Career Opportunities at Action Africa Help (AAH-I)

Salary Scale: AH5
Reports to: Partnership and Busniess Development Adviser
Liaises with: Partnership and Business Development team; Country Offices; HR

Job Purpose:

• To strategically use media and communications to improve the health and wellbeing of lively-hood challenged communities in Africa.

Job summary:

• Under the direction of the Partnership and Business Development Adviser, manage the planning, coordination and completion of regional plans, processes and projects in the execution of AAH-I’s Communications Strategy.
• Work in close liaison with others to identify, develop and communicate the impact of AAH-I’s work.

Communication Job Duties & Responsibilities

• Work with country teams, programme staff and partners to ensure high quality communications products – such as stories, photos, annual reports, newsletters, blogs, website, video and exploring new ways to get messages across using social media, online platforms and mobile technology – for a wide range of audiences at various levels.
• Support AAH-I’s internal communications by working closely with IT; HR to increase staff understanding of AAH-I’s vision and mission and capture and share learning through a variety of channels such as newsletters, videos, talks, calendars and so on
• Build media and communications capacity by delivering training and advice to AAH-I’s staff, partners and communities on media, documentation and communications skills.
• Manage the organisation’s knowledge management system to support documentation and sharing of best practices and success stories and ensure accessibility through various tools – intranet, portals etc.
• Manage organizational events and launches for publications, projects, PR activities and donor visits.
• Provide communications advice including crafting of relevant messages, use of the right media channels by critically developing strategic solutions to given communications challenges.
• Update and maintenance of social media channels within the regional office (Twitter, Facebook, You tube).
• Support in corporate branding through
• Train and advise (as needed) Country communicators in providing and managing content for these sites.

Expected Outcomes

• AAH-I’s work at country, regional and global levels is furthered through effective execution of the Communications strategy and budget
• AAH-I’s audiences and supporters are effectively influenced to support our core development and humanitarian issues through the creative and strategic use of both traditional and new media
• AAH-I is effectively represented in the media and other external audiences and delivery of messages and reputational risks and opportunities is enhanced
• Staff and partners are empowered through enhanced capacity in communications
• Innovation and finding creative new ways to communicate messages to new audiences

Professional qualifications

• A Bachelor’s degree in communications or its equivalent
  Over 5 years’ experience working with media, delivering communications strategies, managing internal communications, knowledge of digital media, and building capacity and creating networks.

Skills and competences for Communication Job

• Minimum requirement: Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism, public relations or related field.
• Good understanding of East Africa region.
• At least five years’ experience in communications in the development sector.
• Advanced understanding of internet and latest communication trends/ technologies.
• Extensive background in communications, journalism and web-based information management.
• Extensive background in coordinating; producing written content for donor/ sponsor engagement, public advocacy and media relations purposes.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills and the ability to communicate complicated and technical issues in a concise and clear way, to a wide range of target audiences.
• Excellent inter-personal skills and ability to work in multi-national, multi-cultural teams
• Contacts with media and other key external relationships in the region and AAH-I’s countries of operations
• Knowledge of professional and ethical issues relating to the Profession.
• Commitment and knowledge of AAH-I’s vision and values

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Salary Scale: AH 5
Reports to: Partnership and Business Development Adviser
Liaises with: Partnership and Business Development team; Country offices; Finance and Grants Manager; Monitoring & Evaluation

Job Summary:

• The Partnerships Specialist will play a key role in securing the resources AAH-I needs to deliver its vision, mission and Strategic Plan and will have a particular focus on strengthening the financial aspects of grant and tender applications. S/he will support the development of key partnerships and exploration into innovative forms of raising unrestricted funds.
• The Partnership and Business development Specialist will support Country Offices in developing proposals and other program designs for a variety of donors to address development and emergency proposals which meet local community needs that are aligned to AAH-I’s strategies.
• The position will also establish good relationships with donors and actively seek out strategic alliances with donors, INGOs, LNGOs, UN, Governments, bilateral and multilateral agencies.

Partnership & Business Development Job Duties & Responsibilities

• Provide support to Country Offices (CO) in proposal development and build cross functional team support to COs for proposals development.
• Identify capacity gaps at COs in grants acquisition and management and other factors leading to poor proposal designs, poor win rates and grants implementation and work with CO, and Partnership and Business Development Advisor to address them.
• Circulate funding forecasts to and support them to identify and capture new grant funded opportunities and maintain an up-to-date record of the requirements of current potential regional donors and be proactive in the lookout for opportunities for regional donors etc.
• Research, analyze, develop, and track relationships with new and current donors at regional level and share information with COs.
• Represent the organisation in various donor and coordination forums at regional and national level and by providing programmatic information as required.
• Will support resource development based assessments, and draft documents which aim to inform internal and external stakeholders concerning CO on-going and future programming.
• Maintain up-to-date knowledge and awareness of regional evidence-based funding approaches for development and humanitarian contexts and ensure these models are embedded in proposals and program designs.
• Ensures such existing and emerging funding approaches and models are incorporated into proposals and program designs through appropriate pilots and roll-out strategies.
• Develop well organized digital database of secured projects funding for the region that can be easily extracted whenever required.
• Maintain a catalogue of grants concept notes and proposals that can be presented to potential donors at short notice.
• Support management of key organisational partnerships.

Professional Qualifications for Partnership & Business Development Job

• First degree in Development studies or related field with experience in resource mobilization.
• Technical Training qualifications desired: Professional technical skills desired: Humanitarian standards (SPHERE, HAP), specific trainings on donor requirements e.g. UN, USAID, DFID, Europe Aid.

Skills and Experience

• At least 5 years’ experience in the development field working in development and humanitarian emergency interventions, preferably with experience in developing countries.
• Demonstrated writing skills: the ability to develop quality concept notes, proposals, logical frameworks and reports under tight deadlines.
• Experience working with both bilateral and multilateral donors.
• Networking/external engagement skills: proven experience in networking with donors and partners to bring about funding opportunities.
• A strategic thinker; the ability to develop proposals which meet strategic objectives of donors, the organization, and government.
• Ability to manage donor expectations.
• Strong budgetary and financial management skills.
• Proven ability to manage competing priorities.
• Team player; the ability to work as part of a diverse team to achieve the overall goal.

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Salary Scale: AH3
Reports to: Programme Director
Responsible for: Monitoring & Evaluation Specialist; Partnerships & Business Development Officer, Communications Officer
Liaises with: AAH-I Directorate, Country Directors, Development Partners

Job Summary:

• Provides strategic direction and oversight to Business Development; Fundraising to ensure that AAH-I positions itself to increase its relevance and viability as a business and that it has the financial resources it needs to deliver its Vision and Mission.

Business Development Job General Responsibilities

• Strategy / Business Development and Partnerships
• Leads on corporate business development strategy, planning and implementation in liaison with the Directors
• Advises Country Directors regarding business/funding strategy and works closely with them to ensure country resource mobilisation strategies are in place
• Ensures coordinated business development system and guidelines are in place
• Manages the department budget as appropriate.
• Build cross functional team support to COs for proposals development, including
• Provide technical support to COs during prepositioning meetings with bilateral, multilaterals, foundations, Public Private Partners, etc.
• Monitor the donor competitive landscape, and circulate funding forecasts to COs to enable them to organize prepositioning meetings with donors.
• Provide support and guidance to COs in development of capacity statements to be utilized during prepositioning meetings with donors.
• Circulate funding forecasts to COs and support them to identify and capture new grant funded opportunities.
• Maintain an up-to-date record of the requirements of current potential regional donors and be proactive in the lookout for opportunities for regional donors etc.
• Research, analyze, develop, and track relationships with new and current donors at regional level and share information with COs.
• Advises Directorate and Country Directors on strategic, planned approach to Business Development
• Pre-positioning: Create mechanisms and tools to identify funding opportunities matched against Headquarters and Country Office strategies to effectively pre-position donors
• Build close cooperation with other Country Offices and key stakeholders within and external to AAH-I to work together to develop and implement Business development strategy. Share learning, innovations and better practices across the region.
• Supports Business Development Officer to develop strategy and partnerships related to private sector/business partner
• Provide strategic direction for COs to pursue non-traditional funding sources, identifying emerging or untapped high potential donors
• Lead the development of key grants database for performance monitoring portfolio management in the region
• Ensure existence of a System/Database for past performance (All grants, US, EU, DFID, UNHCR, Bread for the world etc.

Capacity Building

• Oversees the development and implementation of Country BD capacity building plan
• Oversees development and management of the BD tools, guidelines and procedures
• Supports the Communications Team to ensure that the website and social media communicate effectively for key BD partners.
• Liaises with the M&E Manager and Communications Manager to support effective knowledge management designed to identify, capture, document and communicate results and learning.
• Leads on production of larger proposals and submissions
• Oversee production of concept notes, proposals and equivalent.

Monitoring and Evaluation

• Working with the M&E Specialist, ensure that the MIS is fully rolled out in all countries and that program teams are using the same to produce high quality reports.
• Timely review and submit high quality donor and institutional program reports.
• Timely M&E and donor reports with corrective measures taken where necessary;

Communications

• Oversee communications to ensure execution of AAH-I’s Communications Strategy
• Work in close liaison with others to identify, develop and communicate the impact of AAH-I’s work and aggressively market the organisation to potential funders and partners.
• Ensures and maintains the quality of Communications programmes and activities delivered.

Expected Results

• Corporate BD targets delivered.
• Progress in implementation of the corporate BD strategy and sustainability strategy (and therefore contribution to the corporate strategic plan).
• Annual and quarterly operational plans for BD developed, updated and followed.
• Any other relevant duties that may be assigned by the Programme Director.

Qualifications for Business Development Job

• A Master’s degree or equivalent in a relevant subject (International Development Project Management etc.)
• Proven track record of leadership, with at least 10 years’ progressive senior management experience including managing cross-cultural teams across countries.
• Experience in developing new areas or programmes desirable.
• Proven track record in resource mobilisation, in particular of large projects and grants, including production of proposals and tenders (technical and commercial)
• Proven track record of management of winning bids in the for-profit and not-for-profit sectors
• Proven track record of successfully identifying, developing and managing strategic partnerships
• Understanding of the global development architecture and key players (donors, INGOs, consulting companies and investment funds)
• Commitment to promote AAH-I’s Vision, Mission and its strategic goals
• Excellent interpersonal skills with demonstrated ability to manage proposal processes and team relationships to ensure effective collaboration by various contributors to the process
• Entrepreneurial orientation, self-starter able to work independently and cope with demanding work situations in complex setting.

Skills and Competence:

• Strong management and supervisory skills and experience.
• Demonstrated leadership ability in strategising and coalition building.
• Demonstrated effectiveness and lead experience in Country and fund development.
• Strong analytical (both political and organisational) skills with good attention to detail.
• Ability to provide coaching, mentoring and leadership to team members.
• Commitment to and understanding of AAH-I’s values.