Consultant - Sprout Platform Product Development Consultant at Mercy Corps

Purpose / Project Description:

• The Consultant will support the fulfillment of the objectives, activities, and deliverables below in close collaboration with the DCSA Director and Sprout Lead.

Consultant Objectives:

• The Sprout Platform Product Consultant will support the ongoing development of the Sprout Platform by enhancing its usability and manageability, leading content expansion and platform offerings, designing and developing the Dynamic Marketplace and Digital Advisory Services MVP, and aiding in business development and stakeholder engagement.

Consultant Activities:
The Consultant will:

• Lead in identifying, product designing, and integrating features to the Sprout Platform to enhance usability and manageability.
• Support the Sprout CTO in expanding and scaling the Sprout chatbot.
• Take an active lead and support internal and external stakeholders in the Sprout Platform’s Product Management and Evolution.
• Continuously update the fundraising strategy and lead fundraising for Sprout by identifying funding opportunities.
• Lead the Sprout Consultants in implementing CGIAR -Ukama Ustawi: Diversification for
• Resilient Agrifood Systems in East and Southern Africa Program
• Develop and manage partnerships with key content partners and agriculture government entities.
• Lead in updating of the business plan and strategy for Sprout content expansion into existing and new markets.
• Support the marketing strategy and business development activities.
• Engage with partners to identify potential funding opportunities for the Sprout Platform.
• Support Sprout Content Expansion into existing and new markets.

Consultant Deliverables:
The consultant will work to produce updates on the deliverables below alongside regular progress reports and activity time logs, in close collaboration with the Digital Climate-Smart Agriculture and Sprout Platform Lead:

• Lead in identifying and integrating features to Sprout to make it more easily usable and manageable including enhancement of the web interface.
• Lead the implementation of a co-designed project with the Zambian Ministry of Agriculture for the Acquisition and Transformation of Top Priority Agriculture Value Chains for FFOs and Farmers
• Lead in the maintenance of meeting minutes, log of website updates, and stakeholder requests from Sprout Platform.
• Develop partnerships with content partners – Stakeholder-building relationships with Agriculture Govt Entities for content review and strategic partnerships.
• Develop a structured survey tool and feedback loop with Sprout partners – Farmer Facing Organizations (FF0s) - to gather and track insights on the usefulness of existing and new learning content and services for their farmers.
• Assess Sprout Data Provision Platform to determine its current usability with FFOs and what is needed for FFOs to make access to content and services easier to use and integrate with their existing systems. Provide a report that includes the assessment process, data used, and recommended roadmap for the Sprouts data provision platform.
• Lead the implementation of a co-designed project with the Zambian Ministry of Agriculture for the Acquisition and Transformation of Top Priority Agriculture Value Chains for FFOs and Farmers. recruit and interview local FFOs (up to 5), acquire up-to-date content based on FFO and Zambian Government priorities (up to 10 value chains), transform and validate up to 10 value chains into farmer-friendly
• Support the business development lead in generating leads, presentations, negotiations, closing deals, and acquiring new partnerships.
• Support the Strategy development for Static Content Evolution for Sprout – based on partner needs and strategic opportunities, lead its implementation, and support the expansion of Static Content Availability/Depth into new countries and value chains.
• Update the fundraising Strategy, lead its implementation, and support ongoing fundraising activities for Sprout.
• Design, implement, and recruit service Partners for Sprout Dynamic Marketplace and Digital Advisory Services MVP
• Provide periodic updates on the Sprout Platform Roadmap in partnership with the DCSA Director, Sprout CTO, and BD teams.
• Update Sprout Content Strategy for Static Content Evolution for Sprout – based on partner needs and strategic opportunities.
• Support marketing strategy and planning with marketing team and Marketing Consultant
• Support in the scaling of Digital Weather Advisory Services in MVP, including fielding market research to better understand farmer needs and developing pricing.
• Design work plan and project design for identified Sprout services, which includes various stages including fully released, MVP, and experiment stages that will be integrated into the Sprout Platform.
• Analyze and update the documentation of the partnership process to determine the next Sprout services with key partners.

Timeframe / Schedule:
The time frame will be between June 17, 2024 - Oct 31, 2024.
The Consultant will report to:
Agrifin DCSA Director and Sprout Lead
The Consultant will work closely with:
The Agrifin Technical team
Required Experience & Skills:

• Bachelor’s degree in marketing, computer sciences, sciences, or a similar area
• MBA or Master of Sciences is highly preferable
• About five years of proven sales experience in business or a related area
• Exceptional communication and presentation skills, both written and verbal, in order to express technical and nontechnical concepts clearly and concisely.
• Experience designing and developing products for open data portals
• Experience working with CKAN and DKAN open-source data portal platforms
• Experience working with WhatsApp for Business services, and previous experience working with Turn.Io a highly preferable
• Experience working remotely with a distributed team across time zones
• Experience designing content taxonomies and implementing these as schemas in knowledge management systems Experience in implementing and working with WordPress
• Previous experience working with MC AgriFin, and their network of 150 partners highly preferred
• Previous experience supporting partners integrate, port, and leverage the Sprout Platform and the Sprout Learning services
• Able to manage team and clients remotely