Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning (MEAL) Officer at Comitato Internazionale per lo Sviluppo dei Popoli

Ref N: CISP001-2021
Locationof work: Nairobi 100% with frequent field travel (Nairobi and Mogadishu)
Reports to: MEAL Manager
Start of work:1st March 2021
Duration: Until December 31, 2021 (with possibility of renewal)

Background Information:

CISP is an equal employment opportunity employer with its headquarters in Rome. Currently CISP has various field offices, including a Regional office in Nairobi. CISP Kenya carries out projects in areas of development by supporting national and county authorities to provide quality, equitable, transparent and accountable services in the sectors of higher education, child protection, culture, food security and nutrition.

CISP is the lead agency of a consortium of partners implementing a multi-year and multi-country EU-funded project entitled ArtXchange and aimed at promoting intercultural dialogue, collaboration and exchange among youth professionals from the creative sector in Kenya, Somalia and Europe. The project will engage and support creative youth and youth-led organizations, including young women and minority groups, from the culture, arts and sports sectors of Kenya and Somalia as actors of governance, inclusive development and change through enabling access to investment, capacity building and other opportunities.

Role purpose:

The MEAL Officer will serve as CISP’s focal point for Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning (MEAL) supporting implementation of the overall MEAL system for the ArtXchange project. S/he will assist the MEAL Manager and ArtXchange Project Manager with activities, including data collection, database management and analysis, implementing project monitoring as well as accountability and learning. The MEAL Officer will support all efforts for promoting a high level of beneficiary accountability, and will manage the feedback mechanism. The MEAL officer lead in data entry and management in respective projects as needed. The main purpose of this role is to lead in ensuring the quality, accountability, effectiveness and appropriateness of the programme actions and interventions.The MEAL officer will also be supporting the project in procurement and logistics when called to.

Key Responsibilities

• Monitoring and Evaluation
• Tools Development
• Support the development of project MEAL tools and translations.
• Develop budgets and work plans to ensure high quality data collection.
• Scripting and supporting in ensuring all data colllection tools are uploaded to kobo
• Development of the project database
• Support the PM in the development of project work plans and project funds request. Support in the development of the project’s Learning system to capture and document positive and negative learnings that feed back into project design and planning.
• Project monitoring
• Ensure the projects have DIPs, M&E plans and framework which are updated on a monthly basis or when required.
• Support in collecting data needed for the outcome indicators and support Project Manager with data collection processes if needed
• Support MEAL team with conducting assessments as needed, facilitate focus groups and other qualitative data collection exercises
• Monitor activity implementation progress against objectives and work plans
• Collecting data regularly as per the detailed activity plan, and ensure adherence to MEAL-related systems for quality project implementation are strengthened.
• Participation in routine field visits to verify data, orient project staff and partners on data collection tools.
• Facilitate the data collection of other project teams and consortium partners when needed and verify the collected data and beneficiary figures (gender, age and disaggregated overview).
• Monitor overall project implementation and provide feedback and support to the general strategy and accountability of the project, and produce regular monitoring reports on results of implementation progress including data analysis.
• Data Management and Analysis
• Enter, clean and consolidate the data collected at the field level in a project database accurately.
• Maintain the project database of data capturing all activities for easy retrieval, extraction and analysis to support project team
• Analyse the data monthly or after project activities are concluded
• Prepare and share monthly and quarterly MEAL statistics with the MEAL Manager
• Prioritize integrity of data and reports, their accuracy and validity to the utmost standard, including through identifying potential ruptures in data integrity and applying corrective measures.
• Accountability & compliance
• Assist with the development of the project’s complaints, feedback and response mechanism (CFRM).
• Assist with the roll-out and implementation of the project’s Complaints Feedback and Response Mechanism (CFRM). Support by actively seeking and responding to feedback from all members of targeted communities and other stakeholders as defined by the CFRM.
• Support the PM to ensure that projects are carried out with participation from all targeted groups (including women) and that information is shared with effectively.
• Maintain the Complaints and feedback received and ensuring a timely and appropriate follow-up if needed
• Conduct community visits, focus group discussions with beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries to receive feedback on CISP
• Liaise with various community stakeholders and mobilize them to ensure full involvement of community leaders, community representatives, and local government representatives in the overall implementation and improvement of project MEAL activities.
• Ensure external accountability to donors through the implementation of timely and quality MEAL activities leading to timely and accurate reporting including data analysis
• Ensure that all programmes are implemented in accordance with international standards (such as but not limited to CHS) and National standards.
• Programme Learning and documentation
• Work with the PM and Communication team to ensure documentation of programme learning initiatives and outcomes (case studies, photos, lessons learnt, most significant change stories, etc)
• Participate in the documentation and dissemination of this learning to other team members to ensure that good practice is understood and adopted and information exchanged.
• Support in archiving of project documents at the country offices.
• Under the guidance of the MEAL Manager, coordinate communication and facilitate MEAL-related information sharing among the project team and project participants at the community level.
• Reporting
• Support in ensuring that all CISP internal reporting and donor requirements are met with timely, relevant, triangulated and well data validated.
• Ensures that necessary reporting components are lined up in advance of report deadlines and responsible persons are followed up on the schedule.
•  Support the PM in consolidating the monthly program reports.
• Produce draft reports on the findings of assessments and surveys (such as baseline/ending, KAP surveys, client satisfaction surveys, social norms assessments, household surveys, internal evaluations, etc.)
• General Support
• Perform any other duties and responsibilities within the overall function of MEAL as and when requested.
• Facilitate capacity building for consortium partners’ staff on skills and knowledge related to MEAL and implementing feedback mechanisms.
• Support during main meetings with partners by writing minutes when called to and responding to project administrative needs.
•  Support logistics and procurement aspects of the project, including development of procurement plan and actualization in liaison with admin, raising purchase requests, following up on procurements, organizing travels, among others.
• Support financial aspects by drafting monthly Funds requests and support Admin department in reviewing financial documents from partners.

Minimum Qualification and Experience:

• Bachelor’s degree, preferably in Economics, Statistics or related field
• 2 years’ of progressive work experience in MEAL, preferably in the Arts and Culture sector/development context, in an international NGO, and in a similar role/with similar responsibilities.
• Knowledge of monitoring and evaluation methodologies, including logical models, conceptual frameworks, and assessment/evaluation.
• Experience in collecting and analyzing quantitative and qualitative data.
• Previous experience with evidence-based M&E frameworks and programmes, with emphasis on participatory and partnership-based MEAL approaches.
• Previous experience with mobile data collection tools (ODK, ONA, KOBO).
• Experience in database development/management.
• Confident user of MS Windows and MS Office packages (Excel, Word, PowerPoint), knowledge and use of other database, data analysis and/or data visualization tools preferred (such as Adobe Suite, Illustrator and InDesign).
• Experience in child safeguarding and assured commitment to CISP values and Child Protection Policy.
• Have a valid certificate of good conduct.

Required Skills:

• Observation, active listening and analysis skills with ability to make sound judgment
• Good interpersonal skills and the ability to interact effectively with diverse groups (local partner organization, donors, private sectors partners, and national authorities)
• Good relationships management skills with ability to work collaboratively as part of a team
• Ability to work well in an international environment with people from diverse backgrounds and cultures
• Proactive, results-oriented and service-oriented
• Well-developed conceptual, critical, analytical thinking and planning skills
• Creative, willing to develop and encourage innovative solutions
• Good understanding of cross-cutting issues
• Outstanding organizational and time management skills
• Ability to multitask and prioritize daily workload
• Able to meet deadlines and work both independently and as part of a team
• Excellent and persuasive writing skills
• High degree of integrity and ethics, able to demonstrate past record of upholding the accuracy and validity of data/reports to the utmost standard
• Fluency in verbal and written English and Kiswahili is required
• Flexible and willing to travel extensively to multiple field locations