Child Safeguarding Advisor at Save The Children

The Child Safeguarding Advisor will report to the Director, Programmes Delivery and Quality and work with all the thematic area managers to address the Child Safeguarding issues that affect areas of operation. The Advisor’s role will be that of a resource person and will be providing added assistance in addressing OVC issues across all programmes and promote the concept of “Child Safe Organizations”.

• Develop the Nigeria Programme’s capacity to respond to allegations of policy violations, including the development of a pool of mentors and investigators across the programme, including senior management
• Lead on the implementation of the Child Protection Policy /Code of Conduct (Safeguarding) action plans as identified in the Self Assessment and Internal Audit processes in Nigeria
• Update and institutionalize a database; monitor and analyze data on incidence, to identify trends and impact of our prevention strategy;
• Maintain, update and disseminate orientation and training materials;
• Revise existing drafts and further develop tools to support a mapping of risks of abuse and exploitation within country programs, and advise and support the development of service delivery, HR and monitoring to minimize these risks;
• Work with HR to strengthen the recruitment processes in terms of safeguarding communities and colleagues from potential abusers/exploiters.
• Work with the HR to facilitate Child Protection orientation for all new staff and refresher training for existing staff to help minimize the risks of abuse and exploitation of children.
• Support HR, with input from programme and support service teams, to identify and implement a training strategy that will enable all staff to utilize the Code of Conduct, Child Protection principles, and knowledge and best practice in the development of their programme work.
• Build the capacity of programme thematic teams to work with different stakeholders, in particular, children’s clubs/networks and civil society to develop key success indicators to ‘safeguard children’, which will be used in monitoring and evaluation.
• Work with human resource department to developing tools to evaluate the impact of the Safeguarding’ children and code of conduct induction and in-service re-fresher trainings for staff, partners and key stakeholders, including beneficiaries.
• Ensure compliance and minimum standards are met in ‘Safe Guarding’ Children and take the lead in ensuring an annual CPP audit is carried out and recommendations/action implemented.
• With input from legal counsel (where appropriate), develop standard protocols and contractual clauses for partners and sub-contractors.
• Promote best practice, resource and expertise exchange where appropriate across country boundaries
• Support Social Welfare and Protection programme to refine risk assessment tools and build capacity of thematic programme and support service teams to carry out risk assessment in relation to safeguarding children.
• Represent the agency at inter agency forums in Nigeria, regionally and internationally this will include building networks within Nigeria.

Administrative & General Skills

Essential

• Degree level qualification in social work or equivalent health, education or other relevant professional qualification and working experience
• Significant direct experience of child protection practice and the Convention on the Rights of the Child
• Up to date working knowledge of child care law, child protection policies and practice and current issues in relation to safeguarding children within the West African context

Desirable

• Planning, delivering and evaluating training
• Organizing and managing a complex and demanding workload and working on own initiative
• Influencing practice and policy, including communicating effectively and persuasively at all levels, and in different situations, both verbally and in writing, at individual and group level
• Facilitating learning, development and change for individuals and/or groups/organizations
• Developing, sustaining and referring to external and internal professional networks
• Preparing written reports or materials to a publishable standard in the English language
• Valuing and respecting the contribution of others working effectively with diversity and challenging discrimination
• Coordination skills, especially in relation to cross-departmental working and external networks
• Work and travel in challenging environments
• The right to work within the country where the post is to be based
• The ability to converse fluently in French would be an advantage