Job Positions at Mercy Corps, 27th July, 2017
Mercy Corps is a leading global organization powered by the belief that a better world is possible. In disaster, in hardship, in more than 40 countries around the world, we collaborate to put bold solutions into action - helping people triumph over adversity and build stronger communities from within, now and for the future. In Nigeria, Mercy Corps operates in over 13 states focusing on key thematic areas of humanitarian response, conflict mitigation and adolescent girls’ empowerment.
We are recruiting to fill the position below:
Job Title: Gender & Protection, Senior Program Officer
Location: Biu, Borno
Supervisory Responsibility: Gender and Protection Officer
Reports Directly to: Team Leader
Works Directly with: Operations Manager, MEL, Finance, Program and Operation team
Program / Department Summary
- Mercy Corps Nigeria’s humanitarian program aims to provide assistance to populations affected by the crisis in Northeast Nigeria. With funding from humanitarian donors including OFDA, FFP, EU, and ECHO the humanitarian programs engage in several interventions including but not limited to food assistance, non-food items, protection, livelihoods, WASH and capacity building of humanitarian response actors.
- Mercy Corps is scaling-up and expanding its humanitarian response in Northeast Nigeria to reach more beneficiaries with additional assistance in a wider geographic area.
General Position Summary
- The Gender and Protection Senior Program Officer is responsible for the day-to-day implementation of Protection sector activities including the mobilization of women’s groups, training on topics such as psychological first aid, and sexual and gender based violence (SGBV), and the validation of referral pathways in Two (2) states in Northeast Nigeria (Gombe and Borno).
- The Gender and Protection Senior Program Officer will work closely with the Team Leader, Head of Office, and support staff (including finance, operations, and administration) to ensure that activities are implemented according to schedule, budget and required quality.
- The Senior Program Officer will also advise other sector teams on gender and protection mainstreaming and best practices.
- The position includes the daily management of program staff. The Gender and Protection Senior Program Officer reports directly to the Team Leader and will work closely with the I-SING Programme Manager.
Essential Job Functions
Strategy and Vision:
- Recognize opportunities to evolve the current humanitarian portfolio into a more effective and impactful portfolio addressing the changing needs of conflict-affected populations.
- Contribute to country-wide strategy development.
Representation and Coordination:
- Identify, build and manage collaborative partnerships with communities, local authorities and other stakeholders.
- Ensure effective coordination with relevant working groups, UN, ICRC and colleagues I/NGO agencies.
Program Management:
- Oversee the implementation of protection sector activities and administration of the teams across three field locations;
- Develop activity work plans and manage day-to-day activity implementation;
- Ensure that program implementation is responsive to community needs, meets targets, and is carried out in line with best practices;
- Integrate community approaches, gender sensitivity and capacity building into all activities as appropriate;
- Ensure program filing system is in place, adheres to internal and donor regulation and filing is regularly maintained;
- Ensure that beneficiaries are effectively targeted according to vulnerability criteria;
- Establish and maintain effective program reporting, and monitoring and evaluation systems (to track, analyze and report on results) for both internal and external use;
- Adhere to all MC policies related to security, operations and transport/ logistics information related to programming.
Team Management:
- Supervise, hire and orient team members, as necessary;
- Create and sustain a work environment of mutual respect where team members strive to achieve excellence;
- Promote accountability, communicate expectations and provide constructive feedback via regular performance reviews;
- 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.
- Identify any gaps or capacity needs within the team and ensure training and capacity building is incorporated into program planning.
- Provide team members with information, tools and other resources to improve performance and reach objectives;
Finance & Compliance Management:
- Ensure compliance with all donor and Mercy Corps regulations;
- Proactively follow-up on reconciliation of cash transfer activities related to livelihoods;
- Oversee the livelihood sector activity budgets and project monthly cash flow.
Security:
- Ensure compliance with security procedures and policies as determined by country leadership;
- Proactively ensure that team members operate in a secure environment and are aware of policies.
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.
Knowledge and Experience
- MA/MS/MBA in relevant field required.
- Minimum 4-5 years of experience working on the development, implementation, administration and compliance of a field-based international development or humanitarian program; specifically in economic recovery.
- Prior experience implementing livelihoods programs is essential, preferably in conflict settings.
- Experience working with multiple stakeholders to identify beneficiaries according to criteria required.
- Commitment to renewing and maintaining knowledge of best practices
- Demonstrated training and facilitation experience
- Ability to work under pressure
- Demonstrated strengths in analytical skills, monitoring and evaluation, and report writing
- Strong interpersonal, intercultural and communication skills
- Experience with running assessments, monitoring and evaluation and other learning efforts required.
- Experience representing the organization and its interests to a diverse range of local and international government officials, local civil society organizations, other international organizations, the media and the public.
- Excellent oral and written skills and computer skills
- Fluency in English; fluency in Hausa is required.
Success Factors
- Must be able to work independently and show initiative. Strong leadership, communication, and management skills are essential.
- Understanding of humanitarian principles and their application to program implementation is required.
- Ability to supervise, mentor and coach a diverse team.
- Must be able to problem solve and multi-task on a range of administrative and programmatic issues.
Job Title: Consultant for Civil Society Organization Mapping
Location: Maiduguri, Borno
Program / Department Summary
- For years, the Northeast of Nigeria has been plagued by insurgency and a dire humanitarian crisis. The intense focus on humanitarian and counter-violence activities, coupled with increasingly complex conflict dynamics in the region, has exposed gaps in the international community’s response to new and emerging sources of violence. Tensions between IDPs and host communities, resistance of communities to accept former fighters and their victims, fear of IDPs to return home and face tensions with those who stayed behind - these are just several evolving sources of conflict. If these issues are not addressed in a timely manner through locally- owned solutions, they have the potential to intensify and worsen the on-going crisis in the NE.
- Therefore, a pool of strong local partners capable of addressing existing and newly emerging tensions and conflicts is essential to prevent NE from falling further into a vicious cycle of conflict and poverty.
General Position Summary/ Objective
- The objective of this consultancy is to perform a mapping exercise to identifying 10-12 local CSOs in the Northeast which are already influential or have the potential to become influential peacebuilding organizations.
- These NE-based CSOs will then be engaged in a comprehensive technical and organizational capacity building program so that they eventually apply for grants from international donors and implement high-quality peacebuilding programs that meet USAID and other international development partners’ expectations.
Essential Job Responsibilities
- Draw up a plan of action and timetable to achieve all the goals of this assignment.
- Design the research protocol to be shared and approved by Mercy Corps.
- Desk research of existing CSOs mapping reports in the NE.
- Based on the data collected, identify 10-12 local CSOs working on peacebuilding, reconciliation and related issues in NE Nigeria that are considered to be influential or have a high potential to become such.
- Make recommendation on coordination and networking mechanisms between the 10-12 local CSOs that will bring together diverse actors working on conflict mitigation and management, especially women and youth-led organizations or organizations working on behalf of/with vulnerable groups.
- Prepare and ensure timely delivery of the final report. Ensure consultations with Mercy Corps on each phase of the assignment.
- Develop questionnaires and other research tools.
- Visit and collect relevant information from the CSOs and respective communities.
- Provide short profile of each identified CSOs with details as to their geographic operation, previously and currently implemented projects, sources of funding.
- Produce a report on findings from the mapping for dissemination and presentation to stakeholders including international organizations, donors, government ministries and members of the Peace and Security Network to better engage local organizations in their activities. Make presentations on findings of the research if requested.
Knowledge and Experience
- Preference will be given to consultants with good understanding of the Northeast context, peacebuilding and CVE technical areas.
- Having relevant skills, expertise and past experience gained from working with communities and organizations on various research assignments will be an advantage.
- Due consideration will also be given to consultants having the academic qualification of Master's Degree with background in Social Sciences and relevant professional experience.
- The consultant should have a high standard of professionalism, able to work independently with a variety of stakeholders and should be proficient in both English and Hausa.
Job Title: Field Office Manager
Location: Damboa, Borno
Program/Department Summary
- Mercy Corps, an international humanitarian NGO and has been operating in Nigeria since 2012 and is looking for a Field Manager to be based in Damboa.
- The Field Manager will focus providing; leadership and representation of Mercy Corps Nigeria in Damboa.
General Position Summary
- Field Manager is responsible for leading and managing Mercy Corps operations and multi sectoral program of Humanitarian Assistance, early recovery and long term development in the Field Location.
- Field Manager is responsible for project management and the implementation of program quality and accountability and ensuring Mercy Corps policies and procedures are adhered to by all staff all other contractors for Mercy Corps.
- She/he is responsible for enforcing strict ethical and integrity standards and ensures that those cases of violation of ethics such as fraud, corruption and breach of code of conduct are reported, documented and dealt with according to Mercy Corps policies and procedures.
- As the most senior staff for Mercy Corps in the Field location, the Field Manager is responsible for representing Mercy Corps to partner organizations and local authorities and for coordination with other NGOs. The post holder will represent Mercy Corps on local government level on all coordination platforms.
Essential Job Functions
Project Management:
- Oversee ongoing programs and startup of new programs in Damboa.
- Ensure program implementation is on time, target and budget, using effective M&E systems to achieve the desired impact
- Ensure that program implementation is responsive to communities, authorities and partners and consistent with Mercy Corps’ relevant program guidelines, principles, values, quality standards and strategic plan
- Fulfill Mercy Corps Program Management Minimum Standards based on the organization-wide guide.
- Conduct monitoring visits to the field to ensure that all targeted program beneficiaries are rightly benefitting from Mercy Corps interventions in Damboa.
- Supervise and be responsible for all technical aspects of project implementation, ensure that all interventions are completed in a timely, efficient, and accurate manner according to standard engineering methods.
- Ensure a safe working environment for all people involved in project implementation.
- 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.
Quality, Accountability and Compliance:
- Provide Field Leadership in the roll out and implementation of Community Accountability and Response Mechanism according to established Standard Operating Procedures.
- Promote and encourage openness to welcoming feedback and complaints from beneficiaries and communities, and learning from staff.
- Ensure that those cases of violation of ethics such as fraud, corruption and breach of code of conduct are reported, documented and dealt with according to Mercy Corps policies and procedures.
- Ensure that beneficiaries are effectively targeted according to established vulnerability criteria and Standard Operating Procedures.
- Ensure that Standard Operating Procedures for all program activities are developed and adopted, strictly followed in the Damboa
- Integrate community approaches, gender sensitivity, resilience approach and capacity building into all activities as appropriate
- Create and maintain systems ensuring effective and transparent use of financial resources and timely, accurate and informative reporting in line with donor and Mercy Corps policies and procedures
Operations Management:
- With support of Team Leader and Operations Manager, ensure operation systems (procurement, transport, storage, communications, estate / buildings management, asset management etc) are in accordance with Mercy Corps systems and policies
- Ensure adequate operational systems are in place to provide adequate support to the field team.
- In conjunction with the Senior HR Officer and HR staff, ensure local recruitment is consistent with Mercy Corps HR recruitment policies, the legal context and local practice
- And that HR policies and procedures are understood by the project team and implemented.
- Provide leadership to the Field team, ensuring clarity over project plans and priorities, encouraging effective team work and inclusiveness, and building a team spirit through regular meetings.
- Oversee the administrative functions for the project team, line managing staff where appointed.
Security Management:
- Responsible for security management for the Field team, including providing inputs to the location-specific Security Plan, ensuring staff are fully briefed/trained on the agreed security measures appropriate to the area, staff understand individual and collective responsibilities for safety and security and ensuring incidents are reported, critical learning is recorded and corrective actions taken.
External Representation:
- Develop and maintain good lines of communication and relationships with local authorities and the local community.
- Represent Mercy Corps to local authorities (whether formal governmental or informal
- Authorities), securing the necessary appointments for visitors and local authority approvals and attendance to Mercy Corps functions.
- Represent Mercy Corps to other NGOs, and visitors, ensuring coordination and constructive working relations and attendance at relevant inter-agency coordination meetings as delegated by the Team Leader.
Supervisory Responsibility:
Reports Directly to:
- Team Leader in Maiduguri
- Complete routine progress reports and submit reports as required by supervisor;
- Provide weekly progress reports on implementation to supervisor;
- Assist MC management with any requests for information or data regarding program expansion or development.
Works Directly With:
- Programs, Operation, Logistics and Finance
- Cooperate and coordinate with all project staff to ensure good internal coordination and subsequent high quality project selection, implementation and management.
- Coordinate with MC staff of non-engineering projects that may be present in the assigned locations.
Qualifications
- Bachelor's Degree
- Proven experience in managing programs in relevant technical area(s) including E-Vouchers, Cash Transfers, Livelihoods, Financial Services, and/or services for Internally Displaced Persons.
- Strong understanding of conflict sensitive program mainstreaming would be a key advantage;
- Strong field leadership skills and proven experience in managing diverse and multicultural teams the cooperate and deliver results.
- Must be a person of high morality and integrity standards both at personal and professional level.
- Demonstrated ability to build and manage effective working relationships in multi-cultural environment
- Pro-active and able to work independently to complete project tasks
- Attention to detail and ability to follow through on task assignments
- Experience working in humanitarian context projects is an essential.
- Maintain effective communications with the local authorities and local community.
- Supervise and be responsible for all technical aspects of daily project implementation.
- Ensure regular filed monitoring visits of targeted area and provide on job support & monitoring.
- Good English written and spoken and Hausa language.
Success Factors
- The successful candidate will provide effective leadership to the Mercy Corps program team in Damboa.
- S/he will be capable of multi-tasking, rapid decision-making, have initiative, drive and a lot of energy, as well as high emotional intelligence, constructive mentoring skills and proven experience with capacity building.
- S/he will be committed to long-term program sustainability and the delivery of high-impact activities at the community level.
- Successful Mercy Corps team members have a strong commitment to teamwork and accountability, thrive in evolving and challenging environments, and make effective written and verbal communication a priority.
Living Conditions/Environmental Conditions:
- The position is based in Damboa, Borno state, Nigeria and it requires frequent travel to field locations in and around Damboa.
Security:
- Security in the field locations require additional vigilance and accessibility will be reassessed continuously. Access to good medical services in northeast is limited. Phone communication, internet, electricity and water is available but might be erratic.
- Mercy Corps Team members represent the agency both during and outside of work hours when deployed in a field posting. Team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner and respect local laws, customs and Mercy Corps policies, procedures, and values at all times and in all locations.
How to Apply
Interested and qualified candidates should submit their CV and Cover Letter in one document, addressing the position requirements to:
[email protected] All applications must include the position title in the subject line.
Note: Only short-listed candidates will be contacted for interview and we are an equal opportunity organization so women are strongly encouraged to apply for this position.
Applications Deadline: 10th August, 2017.