and paper file management for program files in compliance with Mercy Corps and donor policies and procedures.
SECURITY MANAGEMENT
- Work closely with the country team’s security focal point to develop and maintain systems that promote the safety and security of all team members.
- Ensure that programs are designed and implemented with a clear analysis and understanding of security.
MONITORING & EVALUATION (M&E) AND REPORTING
- Work closely with the country PaQ team members to ensure that effective M&E systems and processes are embedded within the program implementation unit and that data is collected, analyzed, and used to inform ongoing adaptation of program strategies and delivery approaches.
- Assess and analyze impact and adaptively manage the program to meet results.
- Oversee the scheduling and production of formal and informal reports and work plans on all aspects of Programme delivery in a timely and efficient manner.
- Ensure learning is blended back into program implementation, creating a cycle of adaptation and program improvement.
ORGANIZATIONAL LEARNING
- As part of our commitment to organizational learning and in support of our understanding that learning organizations are more effective, efficient, and relevant to the communities they serve, we expect all team members to commit 5% of their time to learning activities that benefit Mercy Corps as well as themselves.
ACCOUNTABILITY TO BENEFICIARIES AND PARTNERS
- Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our beneficiaries and partners and to international standards guiding international relief and development work, while actively engaging beneficiary communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.
- Team members are expected to conduct themselves professionally and respect local laws, customs, and MC’s policies, procedures, and values at all times and in all in-country venues.
Supervisory Responsibility
- Direct supervision of all team members and consultants within the MM-CBRM program.
Accountability
- Reports Directly To: Director of Programs
- Works Directly with Country Director, Operations Director, Finance Director, Program Managers, PAQ team, consortium partners, local implementing partners
Knowledge and Experience
- Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field, such as conflict management and disaster risk reduction, natural resources/rangelands management, agricultural economics, etc. A master’s degree qualification is preferred.
- Demonstrated experience leading interventions in these fields above, including utilizing market system development and resilience approaches
- Experience coordinating a program.
- A minimum of 5 years of experience in program coordination is required,
- Sound understanding of financial, procurement, administration, and logistics management systems, including remote management.
- Experience coordinating multiple activities, developing synergies and creating opportunities for collaboration.
- Demonstrated experience in team building and team coordination for achieving program goals.
- Strong commitment to local capacity building and the ability to engage local stakeholders in project design and implementation.
- Experience working with host governments at the national and sub-national level, INGOs and national NGOs and familiarity with international humanitarian operations, coordination structures, and the mandates of UN agencies, and other NGOs.
- Excellent organizational and project management skills; detail-oriented; and possessing an ability to anticipate program and operational needs.
- Proven ability to work cooperatively with others in a team environment and to a diverse group of national and international staff.
- Understanding of adaptive management and participatory methodologies for project design, implementation, and evaluation.
- Demonstrated proficiency with the MS Office software (i.e., Word, Excel, PowerPoint) required.
- Persuasive written and oral communication in English and Swahili required; competency in a relevant local language beneficial.
- Experience within the Arid and Semi-Arid lands required