Regional Emergency Manager West Africa at Christian Aid

Type of contract: Fixed Term
Contracted hours: 35
Contract length: 2 years

Role Purpose

• The Regional Emergency Manager leads the humanitarian work in their region and ensures coherence and integration into country strategies. 
• They play a leading role in the region they are based in to improve the capacity of partners and Christian Aid country teams to prepare for, mitigate against the impact of and respond to emergencies. 
• They will lead emergency responses in their region alongside relevant regional or country based staff. 
• They will play a key role in coordinating disaster risk reduction and resilience work in their region.
• They will work closely with the Regional and Country staff and the Humanitarian Division staff in developing and  implementing agreed emergency response and mitigation strategies. 
• They will support partners to enable them to implement rapid, effective and principled responses to emergencies. 
• They will be responsible for developing best practice in emergency preparedness and response and ensure internationally agreed standards are met. 
• They will work to promote the voices of partners and local communities to ensure that they are heard and acted upon in new emergencies.

Role Context 

• The role is based in Humanitarian Division but will also play a leading role in the Africa Division as part of the International Programme role family.
• The post can be based in Nigeria, Ouagadougou. 
• They will have specific responsibility for leading humanitarian work in all countries in west Africa primarily where there is a Christian Aid country programme currently Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Ghana, Senegal, Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger. 
• They need to maintain a watching brief on other countries in the region and be ready to respond should the need arise.
• The post holder will be working in difficult conditions. Whilst the role will require the ability to respond to rapid onset emergencies most of the work will focus on slow onset crises, building resilience and reducing risks relating to climate change and other hazards. 
• National and international travel will be required. 
• This could mean spending up to 6 months away from home per year with assignments of up to 3 months away at any one time, departing at short notice. 
• Usually assignments are for between 2 and 6 weeks, and the time spent away from home is less.

Key Outcomes

• Responses to emergencies and associated programmes successfully lead within the region and effective representation of Christian Aid exists at a high level during emergencies and on resilience and disaster risk reduction issues.
• Country, regional or Pan-Africa managers influenced to ensure coherence between humanitarian and development programmes in line with corporate strategies.  Effective capacity building in place for staff and partners on emergency response, resilience and disaster risk reduction strategies and implementation.
• Robust humanitarian practice and minimum standards in disaster response reflected in policies and procedures and successfully implemented.
• Positive Christian Aid reputation and strong links in place with ecumenical organisations and other partners and organisations based on high quality and principled programmes.
• Enhanced funding for humanitarian activity achieved through successful relationship building with partners and institutional donors 
• Emergency staff performing to high standards and meeting objectives as a result of effective recruitment, support and development.

Role Requirements
Relationships:

• External:
  • Works with donors including the START, DEC, ECHO & DFID. 
  • The post holder will represent Christian Aid in regional humanitarian forums and will thus need to build good relationships with government, other NGOs, the UN and other humanitarian actors in the region. 
  • Build and maintain strong relationship with ACT Alliance members in the region.
  • To deputise for other humanitarian division staff when necessary potentially outside their region.
  • Rotational member of the African Division management group (DMG).
• Internal:
  • Line managed by the Head of Humanitarian Programme, Africa. 
  • Direct reports are variable but could include emergency programme staff and Resilience and/or Emergency staff, particularly during the implementation of the Ebola appeal and the DFID funded humanitarian PPA.
  • Overall staff under control possibly none but up to 4 according to emergency.
  • Works with country and continental representatives. Works with Humanitarian Division.

Decision Making:

• Takes decisions to ensure response to emergency and associated programmes are led and managed effectively.
• Decisions are made to manage a team from recruitment to managing or matrix managing staff so that they can effectively implement humanitarian or resilience/risk reduction programmes.
• They will often be working in isolation and will need to make decisions without reference to others which may have significant impact on Christian Aids humanitarian work in the region. 
• They will need to make recommendations to partners and command their respect. 
• They represent Christian Aid in national and international humanitarian fora and will need to make decisions accordingly.

Analytical skills:

• Works on complex specialist/ technical issues. 
• Problems and issue, risks and benefits may have implications across a number of departments.
• Required to develop new ways of doing things to better meet directorate goals requiring substantial creative or analytical ability.

Developing Self and Others:

• Has direct responsibility for developing, coaching and motivating a team or teams of colleagues/project team members.
• Focus will be on advising and guiding senior management on policy issues/high level procedures and direct line management responsibility may be limited.

Person Specification
Applied Skills/Knowledge and Expertise:

Essential :

• Degree or equivalent is essential.
• Relevant post graduate degree in Development or related subject desirable
• Knowledge of emergency relief, rehabilitation and development issues :
  • Of capacity building tools and techniques 
  • Of Sphere and Red Cross Code of Conduct, Humanitarian Accountability Partnership and other humanitarian standards 
  • HIV/AIDS, gender and the livelihoods approach in relief and recovery 
  • Of the role of churches and ecumenical organisations in relief and development 
• Fluent spoken and written French and English 
• Knowledge of global development, including policy and advocacy issues and familiarity with emergency problems relevant to west Africa
• Working and preferably managing emergency, resilience/risk reduction or development programmes in at least five different contexts, of which at least three were managing programmes 
• Successful project proposal preparation and subsequent funding from a donor 
• Management of large and complex budgets
• Project/programme management 
• Working with and developing partner capacity 
• Public speaking and/or working with the media 
• Managing staff, including at a distance 
• Ability to work on own without requiring much support or supervision 
• Ability to be a good team player and in building relationships across cultures and at all levels 
• Ability to communicate with a wide range of audiences
• Ability to work as part of broad networks 

Desirable: 

• Of the political, social and economic context of the region and the humanitarian and development issues and challenges it faces
• Experience of advocacy on humanitarian, development or related issues 

IT competency Required :

• Intermediate

Eligibility:

• This role requires applicants to have the right to work in the country where this position will be based.

Competency Profile

• LEVEL 3: You are expected to be able to: 

Build Partnerships :

• Supportively manage teams or lead on projects, involving others in discussing how to take work forwards, helping people feel part of the team and treating everyone equally.
• Influence others to develop shared understanding and work cooperatively and collaboratively towards common goals where there are different personal or organizational agendas.
• Develop and maintain new relationships with individuals and organizations to further Christian Aid’s aims.  
• Recognize and value differences in people; be ready to challenge assumptions, beliefs or attitudes in self or others.
• Manage expectations and adhere to what’s agreed, by doing what you say you’re going to do. 

Communicate Effectively:

• Reflect the needs of different audiences, adapting style, media, timing and pace to communicate most effectively. 
• Show an understanding of how personal and external factors impact on others’ communication style and needs and seek to manage these differences to ensure that all voices are heard.
• Clarify expectations and anticipate interests and potential issues of others, in order to help them get involved in debate and dialogue. 

Steward Resources:

• Accept accountability internally and externally for the effective use of Christian Aid resources. 
• Look for ways to achieve more effective outcomes by using existing resources in a new or different way, before using or commissioning new resources.
• Ensure results of self and others are achieved to quality and time by managing allocated resources and workloads. 

Deliver Results:

• Create plans with key milestones and measurable outcomes: track progress and adjust to meet the objectives, ensuring others are aware of changes and reasons for them.
• Ensure individuals/ teams understand and agree to work to the overall goals, specific objectives and quality standards. 
• Make recommendations or decisions in the best interest of Christian Aid, involving others as needed whether in and beyond own work area. 
• Be willing to take action or make recommendations or decisions in difficult or ambiguous situations.
• Commit to your decisions and be accountable for them. 
• Show willingness to adapt if your initial decision did not produce the expected result. 

Realize Potential:

• Demonstrate continuing commitment to your own professional and personal development. Utilise coaching and mentoring skills in order to support others to develop.
• Encourage others to give their best by discussing goals and aspirations and recognize achievement.
• Provide an appropriate level of supervision according to need; know when to provide help and when to give others enough space to learn.
• Give constructive and timely feedback to others on difficult or contentious issues.
• Deal with poor performance directly and sensitively, seeking appropriate and timely advice and support if needed.   

Strive for Improvement:

• Be open to radical suggestions to avoid closing down options too early. 
• Evaluate benefits and risks of new ways of working or ideas, and identify ways to reduce risk. Find and implement ways to better support internal knowledge and information sharing. Coach others on dealing with resistance to change.
• Seek and evaluate a range of viewpoints, whether internal or external, about how Christian Aid could do things better, regardless of whose ideas they are and what role they have.
• Further details of specific tasks and duties will be agreed with the line manager 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.

Salary
N16,409,457 - N19,513,876

Interview Date
13th June, 2017.