Mercy Corps Recruitment (May 2024): Open Jobs/Vacancies Application

Jobs in NGO, Non-Profit Associations, Jobs at Mercy Corps

Mercy Corps is a global humanitarian aid agency engaged in transitional environments that have experienced some sort of shock: natural disaster, economic collapse, or conflict.

Open Jobs/Vacancies Application

1. Investment Manager – Regional Livestock Program, Africa
2. Deputy Regional Director, Operations – East & Southern Africa

Investment Manager – Regional Livestock Program, Africa

• Mercy Corps is currently seeking an Investment Manager for Regional Livestock Program (RLP) who will lead the management of Enterprise Investment, a matching grant facility that will support enterprises to address underlying key constraints, facilities access to finance to support the private engagement and promote investment.
• The Investment Manager is responsible for the overall leadership and management co-investment interventions including developing privates sector engagement mechanisms/procedures and best practices for the promotions of investments in the livestock industry in the RLP targeted areas.
• The Investment Manager will lead establishment of processes and implementation of the intervention as per investment Fund manual.
• They are responsible to coordinate with the project team in designing call for proposals/Application, selection of the most viable investment ideas and its execution; and introduce innovative ideas and approaches to enhance financial inclusion for livestock related business. Working closely with the Mercy Corps RLP program implementing country finance team and RLP program contracts and compliance Manager and other teams, the Investment manager will be responsible to ensure the co-investment interventions are following RLP Donor’s regulations.
• They will monitor performance and provide timely reports to ensure that financial resources are used effectively and efficiently.
• The investment Manager will be guided by the principles of transparent and competitive allocation of funds, strict management guidelines, and support for public, private or community actors and organizations of all sizes.
• S/He will coordinate closely with the Monitoring and Results Measurement Manager, contracts and Compliance Senior Manager, Country program managers, Sr. Women Economic Empowerment Advisors and other RLP team in intervention designing, implementation, monitoring, evaluation, accountability, and learning systems to demonstrate impact, while sharing learning across our team and partners.

Essential Job Responsibilities

• Take the overall technical lead on management of the co-investment fund and private sector interventions to meet the intended project goal and catalyze investment in target areas.
• Lead the design and development of process and guidelines for successful management of investment funds based on Mercy Corps global best practices and in compliance with RLP donor’s regulations.
• Understand the key elements of a successful investment and develop tactical and strategic plans to enhance the investment in the livestock industries in the program targeted area.
• Ensure that the Investment fund supports activities across the key sectors that the project is targeting and does not crowd out financial markets and actors, rather helps them to flourish.

Specific Job Functions

• Work closely with the project team to conduct research and assessment to identify potential private sector, public and community managed entities for partnership.
• Organize and conduct multi-stakeholder platforms to disseminate Regional Livestock Program (RLP) Investment Fund opportunities to potential partners to stimulate changes.
• Develop tracking systems to ensure all documentation is appropriately disseminated and managed.
• Lead the process of the private sector engagement including leading carrying out of due diligence on companies/ business.
• Liaison with the project and finance team to provide support on strengthening partner skills in financial management, program reporting and other administration process.
• Ensure all components of the Investment fund are compliant with RLP donors and MC regulations.
• Responsible for all administrative issues related to the investment fund including monitoring, tracking financial and program reports.
• Propose strategies for building resilience and improving market system performance, including making business strategies more inclusive and beneficial to enterprise productivity through investment fund.
• Support development of learning platform related to innovation and investment to be utilized throughout the life of program.

Security

• Ensure compliance with security procedures and policies as determined by country leadership.
• Proactively ensure that team members operate in a secure environment and are aware of policies.

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.

Supervisory Responsibility: No direct reports but financially oversee private sector engagement officers.
Accountability

• Reports Directly To: Deputy Director/technical lead- Regional Livestock Program
• Works Directly With:
  • Regional Livestock Program Managers (Ethiopia, Kenya, and Somalia),
  • Monitoring & Results Measurement Manager,
  • Reginal Livestock Program Contracts & Compliance Senior Manager,
  • Regional Livestock Program Women Economic Empowerment Advisor
  • Regional Livestock Program Senior Officers/specialists,
  • Mercy Corps Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia country offices grant and compliance coordinators/managers.
  • Mercy Corps Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia Financial Inclusion team members

Knowledge And Experience

• Masters’ degree or equivalent in Finance, Economics, or Business Administration, or Bachelors’ degree with significant additional experience.
• Minimum 7 years of experience in enterprise development; investment management; and working in partnership with private sector actors.
• Good understanding on Markets Systems Development (Making Markets Work for the poor-M4P) approach and facilitation including coaching/mentorship, relationship building, communicating, open and willing to work on new initiatives.
• Good understanding of private sector engagement and investment process is essential.
• Demonstrated experience in the financial sector and in financial inclusion for the private sectors.
• Proven skills in strategic planning, assessment, and business developments
• Demonstrated experience and ability to represent the organization and negotiate with a diverse range of market actors professionally and appropriately.
• Demonstrated understanding of complex developmental and transitional contexts, particularly in a resilience context, preferred.
• Excellent verbal and written communication.
• Demonstrated attention to detail and ability to follow procedures, meet deadlines and work both independently and cooperatively with team members.
• Experience of working on different donor funded programs preferred.
• Fluency in spoken and written English required.

Deputy Regional Director, Operations – East & Southern Africa

• The Deputy Regional Director, Operations (DRD-O) is a senior leader providing significant strategic support to Mercy Corps country offices in the region. They work closely with the Regional Director (RD), Country Directors, as well as Finance, Supply Chain, Safety & Security and Human Resources focal points to improve coordination of global support functions. They will collaborate with the Regional Director to build and sustain a cohesive regional management team, ensuring the East and Southern Africa portfolio is geared towards excellence with established and responsive systems. In addition, they manage the ethics and safeguarding efforts at the regional level to ensure enhanced prevention capabilities, improve investigations and response rates, and strengthen communication between Head Quarter (HQ) and country offices.
• The Deputy Regional Director, Operations will oversee regional initiatives to strengthen capacity to manage and mitigate operational risks, to ensure excellence and accountability. They collaborate with other members of the regional team to set up support systems that ensure the regional portfolio is geared towards excellence with heightened accountability. In addition, the DRD-O will ensure timely support to country programs, and that the region is adhering to internal and external policies and regulations.

Essential Responsibilities
STRATEGY AND PLANNING

• Act as a key partner for the Regional Director (RD) to achieve an effective Regional Management Team (including the Deputy Regional Director, Programs) that delivers programmatic and operational excellence and significant impact and influence in the region.
• Contribute and review Regional Overviews and Annual Implementation Plans with a focus on operational strategies.
• Provide support to the Regional Director and country teams on matters pertaining to program planning, budgeting, and management.
• Mobilize and oversee effective human, material, financial and operational field support systems in the region, in cooperation with the appropriate agency support team.
• Mobilize support services and risk management resources to enable country and regional leadership teams to execute their respective strategic priorities.
• Manage and administer regional core budgets in coordination with regional and global leadership.
• Lead on overseeing the regional scorecards and other performance indicators at country and regional level to inform strategic decision making.

TEAM MANAGEMENT

• In partnership with the Regional Director, motivate, empower and guide teams towards excellence. Ensure a positive team culture and work environment. Fill in as needed for RD and for field leadership during leave and or leadership gaps as necessary.
• Dual Management of key regional support service resources, including those in Finance, Supply chain, Human Resources, and Safety & Security, while liaising and coordinating with functions in Information Technology, Compliance, Legal and Ethics.
• Ensure that dual managed team members have a deep understanding of their roles and are connected to relevant stakeholders across the agency to inform and promote agency strategies and best practices.
• Promote accountability, communicate expectations, and provide constructive feedback informally and formally via regular one on one meetings and performance reviews.
• Coordinate with country and regional/global leadership on recruitment of key support positions.
• Identifies opportunities for training and integration of these standards into core country and regional operations.

OPERATING FOOTPRINT

• In collaboration with Global Legal/General Counsel, responsible for Mercy Corps’ operational footprint in the region, including monitoring registration, tax status, or legal standing in current countries within the region as well as managing registration, tax status, or legal standing in other countries where we monitor potential entry, or in countries where we have had historical programming.
• Responsible for country exit/entry strategies and implementation in the region, including downsizing, complex program startup/closeout etc.
• In collaboration with General Counsel, ensure that adequate legal counsel is identified and in place for existing, former and watch-listed countries within the region.
• Support Country Teams working closely with the Legal Department on the management and resolution of pending or threatened litigation, regulatory actions, etc.

RISK MANAGEMENT

• Lead on assessing and addressing risks at regional and country level in partnership with key stakeholders.
• Engage and support countries across the region to ensure that adequate risk management systems are in place.
• Actively provide assessment of risks associated with program implementation, and support country leadership on identifying risk mitigation measures and solutions.
• Collaborate with country leadership to support preparedness and response to major disruptive events.
• Ensure country team adherence to security procedures and policies, so that team members operate in a secure environment.
• Engage with country level Ethics and Assurance managers as well as the global Ethics and Assurance department to track and analyze trends and needs across countries.
• Engage with country teams on the Internal Audit process to track findings and ensure country team compliance with IA findings and recommendations.

Regional Systems And Support Functions

• Track and analyze trends and needs across the region, and work with the regional team and country focal points to manage related issues.
• Collaborate with support function s International Finance, Supply Chain, Compliance, HR/People, Safety/Security, IT, Legal and Ethics – to enable country and regional leadership teams to execute their respective strategic priorities.
• Lead relevant support services for the region to ensure country needs and technical support are aligned.
• Work with global counterparts to preemptively address upcoming issues and needs at the systemic level whenever possible.
• Regularly engage with governance bodies for complex and flagship programs of comparatively large budgets, ambitious scopes, and high visibility, programs within the region and engage as a strategic leader so that implementers remain accountable to delivery and that challenges are understood and addressed. Play a leading role on complex program boards in the region when necessary.
• Acting as a senior representative for the region with internal MC stakeholders at all levels, ensure effective HQ and regional support for all country programs, flagging and advocating for support requests from country teams, prioritizing as necessary.

FINANCE

• Work with the International Finance and country teams to identify weaknesses and build strategies to provide adequate support and address capacity needs across the portfolio.
• Review and monitor the portfolio’s financial performance, analyze spending against award budget and forecasted revenue projections for the year, review of disallowances, and participate in Mercy Corps’ annual planning and budgeting exercise.
• Collaborate with regional/country finance leads to produce bi-annual master budgets, (or as required in response to country needs), including scenario planning based on pipeline. Coordinate Core/unrestricted budget requests to regional and global leadership and use as a tool to identify BD needs.

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PEOPLE AND HUMAN RESOURCES

• Support Mercy Corps global and regional initiatives for human resources, including safeguarding and diversity, and talent development.
• Streamline HR and operations related policies across the region, helping to develop new policies/policy guidance, as needed.

COMPLIANCE

• Lead on country level operational/legal compliance in collaboration with country leadership and global teams.
• Support country leadership in adhering to donor policies and procedures in collaboration with Global Compliance and Awards Management teams.
• Support the rollout of new internal Mercy Corps initiatives and standards, particularly those related to Finance, Operations, People, Safety & Security and Ethics & Safeguarding functions.
• Collaborate with country and global teams on award /subaward issues and management that are high risk/high profile.

Other Responsibilities

• In coordination with the RD and other senior leaders, lead the planning and preparation of regional gatherings.
• In the event of a major disaster or emergency in the region, work directly with Mercy Corps Emergency Response Team to coordinate an appropriate and timely response, focused on support functions and risk management, including providing dedicated support to country teams and internal communication management.
• Maintain close working relationships with counterparts in other regions, facilitating the gathering and sharing of experiences and lessons from other regions.
• Play a direct role in crisis/incident management in collaboration with country, regional and global teams.
• Represent Mercy Corps with external parties/donors/events as instructed by Regional Director and Global teams. Maintain high ethical standards and treat people with respect and dignity.
• Lead the logistics management and support the planning and preparation of regional gatherings, strategic meetings, program exchanges, learning events, etc.

As a seasoned leader, the Deputy Regional Director, Operations will be expected to provide cover for the Regional Director, Country Directors within the region, or other strategic leadership gaps should they arise.
ACCOUNTABILITY TO PROGRAM PARTICIPANTS

• Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts towards accountability, specifically to our program participants and to international standards guiding international humanitarian and development work, while actively engaging participant communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.

Required Knowledge, Skills And Abilities

• A detailed understanding of the grant/project implementation life cycle.
• Confident communication and facilitation skills applicable to donor relations and inter-agency coordination.
• Demonstrated capacity to lead multi-department teams
• Demonstrated ability to think strategically and solve complex problems at an organizational level.
• Ability to handle multiple issues at one time, especially in emergency situations, and to organize and prioritize accordingly.

Required Education And Experience

• BA/S in international development, social science, public or business administration or other relevant fields required, MA/S or equivalent years of experience strongly preferred. An advanced degree or certification in finance and accounting is preferred.
• At least 8-10 years field experience in senior management and direct program implementation; experience in complex/fragile environments is a plus.
• Demonstrated proficiency and experience with US, UK, EU, UN and other public and private donors, government grant and financial management requirements.
• Demonstrated understanding of the critical humanitarian and development issues in the region, and significant experience with the challenges and contexts of operating in the region.
• An internationally recognized qualification in project or program management or a commitment to obtain the qualification in the early months of work.
• Fluency in written and spoken English is required. Fluency in an additional language relevant to the portfolio is considered advantageous.

Mercy Corps Job Application

Interested and qualified applicants are requested to click on the link below and fill out the online application form. Any applications received after the closing date shall not be accepted.

• Investment Manager – Regional Livestock Program, Africa
• Deputy Regional Director, Operations – East & Southern Africa