Jobs at World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF)

Duties and responsibilities

More specifically, the Senior Manager, ME&L will:

• Lead the development, management and updating of AWARD ME&L tools, strategy/frameworks and systems;
• Coordinate the design, implementation and reporting of ME&L activities under the different AWARD initiatives and programs to track outcomes and impact;
• Integrate gender into AWARD ME&L systems and ensure the application of gender-responsive data collection and analysis methods;
• Provide technical backstopping for project/program’s progress tracking;
• Review and advise on project/program’s overall approach and adjustments, and prepare regular and ad hoc updates;
• Lead the development of gender-responsive indicators and ensure sex and age -disaggregated data is regularly generated, compiled, analysed and adequate recommendations are formulated;
• Support the implementation of quality assurance and control protocols and ensure internal consistency and validity of project/program’s monitoring checks to enable improved capturing and narration of programmatic results and impact;
• Contribute to technical donor reporting using appropriate formats;
• Contribute to proposal development and grants’ negotiations including design of high quality ME&L inputs, to ensure successful proposals;
• Contribute to the review of existing grants’ overall performance and indicators against achieved cumulative results and make useful recommendations for performance improvement;
• Facilitate inclusive and gender-responsive MEL and research approaches, processes,  data and findings through capacity development of AWARD staff, and periodic meetings with partners and stakeholders;
• Coordinate the dissemination of findings/lessons learnt/best practices internally and externally through seminars, international conferences and other relevant forums;
• Supervise and coordinate unit staff members and consultants, including coaching and mentoring others in the unit and overall team;
• Serve as a member of the Senior management and support the strategy design, identification of strategic partnerships in the agricultural research and development sectors;
• Perform any other tasks as assigned.

Requirements

Person specification

The ideal candidate for the role of Senior Manager ME&L (Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning) should demonstrate the following qualifications, skills, knowledge and experience:

Education

• Master's degree or higher in a relevant field such as Monitoring and Evaluation, Development Studies, Social Sciences, or related disciplines.

Knowledge and experience

• Relevant work experience in international agricultural sector of at least 10 years, with not less than 5 years in a management role for ME&L;
• Experience working in various countries on the African continent in the development/agricultural sector.
• Extensive knowledge of gender and social inclusion analysis frameworks and in integrating gender into ME&L systems, including the identification of indicators to track gender specific outcomes and results;
• Demonstrated understanding of gender considerations in agriculture, social and policy-related issues, and opportunities for Africa’s agricultural development;
• Sound expertise in Monitoring and Evaluation and Reporting of international donor-funded programs/initiatives;
• Extensive knowledge of gender-responsive ME&L concepts/systems/approaches, research design, data management, quality assurance and control procedures;
• Experience in developing different project/program logic tools such as the Theory of Change, Logical framework and Results framework
• Ability to establish goals and priorities, to plan, coordinate and effectively monitor tasks, milestones and target achievements;
• Sound experience in technical/donor reporting, knowledge management, capacity building and facilitation;
• Track record of published ME&L studies/reports and information products and dissemination to various audiences;
• Ability to forge and maintain effective working relationships with staff members, partners and stakeholders;
• Excellent command of the English Language, knowledge of French language is an added advantage;
• Ability to work independently and proactively as a team member; and
• Ability to understand expectations, work with competing deadlines and strong commitment to personal and organizational accountability.

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Duties and responsibilities

 Stakeholder Engagement and Requirement Analysis

• Conduct in-depth analysis of stakeholder requirements for new and existing systems.
• Provide comprehensive feedback to stakeholders regarding their requirements.
• Facilitate stakeholder collaboration in designing mockups and developing use-cases.

  Information System Design

• Develop Information System Architecture based on stakeholder requirements and current technologies, including deployment strategies and sustainability plans.
• Assist the unit in selecting suitable technologies (related to backend, frontend).
• Create and validate UI/UX designs through stakeholder engagement.
• Work with other CIFOR-ICRAF themes and units to support platform development where relevant.

Information System Development

•  Implement software solutions using the selected technology stack
• Perform thorough unit testing and quality assurance
• Develop developer/user guides.

Data Science and Analytics

• Assist in building data pipelines using Open-Source technologies (e.g., Apache Airflow)
• Perform data cleaning and curation for dashboard development.
• Apply Agile software development principles in the design and development of data-driven dashboards
• Explore and implement emerging technologies for micro dashboards (e.g., Apache Superset, Power BI, Observable Framework)
• Assist with data analysis and identification of data requirements for data-driven dashboards.

Continuous Integration and Continuous Deployment (CI/CD)

• Establish, maintain, test and deploy production CI/CD pipelines
• Utilize Docker Hub and GitHub for efficient deployment and version control.

Collaborative Requirements Gathering and supervision

• Actively participate in requirement gathering workshops to analyze stakeholder needs
• Supervise junior developers on database design and management, and in platform development.

 Contribute to proposal development and writing where relevant.

Requirements

• BSc degree in relevant field.
• Advance programming skills especially in Python Django framework.
• Excellent understanding of database systems, including advanced database development.
• Proven solution deployment experience.
• Good knowledge of Linux.
• Knowledge of Data Science and Machine Learning.
• Knowledge of Data and analytical pipelines.
• Knoweldge of EDA platforms. 
• 2 to 4 years of experience.

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Duties and responsibilities

 Innovation

• Propose and implement agreed improvements in breeding nurseries and seed production and/or multiplication (e.g. speed breeding).

Coordinate experiment creation, trial kit preparation, shipment to various partners, data return

• Ensure entry lists provided by the scientist are created in enterprise database systems, packed, sent to partners, and planted on time.
• Collaborate with trialists and technicians in partner centers and ensure standard trial protocols are followed.
• Coordinate the compilation of trial data from partners and uploading them into enterprise database systems.

 Management of hybrid breeding nurseries and hybrid seed production

• Understand and gain experience in hybrid breeding, hybrid seed production, heterotic pools in sorghum and pearl millet.
• Manage hybrid breeding nurseries including restorer pool population improvement, maintainer pool population improvement, AxB seed production, AxR seed production and BxR testcrossing as needed.
• Ensure nurseries are established on time (timely land prep, planting, fertilizer application etc) planted according to the plot layout.
• Ensure nurseries are well managed (irrigated, weed control, pest and disease control etc) and that there is frequent communication or updates with scientists.
• Manage accurate and timely data collection as specified by the scientists, and ensure accuracy of data entry and consolidation.
• Implement timely digital data capture using the relevant tools (e.g. FieldBook app) and software as identified by the program.
• Ensure protocols (e.g. seed retention, seed amount harvested from nurseries) are followed.

Supervise casual labor

• Manage a team of casual labor at Kiboko to perform activities in the field, screenhouse and seed laboratories.
• Ensure labor team receive the necessary training to perform their tasks.
• Maintain and practice occupational health and safety in the workplace.

Other Responsibilities

• Assist in tissue sample collection for genetic and/or biochemical analysis
• Manage printing of packets, labels, tags and seed inventory
• Establish and maintain contacts with collaborating organizations and partners.

Requirements

• Master’s or bachelor’s degree in plant breeding, agricultural science or related fields.
• Minimum two (2) years’ experience in managing agricultural field activities or research projects in a private or public research company/institute.
• NGO experience is NOT a requirement