Monitoring & Reporting Assistant at North East Regional Initiative (NERI)

POSITION SUMMARY

The Monitoring and Reporting Assistant (MRA) proactively contributes to telling the story of the NLCB program through daily, short-term and long-term coverage of activities. S/he gathers, analyzes, and processes complex information related to all aspects of program activity implementation and impact to produce compelling investigative stories. Through qualitative and quantitative data collection techniques including interviews with beneficiaries, local officials and other stakeholders, the MRA helps the team learn how its activities contribute to the overall program goal. This position will be based at Borno, with extensive travel to project sites and the head office in Abuja. 

REPORTING & SUPERVISION

The Monitoring and Reporting Assistant reports to the Monitoring & Evaluation Officer (MEO). 

PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITIES

Primary responsibilities include but are not limited to the following:

• Coordinate weekly with M&E Officer to determine priority tasks.
• Conduct site visits during the project implementation phase for each grant in assigned areas.
• Collect in a timely manner information on persons or communities impacted by the program’s activities or on the latest political or security development in target area.
• Draft concise, high-quality reports, articles or summaries on a daily or ad-hoc basis on activity progress or outcome. Monitoring & Reporting Assistant should be able to identify by him/herself information and stories of relevance to the program.
• Develop and maintain a strong network of contacts in target communities.
• In concert with the M&E Officer, develop Monitoring and Evaluation plans for field-level projects.
• Produce a “routine monitoring report” (RMR) according to an approved template for each site visit prior to the indicator verification visit.
• Accurately interpret Bills of Quantities (BoQ) and grant database file shared by head office to determine indicators according which the Officer will be evaluating projects.
• Contribute to drafting “final evaluation reports” (FER) for each activity based on prescribed format after visiting a grant site for verification of indicators.
• Identify lessons learned, constraints, and project impacts based on determined theme and/or sector for inclusion in FERs.
• Share observations from monitoring visits with M&E Officer when findings demonstrate questionable actions.
• Serve as primary point of contact for Grants Office when developing impact assessments, success stories and weekly reporting.
• Serve as primary point of contact for Grants Office when additional information is needed to close grants.
• Participate in professional training and development activities, as necessary.
• Represent the program positively and professionally in both internal and external environments.
• Perform other tasks, as assigned.

 Required Skills & Qualifications:

• BA/BSc in international development, journalism, English, communications, social science, economics, or related field is required.
• One year of relevant experience in field monitoring, journalism, evaluation design, and/or information management is required.

• Strong editing skills, including both line and copy editing, as well as being able to discern broader subject-matter problems.
• Proven writing and editing skills in English with an ability to convey complex ideas in a clear, direct and lively style is required.
• Attention to detail and ability to follow up on tasks to completion is required.
• Excellent reporting and research skills and experience writing for the Web preferred;
• Strong analytical skills are required.
• Knowledge of social media and multimedia technologies desired.
• Prior experience with USAID or US Government funded projects is highly desirable.
• Experience of working in a conflict environment is a plus.
• Fluency in one or more of the local state languages in the North Eastern part of Nigeria is required.