Humanitarian Awards Manager at Save The Children

Job Description

• The Humanitarian Awards Manager will provide the primary awards management inputs in the Save the Children emergency response programme working closely with the humanitarian team in North East Nigeria.
• The role has three main aspects to it: setting up and leading the emergency awards management teams; provide the Response Team Leadership with funding landscape oversight; and contribute and lead on Awards Management in emergencies best practise and ensure capacity building of awards and non-awards staff in their professional development.
• The individual will be responsible for working within an existing CO structure/ response team and all other teams in the Country Office/Response Team to develop the capacity of all staff and provide on-the-job support to develop an awards management process in emergency that supports Save the Children quality standards.

Key Areas of Accountability
Developing self and others; Networking:

• Building a high performing emergency award management team to support good practice and high quality delivery across the response
• Lead/Support Award Management related capacity building both within the AM team and for other relevant staff members including budget holders working on the response
• Develop strong relationships with the region, centre, members and other Award Directors in the region; escalate issues through the correct channels when required
• Anticipate Award Management staffing surge capacity requirement at first onset, reporting periods and roll down and ensure that adequate staffing level is maintain throughout and that hand-over are planned and documented.

Communicating with impact:

• Provide strategic support to the Response Team Leader on all aspects of award management including pipeline management through the creation and maintenance of the funding tracker
• Lead the coordination of proposals, working with PDQ, Finance and Operations to produce high quality, fully costed proposals whether those team are part of existing CO or have response counterpart
• Maintain effective communications with Save the Children Members, providing them with timely updates on their awards and flagging potential issue promptly
• Ensure the production of high quality and timely reports that accurately reflect the impact achieved and lessons learnt during the implementation of an award
• Build and maintain relationships with relevant networks and award management staff of similar organisations in the country, as well as local representatives of donor organisations

Compliance (systems, processes & donor):

• Ensure all funding opportunities are coordinated, appropriate go/no-go decisions taken, and proposal development plans agreed.
• Be a champion of awards management in emergencies by applying relevant waivers and tools for emergency response
• To ensure that the Award Management System (AMS) is effectively maintained and up to date for all response awards and sub-awards including authorisation and document retention
• To ensure that key staff (including partners) have a clear understanding of donor compliance requirements in a rapid but controlled fashion throughout the project management cycle and that there is a complete audit trail of the implementation and reporting for all awards
• Work with relevant program staff to ensure all implementing partners for the response operations undergo legal vetting prior to commencing work with Save the Children, are engaged with appropriate agreements and effective monitoring systems are in place so that partner delivery meets donor expectations and requirements.
• In rapid onset emergencies, work with program staff to ensure capacity assessments and induction into Save the Children policies are undertaken for all new partners, and any actions needed as a result of this are taken within an appropriate timescale

Monitoring and analysis:

• Working in collaboration with the Finance Director/response finance lead and SMT, ensure the CO has a clear framework for response master budget development, cost allocation, monitoring of award budgets, phasing and forecasting, ensuring alignment between the response master budget and funding tracker.
• Using strong financial analysis skills to oversee the award portfolio and pipeline
• To work in collaboration with the finance department and provide technical advice regarding strategic donor costs allocations with a view to minimise compliance issues where possible

Leadership, portfolio management & strategy:

• Define the strategic direction of the response portfolio through the development of Proposal budget and reporting guidelines in the first phase of the response
• Work with Response SMT to map seed and other source of unrestricted funding across the membership to activate emergency flexible funding in early stages of the response
• Coordinate with existing CO AM team in order to build new donor relationship identified for the response
• Work with the existing CO AM team to align existing portfolio with response need according to the response scope and scale.
• To provide detailed analysis of current/ pipeline awards to senior management

Experience and Skills
Essential:

• Experience with award management policies, procedures and systems and Save the Children's award management system (AMS)
• 7-9 years working experience in relevant field, at least 5 of which should be in grant management with non-profit sector
• Previous experience in Awards management in a Humanitarian context
• Excellent planning, management and coordination skills, with the ability to organise a demanding workload comprised of diverse and challenging tasks and responsibilities
• Proven track record of active contribution to a senior management team, and providing strategic support across multiple sectors and/or regions
• Extensive experience with NGOs with increasing responsibilities including a proven experience of establishing and running the award management function in the field
• Knowledge of the requirements of major humanitarian institutional donors (ECHO, DEC, OFDA, DFID..) including budgeting, eligibility issues, compliance management, and reporting; experience of engaging with donors at a strategic level
• Well-developed skills in team/staff management.  Proven coaching and capacity building skills
• Understanding of the financial aspects of award management, and understanding of operations and programming
• Very strong attention to detail, problem solving skills, and ability to analyse trends
• Computer literate (i.e. Word, Excel, Outlook, Internet Explorer, financial systems)
• Cultural awareness and ability to build relationships quickly with a wide variety of people
• Patient, adaptable, able to improvise, and communicate clearly and effectively under pressure
• Strong communication (written and spoken) in English, and strong interpersonal skills, with experience in managing multicultural teams

Desirable:

• Understanding of financial reporting from Save the Children's accounting software  (Agresso)
• Experience of Project Management, M&E Management or Funding Coordination