Project Director, YouLEAD at Save The Children

Child Safeguarding

• Level 3:  the post holder will have contact with children and/or young people either frequently (e.g. once a week or more) or intensively (e.g. four days in one month or more or overnight) because they work country programs.

Role Purpose

• Save the Children seeks a Project Director for an anticipated, five-year USAID-funded project that will increase voluntary uptake and continued use of family planning (FP) services among poor, unmarried adolescents aged 15-19 in selected urban areas of Nigeria.
• The project will use a holistic, multi-sectoral approach that moves beyond traditional, facility-based service delivery, is rooted in youth engagement, and takes into account the unique susceptibilities vulnerable urban adolescents face, such as familial and interpersonal violence, poverty, substance abuse, limited educational and economic opportunities.
• The Project Director is a senior leadership position. S/he will provide overall technical direction and oversee project implementation, leading a diverse team of experts and consortium partners to design, implement, monitor, and advance learning around evidence-based activities and approaches. Nigerian candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.
• This position is contingent upon donor approval and funding.

Key Areas of Accountability:

• Provides technical leadership and direction to design, implement, update, and/or scale evidence-based approaches and activities to increase uptake and sustained use of FP services among adolescents in selected urban areas of Nigeria, ensuring that approaches are evidence-based, context-appropriate and reflect global best practices;
• Oversees program implementation, including by developing annual and quarterly work plans and budgets and ensuring activities are completed on time and within cost, making proactive adjustments as needed to ensure continued successful implementation;
• Leads the project’s Technical Advisory Group;
• Supports the development of strong monitoring and evaluation and learning systems, processes, and tools that enable assessment and understanding of program impact, facilitate adaptive management, and contribute to knowledge sharing;
• Supervises and monitors the work of project staff and performance of consortium partners, providing the support necessary to achieve results and creating an environment of mutual respect where the project team strives to achieve excellence;
• Serves as Save the Children’s primary point of contact with USAID and in-country stakeholders, such as within relevant Nigerian ministries, departments, and agencies, developing and maintaining a close, collaborative relationship;
• Ensures quality and timely completion of programmatic deliverables and reports in alignment with donor guidelines;
• Establishes and applies systems that ensure compliance with USAID’s rules and regulations and Save the Children’s policies and Code of Conduct.  

Behaviours (Values in Practice)
Accountability:

• Holds self-accountable for making decisions, managing resources efficiently, achieving and role modelling Save the Children values
• Holds the team and partners accountable to deliver on their responsibilities - giving them the freedom to deliver in the best way they see fit, providing the necessary development to improve performance and applying appropriate consequences when results are not achieved.

Ambition:

• Sets ambitious and challenging goals for themselves and their team, takes responsibility for their own personal development and encourages their team to do the same
• Widely shares their personal vision for Save the Children, engages and motivates others
• Future orientated, thinks strategically and on a global scale.

Collaboration:

• Builds and maintains effective relationships, with their team, colleagues, Members and external partners and supporters
• Values diversity, sees it as a source of competitive strength
• Approachable, good listener, easy to talk to.

Creativity:

• Develops and encourages new and innovative solutions
• Willing to take disciplined risks.

Integrity:

• Honest, encourages openness and transparency; demonstrates highest levels of integrity

Additional job responsibilities:

• The duties and responsibilities as set out above are not exhaustive and the role holder may be required to carry out additional duties within reasonableness of their level of skills and experience.

Equal Opportunities:

• The role holder is required to carry out the duties in accordance with the SCI Equal Opportunities and Diversity policies and procedures.

Child Safeguarding:

• We need to keep children safe so our selection process, which includes rigorous background checks, reflects our commitment to the protection of children from abuse.

Safeguarding our Staff:

• The post holder is required to carry out the duties in accordance with the SCI anti-harassment policy

Health and Safety:

• The role holder is required to carry out the duties in accordance with SCI Health and Safety policies and procedures.

Qualifications, Experience and Skills

• Clinical background in Medicine or Nursing or Masters-level Degree in Public Health;
• A minimum of 10 years of experience designing and implementing adolescent health and FP programming designed to increase access, quality, and use of services, including at least seven years in a senior leadership role;
• Prior experience as a Chief of Party, Deputy Chief of Party, or Project Director on USAID-funded programs with budgets of at least $5M
• Demonstrated experience applying formative research, human-centred design and/or social network analysis methodologies;
• Familiarity with the state-of-the-art in adolescent sexual and reproductive health;
• Demonstrated experience successfully managing relationships with diverse stakeholders, including host country government and private sector; and donor representatives; international implementers; and NGOs, FBOs, and CBOs;
• Strong organizational and interpersonal skills, with a proven track record leading and inspiring a diverse team of technical and administrative professionals to achieve results;
• Flexible, innovative, creative, adaptable, and open to new ideas, comfortable with change and uncertainty;
• Prior experience working on family planning in Nigeria and familiarity with the political, social, and cultural context;
• Professional fluency in English with strong oral and written communication skills; professional fluency in at least one local language a benefit.