Women Economic Empowerment (WEE) Advisor - Mafita at Adam Smith International

Tracking Code: 1083-112
Location: Kano, Nigeria
Department: Private Sector Development
Position Type: Full-Time/Regular

Programme Background
Mafita is a large-scale, six-year youth employment programme operating in Nigeria’s northern states, funded by DFID and implemented by Adam Smith International. Through a combination of innovative skills development and job creation interventions, Mafita will support over 60,000 marginalised young people to find employment or become entrepreneurs by 2021.

Within the above scope, Mafita is mandated to support the economic empowerment of Northern Nigerian women, whose economic disenfranchisement has direct and adverse impacts on the country’s economic prosperity and development at the national, regional and community levels. Through its work, Mafita seeks to support women to access economic resources both directly by supporting women’s entrepreneurship, employment and access to finance, and indirectly by creating a more enabling environment for women.

Position Overview
The WEE Advocacy Advisor is expected to lead the design, development and implementation of macro-level initiatives that strengthen the visibility, impact and sustainability of technical activities in the field. Specifically, the WEE Advisor is expected to:

• Build awareness among national stakeholders of the impact of diversity in national economies and build support for diversity efforts at different levels of the economy. The WEE Advocacy Advisor will give visibility to Mafitas work with women to raise gender awareness and capacity among MSMEs.  The WEE Advisor will also communicate to stakeholders and partners the need for such efforts to facilitate women’s meaningful economic participation and empowerment, to build sustainable businesses and enhance economic performance at different levels of the economy.
• Facilitate women’s financial inclusion. The WEE Advisor will build partnerships with formal financing institutions to identify and design mechanisms that create new possibilities for delivering micro-finance to the MSME sector, especially for women. These mechanisms will likewise establish new pathways from informal to formal financing for women operating in the MSE sector, and upgrade the capacity of informal saving and lending groups to enhance member’s creditworthiness and credit history.
• The WEE Advisor will also explore opportunities for value chain financing in the sectors where Mafita targets women-owned business.
• The WEE Advisor will lead key initiatives that will achieve or support:
• Women’s access to productive economic resources, such as assets, wage or self-employment or other income, or financial assets such as savings and credit.
• New services that that contribute to the economic and social empowerment of women.

Major Tasks
The Advocacy Advisor’s main tasks and responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

• Networking and relationship-building with national stakeholders engaged in Mafitas activity areas.
• Support, in collaboration with Mafita staff and external consultants, the development, design and implementation of marketing campaign for women-owned businesses in non-traditional sectors.
• Design activities that will build awareness among stakeholders at the national level of the impact of diversity in national economies and build support for diversity efforts at different levels of the economy.
• Identify and map potential partners in financial sector willing to explore unconsidered opportunities to support women’s transition from informal to formal saving, lending and credit.
• Identify the opportunities and requirements necessary to sustainably link formal financial institutions and informal/quasi-formal financial groups.
• Evaluation and technical supervision of grants.
• Ensure that appropriate practices, are adhered to in relation to WEE, and provide guidance and leadership on compliance with WEE principles.
• Support the capacity building of Mafita team members in gender and WEE capabilities.

Required Skills:

• Fluency in spoken English and Hausa
• Exceptional writing skills in English and Hausa
• A PhD or Master’s degree required in the Social Sciences and/or a field related to Mafita's core technical work.
• Able to articulate the challenge and opportunity of diversity in Northern Nigeria´s economy.
• Robust interpersonal, negotiation and persuasion skills that facilitate collaborative, effective working relationships with potential partners in the three areas of activity described in the job description above.

Required Experience

• Experience in advocacy, with demonstrated results; experience with successful advocacy related to gender equality and/or women’s empowerment will be preferred.
• Prior experience in designing and implementing gender equality/women’s economic empowerment programs or activities, including those that have resulted in a change to social attitudes and/or power relations at the household, community, regional or national level.
• Strong knowledge of approaches to women’s empowerment and gender equality.
• Deep understanding of complex and inter-related challenges to Northern Nigeria women’s economic participation.
• Experience in event design and planning.
• Experience in design and delivery of training, especially related to business or gender.
• Strong writing and oral presentation skills.
• Extensive work experience with DFID, Adam Smith International would be a benefit.