Program Development & Partnerships Lead, Violence Prevention and Response at International Rescue Committee

Job Overview

• The Program Development & Partnerships Lead, Violence Prevention and Response will provide leadership to drive the VPRU’s strategic planning, partnerships, and business development (BD) priorities, as set by VPRU leadership and in the Safety Strategy. The Program Development & Partnerships Lead will work in close collaboration with TU Global Practice Leads, TU Regional Leads, and the Grant Operations & Analytics Team (GOAT) to develop and drive a global funding strategy for VPRU. They will provide business development and program design support on Technical Unit-led or strategic proposals with a focus on public and institutional donors and cultivate strategic partnerships. As is strategically important, they may flex to support significant single-country or regional bids as well. Overall, the Program Development & Partnerships Lead should be responsible for setting the BD strategy, assembling inputs to create compelling bids, gap filling in the BD process as needed/relevant, and driving ultimate bid success through correct donor intel and positioning, strong bid submission, and effective cross-functional collaboration.

Major Responsibilities

Strategy and Capture

• Develop and drive a global funding strategy for VPRU in collaboration with Global Practice Leads and Regional Leads.
• Adapt, strengthen, and roll out new and existing tools and processes, such as the Business Development Manual, for the VPRU to pre-position and respond to new funding opportunities in line with the Safety Strategy
• Partner with and coordinate knowledge and information sharing with the Awards Management Unit (AMU) for public fundraising and GPPS/IPP for private fundraising, capturing priority needs across the portfolio, and providing accurate guidance to technical leaders and executive leaders for bid development
• Track a pipeline of upcoming opportunities and circulate to key staff
• Work closely with GOAT BD and AMU BD to plan for staff needs and BD capacity requirements to successfully write and budget for winning bids
• Coordinate internal competition processes for unsolicited submissions (e.g., BHA) by working closely with GOAT BD, including but not limited to facilitation of expressions of interest from VPRU’s Global Practice Leads and strengthening ideas for internal competitions

Business Development and Program Design

• Play the role of Proposal Design Lead or Proposal Lead for TU-led opportunities, as needed. This includes:
• Ensuring that the Project Design Meetings (PDM) take place on time, adapting PDM agendas to the specific opportunity, providing (or arranging) PDM facilitation
• Ensuring overall quality, coherence and logic in project design, promoting integration with other sectors as needed, partners' meaningful participation, adherence to IRC’s IMPACT quality standards and scale considerations
• Escalating key decisions to management group as relevant
• Being mindful of competitiveness aspects throughout the design process
• Ater the PDM, sharing core decisions and ensuring their validation by technical leadership and partners
• Provide advice and support on budget development to TU staff; review budgets to ensure consistency with the proposal design
• Write non-technical sections and edit all sections for TU-led proposals
• Coordinate with the Grants, Operations and Analytics (GOAT) team, Awards Management Unit (AMU) or Global Partnerships & Philanthropic Services (GPPS) on the review and signature process of agreements and contracts to closely follow IRC processes for award
• Coordinate technical input during negotiations with donors on any requested changes to the proposal
• Upon request, organize re-design meetings at inception phase or during pre-established learning moments
• Gather technical insights across the Technical Unit and consolidate for proposals in which multiple Global Practice Areas are represented

Partnerships Strategy

• Lead VPRU’s approach to partnership, including both global and local partnerships, working closely with the GOAT Partnerships team to ensure successful pre- and post-award partnership operations
• Lead coordination to drive all aspects of the partnerships strategy and management for TU, with a strong focus on building effective partnerships with local actors and organizations, and evolving tools, processes and ways-of-working to be fit-for-purpose for TU-led projects and strategic priorities
• Identify and evaluate opportunities for partnership development with local civil society, women-led organizations, and other local actors organizations both as part of but also outside specific BD opportunities
• Identify and evaluate opportunities for partnerships with academic or research centers, with Research & Innovation colleagues as appropriate, with a goal of identifying more research partnership opportunities from the global South

Key Internal Relationships:

• VPRU Deputy Director
• VPR Regional Leads across 6 regions, and regional Technical Advisors
• Global Practice Leads for Child Protection, Women Protection and Empowerment, and Protection – Rule of Law
• Global Leads for Policy & Advocacy and MEAL
• Prevention and Inclusion Advisers
• Grant Operations and Analytics Team (GOAT) Business Development Sr Coordinator and team
• Program Development and Partnership Leads in other Technical Units (Health, Education, Economic Recovery and Development)
• Policy & Solutions, Advocacy & Influence, and Systems Change global teams
• CRRD Senior Management Team and Leadership Group; Regional Leadership Teams
• Global HQ and AMU focal points

Key External Relationships:

• Counterparts at other INGOs and international Coalitions
• Civil society actors across geographies with a focus on civil society platforms and across in the ‘Global South’
• Counterparts at Red Cross/Crescent Movement with a focus on IFRC and ICRC and with national societies as relevant to partnership , thought partnership opportunities
• Donors and policy makers including humanitarian and protection policy spaces
• Counterparts in relevant multilateral agencies including but not limited to UNICEF, UNHCR, IOM, WFP, UNWomen, UNFPA, UNDP, OCHA, World Bank Bank

Desired Experience and Skills

• 8+ years of progressive experience providing technical and/or bid leadership to multi-year, multi-million-dollar business development opportunities in Child Protection, Gender Based Violence (GBV), and/or Humanitarian protection, IHL, and human rights
• Outstanding capacity to understand the humanitarian system and operating context and coordinate the relevant technical inputs from within and outside VPRU
• Familiarity with managing large-scale, complex portfolio and experience using strategic insights and data from varied sources to support portfolio management, pivoting and alignment to organizational and sectoral goals
• Excellent attention to detail and problem-solving skills and ability to analyses trends based on a diverse set of data and insights
• Demonstrating experience leading the development, review and implementation of systems, policies and processes in collaboration with other functional areas including Finance, Awards, Advocacy, MEAL
• Experience in building partnerships for development and humanitarian funding as well as negotiation of programmatic and financial contractual arrangements with donors and partners
• Demonstrated expertise in working with both public and private donors and knowledge of the funding landscape for Child Protection, GBV, and/or Humanitarian protection, IHL, and human rights
• Experience with some of the following donors programmatic and advocacy priorities, funding instruments and cycles: USAID, BHA, PRM, Irish Aid, FCDO, AFD, Global Affairs Canada, Swiss Cooperation, GFFO
• Experience and comfort interrogating partnership practices and familiarity with emerging developments including growing attention to power-shifting, localization and technical assistance models for INGOs
• Knowledge of public and private fundraising - Appetite and curiosity about building collaborative pathways with philanthropy and private sector
• Experience in developing and managing project concepts and funding proposals for humanitarian / development work with the ability to turn concepts and strategy into measurable action
• Demonstrated ability to work with stakeholders at multiple levels
• Highly collaborative and proven ability to work independently and work with remote, multi-cultural, and multi-disciplinary teams
• Flexibility and ability to work well under pressure, taking care of competing priorities, in a fast-paced team environment
• Experience in successfully influencing change in teams you don’t directly supervise
• Fluency in English required; Arabic, French and/or Spanish also valued
• Ability to travel globally up to 20% of the time, occasionally on short notice