Jobs at Mercy Corps

The Position

• The Jobtech Alliance Partnerships & Network Lead plays a lead role on the first workstream outlined above, while contributing to improved performance of Jobtech Platforms across the continent. S/he is responsible for building the community as a fundamental anchor for all other activities of the Jobtech Alliance, and building out complementary workstreams. Firstly, this involves managing community outreach and onboarding, engagement (including online and offline channels), and events. Secondly, it involves providing 1:1 support to platforms to ensure that they get the most of the Jobtech Alliance, as well as identifying and managing further workstreams and partnerships that contribute to the growth and enhancement of the ecosystem and community.

Who You Are

• You are a creative extrovert who has phenomenal EQ, and are deeply passionate about startups and employment in Africa. You are strategic and can build things from scratch, and know the difference between a good and a dud partnership. You have a skill at facilitating, and are a natural connector. You are highly organized, and can keep the day-to-day ticking while working on ambitious new projects.

Key Responsibilities
COMMUNITY & PARTNERSHIPS STRATEGY (15%)

• Lead the overarching community management strategy & develop new ideas about how to improve both size of membership and quality of engagement. You’re the primary KPI holder for quantity of members and quality of engagement.
• Develop processes for community management and maintain the Jobtech Alliance Playbook around community engagement. Establish our model to enable us to better share useful resources / collaborations with platforms on a 1:1 basis.
• Evolve strategy, and identify opportunities for partnerships, special projects, or services that would improve the enabling environment of the ecosystem

COMMUNITY OUTREACH, RECRUITMENT AND ONBOARDING (10%)

• Drive membership of the Jobtech Alliance community through mapping of startups in the sector, outreach and promotion, direct engagement with startups, and creative outreach campaigns
• Review Platform Member applications on a regular basis, and conduct onboarding with new startups
• Other activities, as guided by his/her community engagement strategy

COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT AND EVENTS (25%)

• Maintain social media channels (LinkedIn and Twitter) with quality and engaging content (including user-generated) to promote high levels of learning and engagement. Where possible, develop more creative content based on Jobtech Alliance blogs and other learning
• Manage Jobtech Alliance website, email, and other communications channels
• Organize and host meet-ups for the Jobtech Alliance community in different markets
• Organize and manage webinars hosted by Jobtech Alliance and partners
• Go-to organizer for bigger events, including the Africa-wide Jobtech Summit

PLATFORM SUPPORT (25%)

• Maintain 1:1 relationships with community-members, and maintain a finger on the pulse of what the community needs
• Identify unique needs of platforms, and play a ‘connector role’, sharing useful Jobtech Alliance resources, introductions to other Platform Members, or beyond

PARTNERSHIPS AND SPECIAL PROJECTS (25%)

• Based on emerging opportunities, and feedback from the community, identify partners and lead special projects which improve the enabling environment for inclusive jobtech platforms in Africa
• This could improve projects including (but not limited to): partnerships with useful service providers, the building of open-source tools solving key problems for start-ups, pilots with external actors, policy roundtables, and more.

Supervisory Responsibility

• None

Accountability
Reports Directly To: Program Director / Jobtech Alliance
Works Directly With: Startups, External partners, BFA Communications team, Results, Learning & Research team, Venture Building Managers, Finance team.
Accountability to Participants and Stakeholders

• Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our program participants, community partners, other stakeholders, and to international standards guiding international relief and development work. We are committed to actively engaging communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.

Minimum Qualification & Transferable Skills

• A minimum of 5 years of experience in community engagement, project management, and/or leadership roles in the startup space in Africa
• Experience working in jobtech platforms strongly preferred, as a founder/leader a plus
• Experience building communities in the startup space in Africa, and/or with diverse stakeholder management.
• Experience managing and growing social media channels, demonstrating creativity in content and engagement . Flawless written English and evidenced track record of developing compelling content in written form and beyond.
• Demonstrated capacity to come up with ideas and build things from scratch that are rolled out with multiple stakeholders.

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The Position

• This is a full-time position to manage the FICCARS programme and ensure quality delivery of outputs. The Programme Manager (PM) is primarily responsible for planning and leading delivery of programme activities, co-ordinating activities with implementing and commercial partners, and providing technical expertise to commercial partners on clean cooking technologies and business models.

Essential Responsibilities (90%)

STRATEGY AND PLANNING

• Lead planning and execution of programme activities with implementing partners, commercial partners, and other departmental teams within Mercy Corps.
• Support the Head of Energy Research and Innovation in engaging and maintaining the relationship with the programme donor.
• Work closely with the Head of Energy Research and Innovation to engage and maintain relationships with key stakeholders who are programme focal points or sector enablers. This includes documenting and disseminating programme lessons and successes to inform further programming.

PROGRAMME MANAGEMENT

• Track programme activities and outputs to ensure cohesiveness in program delivery among the programme team, implementation partners, commercial partners, and consultants.
• Directly manage and quality check delivery of activities and outputs commercial partners and expert consultants in the programme.
• Work closely with the Deputy Project Manager (DPM) in managing the in-country implementation partners.
• Lead budgeting and resource planning for the programme, ensuring adherence to Mercy Corps policies and standards, as well as donor requirements.
• Develop and oversee implementation of programme activities and workplans in adherence to Mercy Corps policies and programme standards.
• Work closely with the Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) team to ensure effective monitoring, evaluation and reporting of programme activities and results. This includes support in developing tools necessary for effective M&E, and analysis and reporting of evaluations.
• Work closely with Mercy Corps’ Regional Programme Team to prepare narrative and financial reports to the donor.
• Work closely with the DPM to plan and co-ordinate stakeholder workshops in the programme. This includes leading facilitation of events with implementing partners and other programme partners.
• Ensure effective documentation and filing of programme documents as per Mercy Corps’ Record Retention policy.
• Lead engagements with key stakeholders in the public and private sector and manage logs of engagements carried out throughout the program. This includes participating in relevant sector working groups in the countries.

COMMUNITY ACCOUNTABILITY AND REPORTING

• Ensure CARM is operationalised in FICCARS in accordance with Mercy Corps standards.
• Provide overall guidance to the FICCARS team and implementing partners on CARM management.
• Ensure that programme stakeholders are proactively informed of the programme CARM feedback channels.
• Ensure that appropriate action is taken for all programmatic feedback and that it is appropriately incorporated into programme activities and overall implementation strategy.

RESEARCH AND LEARNING

• Work closely with the DPM and Head of Energy Research and Innovation in carrying out research and learning initiatives with the program team and implementing partners to contribute to the programme's learning and adaptation needs.
• Coordinate periodic learning and reflective sessions with the program team, stakeholders, and partners to share monitoring data, lessons, and research findings.
• Represent the programme and E4I in conferences, workshops, webinars, industry events, and other sector meetings as a presenter, speaker, or participant.

CLEAN COOKING ADVISORY

• Co-ordinate with the procurement, compliance, and finance teams to select and contract suitable commercial partners to support under FICCARS.
• With commercial partners, develop implementation plans in alignment with FICCARS objectives.
• Provide expertise to commercial partners on clean cooking technologies, business models, pricing models, last-mile delivery, partnerships, consumer insights, M&E, reporting, and other areas as needed.
• Lead design and implementation of route-to-market activities with commercial partners.
• Work closely with the commercial partners and assigned consultant(s) to design and execute action research activities in the programme.
• Support the Head of Energy Research and Innovation in co-ordinating and facilitating capacity building workshops and events for the public sector, private sector, and national and local government on clean cooking, financial inclusion, and gender.

Institutional Support (10%)

• Provide ad-hoc advisory services in SME advisory programmes with clean cooking components.
• Building in-house knowledge and capacity on clean cooking technologies, business models, and best practices.
• Work closely with the Head of Energy Research and Innovation, the communications team, and the MEL and knowledge management departments to disseminate position papers/publications on energy trends, gaps and opportunities in the market that E4I and Mercy Corps are helping to addressing.
• Contribute to business development (BD) to build E4I’s energy portfolio. This includes supporting development of proposals, concept notes and presentations to donors, participating in design workshops, and/or participating in internal and external BD meetings as needed.

Supervisory Responsibility

• Energy Analysts, Programme Officers, Programme Assistants

Accountability

Reports Directly To: Head of Energy Research and Innovation

Works Directly With: The FICCARS team, the MEL team, in-country implementation partners, commercial partners, consultants contracted in the programme, the Programme Performance and Quality (PaQ) team, and the Regional Programmes Team (RPT).

Accountability to Participants and Stakeholders

• Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our programme participants, community partners, other stakeholders, and to international standards guiding international relief and development work. We are committed to actively engaging communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.

Minimum Qualification & Transferable Skills

• Graduate degree or equivalent in Energy, Environment, Economics, International Development, Urban Development, Climate Change, or other relevant subject.
• At least 7 years of progressive experience in energy implementation within the context of international development. Experience implementing energy programmes in urban areas is advantageous.
• At least 3 years’ experience with managing projects and teams in an international development organisation.
• Experience working with national and sub-national authorities, the private sector, and non-government organizations as programme partners.
• Strong demonstrable expertise in clean cooking technologies and businesses, particularly in the context of the private sector. Expertise in modern energy cooking solutions is desirable.
• Demonstrated ability to work with, communicate effectively with, and manage ethnically diverse team members of varied work styles.
• Excellent verbal and written communications skills in English. Please include links to published work as evidence.
• Demonstrated analytical skills and ability to synthesize/translate data into a high-profile narrative to draw insights and inform decision making.
• Ability to effectively represent Mercy Corps and its interests to key stakeholders.
• Experience developing programme reports for donors.
• Demonstrated flexibility and creativity in planning and problem solving.
• Internationally recognized qualification in project or programme management or a commitment to obtain the qualification in the early months of work.

Qualifications

Experience

Required

2 years:

• Experience working with national and sub-national authorities, the private sector, and non-government organizations as programme partners.

7 years:

• At least 7 years of progressive experience in energy implementation within the context of international development. Experience implementing energy programmes in urban areas is advantageous.

3 years:

• At least 3 years’ experience with managing projects and teams in an international development organisation.