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Humanitarian Program Manager

Reference number: Rec/081/2022

Closing Date:11-November-2022

Location: Addis Ababa, with frequent travels to program sites

Employment Type: Regular – Fixed term

Salary: As per the organization scale

Introduction

Cordaid works to end poverty and exclusion. We do this in the world’s most fragile and conflict-affected areas. We engage communities to rebuild trust and resilience and increase people’s self-reliance. Where poverty, conflict, and exclusion divide societies, we connect people and communities. Cordaid is one of the leading Civil Society Organizations in the Netherlands, working in fragile contexts on Health, Resilience, Private Sector Development, Humanitarian Aid and Security & Justice, Economic empowerment and Food & Nutrition Security. Cordaid has over 1400 staff, working at Global Office in the Netherlands and in offices across the most fragile countries in the world. Within Cordaid we work on the basis of respect, accountability, sustainability and diversity & inclusion.

Purpose of the position/Job’s aim

The Humanitarian Programme Manager is responsible for Cordaid Ethiopia’s Humanitarian program. This includes the effective planning, implementation, coordinating, standardization and monitoring of Cordaid’ emergency preparedness and response in Ethiopia. She/he will work together with the program team, Logistics/Procurement, Human Resources, Compliance and partnership, PMEAL, finance departments, will maintain donor relations and execute resource mobilizing strategies with current and potential donors. S/he continuously work on improving quality of products and services by formulating the strategies and program developments. As Cordaid will increasingly work through local partners, local partner relationship management and capacity strengthening will be an important part of the work. She/he reports directly to the Country Director, and collaborates with technical focal points of the Humanitarian team at Cordaid Global Office in The Hague.

Responsibilities and Accountability

Program Strategy, Development, and Management

  • Lead the country team to develop, implement and update the humanitarian Response strategy and implementation plan.
  • Provide relevant technical guidance on humanitarian (emergency response and recovery- nexus approaches), and lead with specific technical guidelines, tools and manage the humanitarian program cycle management (identification, formulation, monitoring, and evaluation, learning and reporting).
  • Manage strategic donor relations and execute resource mobilizing strategy with current and potential donors and delivers on fundraising plans and monitor its execution.
  • Maintain relationships with national/local partners, support the capacity and risk assessment of national/local partners and enforce dialogue with partners on (strategic) relation between Cordaid and local partners.
  • Conduct regular on-site visits to project sites to build relationships, and continuously support and monitor the progress of projects funded by Cordaid and donors.
  • Ensure that Humanitarian programs are of high quality and in line with relevant standards (CHS, SPHERE, clusters), are sensitive to gender and vulnerable groups (incl. women, girls and boys, people with disabilities and older adult) and incorporate identified risks reduction measures into the full life cycle of the Program design, operations & maintenance etc.
  • Lead and support report writing to ensure accuracy in evidence harvesting, consistency, high quality documents submitting them on time to donors.
  • Lead and support organizational program accountability and transparency and produce key program documents, reports submitting them to Cordaid, donors and to other stake holders as requested.

Grant Acquisition, Bid Management

  • Provide overall strategic leadership to the respective programme and initiative and input in continuous donor mapping, donor intelligence, competitor analysis identifying that lead to concrete results in resource mobilizing to secure financial and other resources for the programs.
  • Lead response to call for proposals observing laid out donor requirements and standards and considering relevant sectoral strategies, with evidence-based proposal development processes and quality technical writing for award opportunities.
  • Leads the bid project of calls for proposals and tenders related to the assigned specific donor portfolio.
  • Guides the project opportunity from the lead stage to the contracting stage – ending with a signed donor contract.
  • Ensures the writing of the technical and financial proposal through facilitating the technical writing team, finance lead and monitoring progress. Leads negotiations for specific assigned bids.
  • As manager of the bid team provides donor specific advice on rules, regulations and policy. Uses donor contacts to ensure the winning outcome of calls and proposals. Oversees (parts of) the role division, planning and communication with donors and a consortium to achieve a positive outcome for Cordaid.

Networking, Communication, Representation & Advocacy

  • Develop & maintain close relationships with donors and counterparts such as ECHO, the UN system, DRA, and other in-country INGO and NGO fraternity networks for information sharing, exchange, building relations and networks to further Cordaid aims in Ethiopia.
  • Participate in relevant ACT Alliance, Caritas, UN, CAP, and other humanitarian coordination/thematic cluster meetings and other meetings at government & national level.
  • Facilitate documentation of stories and media materials with human interest related to Cordaid and partners’ programs and projects and liaise with concerned units for broader coverage (digital and print media)
  • Facilitate program representation and accountability of Cordaid in relevant strategic levels, platforms, sector, cluster forums and events that profile visibility, and offer opportunity to share exchange and improve relations, space and opportunities for Cordaid at regional, Woreda and among institutional forums.

Leadership & Management

  • Maintain strong focus on leadership and people management, ensuring the most capable and competent staff members are in place to implement the humanitarian program strategy and operational plans both at Country Office and field offices.
  • Ensure all program-based needs and requirements are timely and efficiently shared with support services for best coordinated implementation.
  • Provide excellent standards in the management of the human, financial, capital and technical resources of the organization, which includes inspiring and maintaining high standards of work and clear accountability to stakeholders.
  • Establish a consultative and participative management environment that engages and develops Cordaid project teams to deliver on donor obligations hence meeting program commitment priorities.

Financial & Operational Compliance

  • Ensure quality adherence, contractual compliance, and timely reporting on all humanitarian projects. In collaboration with the Finance and Operations Manager, ensure responsibility for project expenditure, financial accountability, and planning requirements, and provide a high level of support to program processes and procedures.
  • Monitor the financial integrity of Cordaid program funds through grant management, monitoring and evaluation through track project indicators, expenditure and other grant essential information and ensure to conduct grant review meetings on regular basis.
  • Lead the coordination of grant opening and closing meetings and propose resource mobilizing strategies.
  • Support the humanitarian team to strengthen the organizational practices that result in successful financial and operational audit scores and take lead in the implementation of risk management, risk mitigation, and in executing audit recommendations.
  • Familiarize self and understand to Cordaid Donor Compliance issues, specifically to the terms and conditions of the Donor the programme is working on and comply with same in area of responsibility.
  • He/she is ultimate budget holder of the sectoral program. Ensure project compliance with donors’

regulations, organizational and local government policies

  • With support from the Country finance team, review grant management report, assess spending rates and budget forecasts.
  • Ensure a timely pace of implementation in a challenging environment, with spending in line with budget forecasts.
  • Review and approve project expenditures, carry out regular budget tracking and take the lead on official requests for modifications in consultation with Finance & Operations and Grants team when needed
  • Ensure project implements and adheres to approved visibility, marking and branding plan.

Accountability, Integrity, and Reporting

  • Maintain management accountability, reporting and updating the line manager on all humanitarian projects performance and progress in program, including resource mobilizing processes, decisions and actions. Present project/programme progress and challenges on a regular basis as appropriate to the Country Director.
  • Showcases integrity standards as outlined in Cordaid’s integrity policies. Fulfills integrity responsibilities as outlined in Cordaid’s Integrity Framework and Standard Operating Procedures. Actively contributes to a safe environment within their scope of influence by encouraging dialogue, trust, as well as understanding and adherence to Cordaid’s integrity standards and procedures.
  • Undertake functions and roles delegated by the line manager.
  • Attend to other duties as directed and instructed by the line manager.

Others

  • Ensure logistics, procurement, and finance protocols are followed by all respective team members and collaborate closely with Internal/external Audit and Grant team to ensure the integration of compliance concerns into the work of the programme respective sector.
  • Ensure appropriate Human Resource planning, training, staff performance management, resource allocation, etc. is made as required for the successful implementation of programme objectives, including appropriate support personnel at Cordaid’s field sites.

Job Requirements Qualification, skills and experience required

  1. Masters or post-graduate in International Relations, Humanitarian Programs Management, degree, international development, Disaster Risk Management and/or similar field.
  2. Minimum 5 years’ management experience, of which at least 3 should include management of a portfolio of programs across humanitarian and Recovery sectors.
  3. At least 7 years proven experience with strategy and program development and management of humanitarian aid programs.
  4. Proven experience in writing proposals.
  5. Demonstrable experience of driving integrated advocacy, communications, and fundraising approaches.
  6. Proven skills in leading strategic programming and planning processes.
  7. Ability to live and work under pressure in a rapidly changing and insecure environment.
  8. Team player with excellent communication and strong participatory leadership skills.

Knowledge and Experience

  1. Understanding the workings of the Humanitarian Sector in Ethiopia, knowledge of working with humanitarian concepts, principles, approaches, CHS and SPHERE standards, guidelines frameworks and tools; this includes competent working knowledge on how to link of humanitarian aid to development programming.
  2. Proven competencies and experience in representation externally to key stakeholders, including donors, embassies, and clusters.
  3. Experience of managing program systems and tools to oversee complex project portfolios across different sectors and locations as well as within consortiums
  4. Experience in working with national/local actors and capacity building of national and local organizations in emergency preparedness and response.
  5. Experience with maintaining donor relations and policies in particular ECHO, UN funding mechanisms, CAP and cluster approach.
  6. Competence in resource mobilizing and working knowledge on how to meet requirements for call for proposals, and the relevant attendant pre, in situ, and post proposal procedures, including skills for adapting to different donor requirements and procedures for funding.
  7. Strong experience in program quality, PMEAL, program development and proven fundraising abilities with key donors.
  8. Experience with using relevant humanitarian international standards such as sphere.
  9. Proficient in micro-soft office packages such as word and excel.

Core Competencies

  1. Critical Thinking & Problem Solving.
  2. Collaboration & Influence.
  3. Agility & Adaptability.
  4. Initiative and Entrepreneurship.
  5. Effective Communication: Oral and Written of English language
  6. Assessing and Analyzing Information.
  7. Curiosity and Imagination

How to Apply

Interested and qualifying applicants can submit their application letter and CV in English, with both phone and email contact details of at least 3 professional references, to the following email [email protected]. The vacancy reference number along with the title of the post needs to be written in the subject of the email.

CORDAID is an equal opportunity employer and women are strongly encouraged to apply.

All applications submitted cannot be returned.

Applicants are encouraged to apply early as interviews are done on a rolling basis and the advert can be closed when a matching candidate is identified

An integrity screening will be part of the application procedure.

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted.