Vice President, Africa at Luminate

Luminate is hiring a Senior Leadership Team position to manage existing relationships and expand our funding and operational work across the Africa region. Success in this role requires maturity, analytical ability, creativity, strategic insight, and business acumen, including the ability to manage an end-to-end grant making or funding process, as well as interest in working collaboratively in multi-cultural, global environments.

In addition, the VP for Africa will have responsibility for supporting the office of a Nairobi-based team of operational experts who work across the organisation. This is a full time and in-person role, based in Nairobi.

SUMMARY

Priorities for this position will be to:

• Direct the strategic work across the region, primarily executed through grant making, and advocacy work in Kenya and Nigeria, with some regional work in South Africa, along with a small team of direct reports
• Identify a healthy pipeline and portfolio of partner organisations 
• Make grants and provide other support, including support to partner organisations to grow and help them have impact
• Lead work on policy issues that can strengthen governance in the relevant countries 
• Represent Luminate in Africa, by participating in strategic opportunities for public engagement and by building a strong network of partners in civil society, private sector, media and government
• Contribute to the development of Luminate as a key member of the Leadership Team
• Oversee the smooth running of a small office in Nairobi

TEAM

This position reports to the CEO who is based in London, UK.  The role has direct management responsibility for a team of five who are based in Nairobi and Abuja, Nigeria, as well as oversight of Nairobi based employees working for other teams across Luminate. Successful candidates must have the right to work and be located in Nairobi, Kenya.

RESPONSIBILITIES

Leadership

• Actively contribute to leading Luminate as a key member of the Leadership Team
• Manage the Nairobi Office providing a supporting function to the VP Operations & Finance as well as the Senior Director of People & Culture
• Attend to duty of care of staff members operating in uncertain or fluid circumstances

Programme

• Define Luminate's approach in the priority countries and identify high impact opportunities to deliver against Luminate's strategic goals
• Manage Luminate's grants and investments budget for Africa
• Supervise a team to review and analyse business plans, investment proposals, and organisation budgets; prioritising opportunities, conducting necessary diligence on prospects
• Execute funding transactions by taking shortlisted opportunities through a well-defined approval and closing process, including definitive documentation, legal and financial due diligence (as applicable)
• Identify, develop and coordinate support to partner organisations by curating networks, making connections between partners, identify relevant consultants or other opportunities to build capacity
• Represent Luminate's perspectives with a broad array of stakeholders in government, civil society, academia, and private sector and expand Luminate's profile/influence in the region
• Identify key trends in philanthropy and emerging policies that could help advance Luminate’s strategy and define strategic recommendations to respond to those trends 
• Serve as key point of contact in relationships with other foundations and partners to identify potential areas of collaboration and grant co-funding/collaboration
• Engage regularly with other regional and global programmatic teams leads to help shape strategy, provide inputs on specific funding opportunities, and work on common areas of interest and impact
• Track learning and impact goals for Luminate's work in Africa and contributing to our knowledge management efforts by sharing key learnings and providing feedback on similar themes/ opportunities across Luminate’s target countries/regions

QUALITIES AND EXPERIENCE

Note: We view this section as a guide, not a checklist. We encourage you to apply even if you don’t satisfy every single bullet on this list.

• A track record of achievement in the area of governance, including the participation of underrepresented groups in civic and political life, media and information ecosystems – including the role of tech platforms.
• Demonstrated ability to make thoughtful judgement calls, drawing on prior grant-making and/or meaningful operating experience
• Willingness and interest to invest across non-profits and research, where relevant, to drive the impact we seek to have in the broader sector
• Significant experience working and living in Kenya, Nigeria or South Africa
• Strong analytic, strategic thinking and project management skills
• Strong written and verbal communication skills
• An understanding and appreciation of the concepts and practice of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Justice – especially in the African context.
• Experience managing team members across multiple locations and comfort working in an organisational structure that is geographically distributed
• Prior demonstrated interest in/experience with social entrepreneurship and creating positive social impact
• Flexibility to travel both within the African continent as well as to other team locations in the UK, US and beyond