Senior Internal Auditor for Africa at Christian Aid

Type of contract: Fixed Term
Contracted hours: 40
Contract length: 2 years
Report to: Internal Audit Manager
Competency level: 3

Role Purpose

• This role will report directly to the Internal Audit Manager for Africa. The role will be part of the global internal audit team, but its main focus will be to deliver a schedule of internal audits in the Africa region covering both whole country programmes and individual donor grants.
• The role will also provide investigation resource for fraud and misuse on an ad hoc basis, reporting on this to the Senior Compliance and Investigations Manager, Fraud and Financial Crime.
• This is a high-profile role that requires significant communication, negotiation, influencing, process and controls skills to assist organisational understanding of and management of risk. It is also required to test compliance to CA’s key controls. The role holder will be required to work on assignments autonomously or as part of a team.
• The role will involve interfacing with relevant audit stakeholders, scoping of audit work, testing of systems and processes and providing timely reporting on the results of the audit to management. The role holder will be proactive and support the capacity building of teams in Africa, working closely with the Internal Audit Manager, and help to embed a strong culture of compliance to ensure excellence in systems and processes.
• The role will also support other audits/ audit initiatives as determined by the corporate internal audit plan.

Key Outcomes:

• Deliver a schedule of agreed audits to time and quality. Audit reports are accurate, timely, well-reasoned, documented & communicated and effective management actions agreed and followed up within agreed timescales and budget
• Support the ongoing development of the Risk and Control Self-Assessment tool and validation of results within the Africa region
• Strong compliance culture is embedded in Africa region along with effective risk management
• Internal audit is a visible and respected resource within the region
• Investigations are carried out sensitively and effectively supporting Christian Aid’s zero tolerance to fraud and misuse.

Role Agility:

• Expected travel per annum: Over 75 days
• On call/unsocial hours No
• Surge capacity for emergency responses No

Note

• In order to respond to ever changing demands within the environment, Christian Aid operates within an agile framework (both in workforce and operational) that requires from all employees, a high level of responsiveness and adaptiveness to processes and structures making flexibility and a project based working approach the norm. To sustain this system, managers may agree further details of specific tasks and duties as part of the performance agreement. Any reasonable duty may be assigned that is consistent with the nature of the job and its level of responsibility, and employees may be required to change the focus of their role from time to time.

Role Context:

• It reports to the Internal Audit Manager for Africa and works very closely with other audit colleagues to ensure internal audit and risk management processes within Christian Aid are robust and fit for purpose and that fraud and misuse investigations are performed within required timeframes and to high quality.
• It supports colleagues in Africa and globally by advising on control effectiveness, including risk management and internal control self-assessment processes and post audit requirements. It helps embed an understanding of risk and control processes and provides guidance and capacity building support to teams as appropriate on relevant areas of policy implementation and best practice.
• The role is based in Africa.
• The location of the role within Africa is flexible but there must be a country programme in which the role holder will sit.
• The role holder will be flexible to responding to changing audit needs of country offices whilst remaining focussed on overall delivery of the audit plan.
• The role holder must be willing to travel extensively and at short notice to other locations, primarily in the Africa region.

Role Requirements
Relationships:

• External Donors, Partners, External Auditors, other NGOs
• Internal The role holder must be able to interface effectively with a variety of stakeholders across the organisation. It must be capable of building strong relationships whilst at the same time providing accurate, timely and objective feedback to support control improvement. The role is expected to lead on audit assignments with minimal supervision. The role holder reports to the Internal Audit Manager but will have a strong relationship with the Senior Compliance and Investigations Manager, Fraud and Financial Crime.

Decision Making:

• Budgetary/savings responsibility The post holder will ensure that audit work is performed to time, quality and budget. The role will work efficiently maximising opportunities to perform audit assurance work remotely where it makes sense to do this and thereby making the most effective use of time and resources when in the field. The role holder will be cognisant and support the effective delivery of other assurance mechanisms to reduce the risk of duplication of effort.
• The role holder will have regular dialogue with the Internal Audit Manager for Africa to ensure that any issues with the internal audit work are appropriately addressed. In practice the expectation will be that the role holder will have well founded proposals and will know when it would be appropriate to seek further guidance and support.

Analytical Skills:

• The role is required to assimilate complex information and recommend appropriate courses of action that are proportionate to the risk. It will have the ability to see the big picture whilst also paying attention to the detail. It will be able to prioritise work to achieve the greatest outcome. It will have a good understanding of donor rules and their effective application. It will be an experienced internal auditor and investigator.

Overall People Management Responsibility:

• Cross organisational engagement with relevant auditees, agreeing audit scope and feeding back on the results of the audit work. Influencing and embedding high standards of internal control.
• The role is expected to be able to work autonomously and innovatively whilst ensuring appropriate consultation with key stakeholders both inside and outside of the internal audit function.

Role Related Checks:

• Child protection clearance Not required Counter terrorism screening Required.

Code of Conduct:

• Christian Aid requires all employees to abide by its code of conduct and safeguarding policy.

Person Specification
Applied skills/knowledge and expertise:

Essential:

• Qualified accountant with CIMA, ACCA, ACA
• Good understanding of risk management and internal control procedures and how these should be applied within core business processes
• In house internal auditing experience at a senior auditor level within the INGO sector – scope development, design of audit testing, feedback and reporting within the sector.
• Experience of leading fraud investigations, including experience carrying out interviews and preparing investigation reports for use in disciplinary or similar proceedings
• Experience of auditing donor compliance
• Strong record of working autonomously and delivering results.

Desirable:

• An understating of humanitarian issues and standards, including codes of conduct and accountability principles
• Holds a relevant counter-fraud qualification (e.g. ACFS, CFE, PIP2) or has substantial relevant professional experience
• Forensic audit experience
• Advanced Excel skills
• Working knowledge of French.

Digital/IT competencies required:

• Intermediate:
  • Word, Excel, PowerPoint
  • Web content design & development
• Basic:
  • Internet based collaboration tools and video calling
  • Social Media

Remuneration
Salary (full time): N13,131,134 - N14,992,536 per annum.