Resilience Assistant at Islamic Relief

Job Description

Reporting To: Livestock Insurance Officer

Base Location: Project site (Field) 100%- Marsabit County (Moyale Sub-County)

GENERAL

Sustainable Community empowerment is one of the thematic focus areas adopted by Islamic Relief Kenya in its Country strategy. The programme focuses on poor, vulnerable communities with the aim of economic strengthening to enable them generate food and income through diverse livelihood opportunities available in their communities. The programme includes a strong focus in building community resilience and disaster risk reduction to reduce the vulnerability of rural livelihoods to external shocks and the effects of climate change, as well as the strengthening of organization advocacy capacities to influence public rural development.

This post requires someone with experience working in or with community based resilience building interventions and the ability to understand the constraints of early stage sustainable livelihood models.

Job Summary:

We are looking for someone who has strong written communication skills and financial analysis expertise, with the ability to engage stakeholders in the implementation of the project and generate quality regular internal reports. The successful candidate will need to understand and take on Islamic Relief’s values and commitment to poor communities’ economic empowerment. Lastly they will need to show strong self-awareness, inter-personal skills, and self-motivation, with the ability to deliver results and work well under pressure and to be flexible in demanding situations. The Resilience Assistant will be responsible for the day to day engagement with the project implementation stakeholders and communities in Dabel-Moyale to ensure project results are realized in an effective manner as per the project documents and donor guidelines and expectations.

Key Responsibilities:

• Project Administration and Operation
• Implementation of the project; “Strengthening Pastoralist Resilience to Climate Stress through Livestock Insurance and Agricultural Support Services” in accordance with the project requirements and work plan.
• Mobilize community common interest groups including Women and youth for engagement in various economic activities including fodder production and management.
• Organize and execute community capacity building in various project thematic focus areas in line with the IR training manual.
• Monitor the progress of resilience activities initiated through the project for technical advice and ensure sustainable systems are established.
• Collaborate with local stakeholders to identify market economic opportunities enhance social and economic stability of pastoralist population in Dabel Location.
• Build the business capacity of the targeted groups for easy access of available credit facilities for startup capital and expansion of business ventures.
• Monitor distribution of agricultural inputs to farmers including seeds and tools while ensuring that know-how is available for the targeted groups.
• Work with relevant stakeholders like National Drought Management Authority (NDMA) to establish and strengthen Community based structures for disaster risk reduction.
• Keep abreast of political, economic and social developments priorities in the area of operation and report the same to the line manager for appropriate action.
• Identify existing and emerging challenges facing the community and recommend suitable sustainable innovative approaches of addressing the gaps.
• Link with other related interventions run by IRK and other partners to ensure synergy and avoid duplication of activities.
• Monitor and mentor the Community extension workers.
• Compile all projects monitoring information on a regular basis and documentation of lessons learnt from field visits and project activities.
• Report regularly to the line Manager on general progress including learning, participation in project activities and other relevant matters.
• Maintain service-oriented culture to achieve service excellence objective.
• Training/Meeting/ Forums
• Prepare and conduct community sensitization forums/meetings with community groups.
• Document lessons learned from training activities, community meeting and assist in preparing training reports
• Represent IRK in the county and sub-county sector forums as may be necessary.
• Design, Monitoring and Evaluation activities
• Participate in the development of appropriate tools for monitoring and reporting including detailed implementation plans (DIPs) and M&E Plans.
• Participate in regular lessons learned feedback sessions with the project team

Qualifications/Experience/Skills:

• Diploma on Agriculture, Agribusiness, entrepreneurship, Agriculture resource economics or any other food security related field. A Bachelor’s degree in similar fields is preferred and will be an added advantage.
• Minimum of at least Three years’ experience in Resilience building and enterprise development Programmes targeting vulnerable groups.
• Vast experience in youth livelihood Programmes –planning, implementation, monitoring, evaluation and learning.
• Knowledge of the key issues/challenges and trends with regard to sustainable livelihood in pastoral communities.
• Experience in the use of computers and office software packages (MS Word, Excel, etc) and knowledge of spreadsheet and database packages.
• Flexible, with ability to work and handle multiple tasks and meet strict deadlines
• Ability to provide continuous input on the organization’s processes, implementation of new systems etc
• Strong planning, organization and problem solving skills with ability to work hands-on, independently, and within a team
• Strong communication (written & spoken) and interpersonal skills.
• Ability to work on your own initiative as well as a part of a team.
• Any other duties that may be assigned by supervisor.

Personal requirements

• Ability to cope with stress, and live in environment with very basic living condition
• Very strong interpersonal skills: strong communication and diplomatic skills
• Flexibility to respond to changing nature of humanitarian context and operational difficulties
• Excellent analytical skills, observation and analysis capacity
• Ability to plan ahead and output oriented (pro-active)
• Ability to adhere to deadlines and respect line management
• Readiness to commit and adhere to the values, mission and vision of IR Kenya