Programme Development Funding Manager at VSO

Purpose of Role

• To lead donor engagement and proposal development in line with VSO Nigeria strategy, including the development of partnerships and consortium, writing narrative proposals and developing project budgets.

Responsibilities
Funding strategy:

• Ensuring funding strategy aligns to signature packages; work with country office and programme funding manager to ensure funding plans reflect programme strategy and appropriate national and regional donor mapping is up to date
• Support Country Office to respond to funding opportunities from institutional donors, trusts & foundations, the corporate sector and major donors (directly and/or through coordinated support from global funding and programme teams);
• Advise on, and support the development of, consortia with other I/NGOs to ensure VSO is well positioned for upcoming funding opportunities

Donor and partner engagement:

• Support local engagement with partners and donors – advising the country team on appropriate and prioritized engagement strategies; participate in local INGO forums, thematic groups etc,
• Gather donor intelligence from partner and donor meetings to feed into country and regional planning
• Where necessary, provide presentation materials (e.g. signature packages, concept notes, briefings) for country office staff to use for donor / partner meetings

Programme Development:

• Support the collation of evidence based Country Office programme design through the creation of programme strategy documents (including signature packages)
• Ensure programme design is informed by and aligns with donor trends and national development priorities - identify additional relevant development interventions, including advocacy, and cross cutting themes as appropriate
• Support the local contextualisation of VSO's global flagship frameworks

Proposal development and proposal writing, Bid:

• Evaluate bids against country / programme strategy to support their go / no go decisions
• Write proposals and concept notes as required
• Participate as member of bid team including as: proposal lead, reviewer, content provider; facilitate proposal development workshops as needed

Contract management and grant monitoring:

• For secured contracts, facilitate grant start up; support programme team to design and implement appropriate monitoring & evaluation systems
• Monitor spend rates and delivery toward agreed upon targets; write reports for donors, provide ongoing local donor / partner engagement during implementation,

Other requirements:

• Support capacity building and training of country office team and local partners on proposal development and help conduct trainings to continually build capacity and promote effective and efficient processes
• Share learning, knowledge and tools with larger organisation to advance good practice and innovation

Key Performance Indicators
The country office meets or exceeds its income targets:

• Amount of proposals submitted and the value of those applications
• Success rate of applications

The country office's donor base is deepened and diversified:

• Donor engagement strategies development and pursued in country
• Partnerships with consortia partners agreed (teaming agreements and MOUs signed)

CO capacity is developed through the process of articulating signature packages and preparing funding proposals in a participatory manner with emphasis on learning by doing:

• Evaluation feedback from CO and wider VSO team is positive
• Quality of documents and tools leads to replication and adaptation within VSO and beyond

Programmes are well designed and prepared in advance:

• Signature packages are completed for country office
• Flagship frameworks are locally contextualised
• Information about CO fundraising priorities are shared with Donor Managers across VSO in market place

Competencies
Working together: Strength:

• Successfully leads proposals teams and participates as a reliable and positive team-member in all working relationships

Communicating & influencing: Strength:

• Inspires others by: advocating plans and ideas within and outside VSO;

Managing Knowledge: Strength:

• Leads initiatives that improve knowledge management; develops others' knowledge management skills

Striving for excellence: Strength:

• Contributes ideas to improve processes, policies and approaches; is a role model for continuous learning and improvement.

Managing Resources: Adds Value:

• Organizes own and others' work to meet objectives; clarifies accountability of roles; seeks ways to generate and save money.

Managing People: Aware

• Requests and follows up on appropriate support from others; raises concerns about uncooperative colleagues in an appropriate way.

Developing People: Adds Value:

• Offers constructive advice to others and provides ongoing coaching throughout the proposal development process

Leading for the Future: Adds Value:

• Builds confidence and excitement in VSO's work and vision, both internally and externally; suggests innovative projects.

Thinking Strategically: Adds value:

• Advances strategic project

Delivering Results: Strength:

• Adopts a goal-oriented, problem-solving team mentality and ensures timely, high quality results.

Skills/Experience Required

• Extensive experience in multi-sector programme design in several countries
• Experience with participatory research, evaluation and consultations as used in workshop facilitation and situational analysis
• Proven track record in writing winning donor proposals for donors including USAID, EC, UKAID, SIDA and UN Agencies - including proven ability to develop log frames, monitoring frameworks, and theories of change
• Experience of preparing compelling, high quality documentation (concept notes, presentations, proposals, budgets, reports, etc) for different partner and donor audiences
• Strong interpersonal skills, including written, verbal and presentation skills used in international settings - experience of leading and facilitating workshops and training
• Ability to be self-directed and take initiative within organisational mandates - sound judgement and strong administrative and organisational skills
• Experience of establishing partnerships between organisations including teaming agreement and consortia bid development

Qualifications required

• Educated to degree level in an International Development-related discipline preferred
• IT skills including fluency in Microsoft office suite and database usage
• Experience of living and working internationally (4+ years required)