Lead Coordinator, RDTS at African Development Bank - AfDB

Reference: ADB/20/179
Location: Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire
Grade: PL2
Position N°: 50069784

The Complex

• Within the Regional Development, Integration and Business Delivery Complex (RDVP), the Bank has five (5) Regional Development, Integration and Business Delivery (RDIBD) Directorates, one in each region of Africa: North, South, East, West, and Central. Each Regional Directorate is headed by a Director General (DG) and is staffed with the relevant sectoral functions and administrative capabilities for rapid delivery of services to client countries.
• The Regional Directorates provide overall strategic direction to country offices within the regions and are responsible for the Bank’s operations, business development, project management and overall effective delivery of the Bank’s High 5s agenda: ‘Light up and Power Africa,’ ‘Feed Africa,’ ‘Industrialize Africa,’ ‘Integrate Africa,’ ‘Improve the Quality of Life for the People of Africa.

The Hiring Department
The Transition States Coordination Office (RDTS) oversees the implementation of the Bank Group’s Strategy for Addressing Fragility and Building Resilience in its Regional Member Countries (RMCs). It also coordinates the lending and non-lending activities of all fragility and resilience experts stationed in the various Regional Directorates or Country Offices. Apart from RMCs, the Bank also works with several international partners including the African Union (AU), the United Nations (UN) system, Regional Economic Communities (RECs) and other sub-regional organizations such as the G5 Sahel Permanent Secretariat, Lake Chad Basin Commission, IGAD, and the Mano River Union(MRU) Secretariat. The Bank also works with several humanitarian, peace and development actors working in fragile and conflict affected situations.

Over the past decade, Africa has seen enormous growth and transformation that has expanded opportunities and improved living conditions for millions of people. More than two-thirds of African countries have strengthened their quality of governance, improved basic services, and expanded economic opportunities. Yet, there are significant risks that this momentum could be undermined by emerging pressures which include conflict and instability, population displacement and migration, continuing patterns of exclusion and poverty, unemployment, rapid urbanization, climate change and poor management of natural resources. More recently, the impact of the COVID-19 global pandemic, is expected to significant adverse effects and far reaching consequences for fragile and conflict affected countries.

RDTS aims to place the Bank at the center of Africa’s efforts to address fragility and pave the way for a more resilient and inclusive development trajectory. A major part of RDTS’ activities involves the identification of the main drivers of fragility, including economic, social, political and environmental dimensions, through the application of the Country Resilience and Fragility Assessment (CRFA) tool and corresponding fragility assessments.  RDTS also plays a crucial role in mainstreaming fragility considerations in the Bank’s regional and country strategies as well as in the design and implementation of projects and programs. In this regard, central to
RDTS engagement is the systematic application of a fragility lens to identify, respond to and prevent fragility and to build resilience and focus the Bank’s engagement in the areas where it can have the biggest impact. To this end, the Bank is also active in carrying out thematic analytics to enhance policy dialogue on fragility related issues to steer reforms and policy changes aimed at creating enabling environments for accelerated development in fragile and conflict affected countries. This includes creating a business enabling environment to attract private sector investments in these countries, as a way of expanding opportunities for decent work.

The Position

• Under the supervision of the Director, RDTS, the Lead Coordinator will principally be responsible for the implementation and execution of the African Development Bank’s agenda for addressing fragility and building resilience in Africa.
• The Lead Coordinator will also be responsible for providing leadership and supervising the implementation of the Bank’s fragility and resilience programs and frameworks. This will entail advising senior management on the actions needed to meet the Bank’s commitments under each cycle of the African Development Fund.

Duties and responsibilities
The Lead Coordinator, under the supervision of the Director, will provide leadership, manage and supervise staff and activities of RDTS, determine the overall objectives, oversee the execution of the work program and ensure effective use of the RDTS budget. Her / his duties and responsibilities will include the following:

• Lead and coordinate the formulation of the Bank’s strategies, guidelines on fragility and the preparation of the Bank’s work program; oversee and ensure regular review and update of the Bank’s strategies and guidelines;
• Lead work on the development of new tools, knowledge generation and participate in policy dialogue with Regional Member Countries;
• Oversee the execution of the Bank’s annual work program in the areas of Fragility, Conflict and Violence;
• Provide leadership in the analysis of fragility trends and their likely impact on the Bank’s portfolios;
• Build and maintain the Bank’s reputation through developing effective partnerships, maintaining frequent contacts, representing the Bank at seminars, and conferences on relevant topics and discussions with counterparts and inspire the staff to do the same. Manage internal relations, ensure effective information dissemination, deepen and widen the Bank’s investor base;
• Ensure strict compliance with operational guidelines for implementing the Bank’s fragility strategy as derived from the Ten-Year Strategy, and long-standing practices and relevant operating procedures / manuals as well as apply best practices for mobilizing the funding of the fragility strategy, while keeping abreast of trends and new developments in fragility discourse.
• Provide advice on resource mobilization, including during each cycle of the African Development Fund replenishment, and administrative management of the Transition Support Facility;
• Under the supervision of the Director, monitor closely portfolio performance in Transition States, ensure the effective utilization and performance of the Transition Support Facility; and provide regular reports to the Bank’s Senior Management and the Board of Directors.
• Lead resource mobilisation efforts for the Transition Support Facility
• Build working relationships with other Bank Departments and Units, reporting the Bank’s work on addressing fragility and building resilience and monitor and assess progress towards the attainment of relevant key performance indicators assigned to the Office;
• Manage relationships with regional member countries, donors, partners and other clients;
• Represent the Director, as needed, in Bank-wide working groups as well as preparatory meetings for High Level events.

Selection Criteria

• Hold at least a Master's degree in Economics, Political Science, International Relations, Public Policy, or related, discipline;
• Have a minimum of eight (8) years of professional experience in a multilateral development institution at a similar operating level;
• Demonstrated understanding of the multi-dimensional nature of fragile and conflict-affected situations, particularly in Africa;
• Excellent strategic thinking skills with the ability to translate strategic concepts and direction into the results-driven implementable operational programs and activities;
• Excellent knowledge of development institutions’ policies, guidelines and procedures relevant to fragile and conflict-affected contexts
• Strong analytical and strategic capabilities, program management in policy-oriented institutions, academia or within multilateral development institutions;
• Superior leadership qualities, technical excellence and first-rate interpersonal and people management skills;
• Good / sound judgment and strong integrity;
• Ability to lead cross-complex and Corporate assignments;
• Demonstrated ability to produce high-quality work on a variety of issues with very short deadlines and make effective and timely decisions;
• Excellent communication and presentation skills, able to write effectively in English and / or French with a good working knowledge of the other language;
• Competence in the use of Bank standard software applications (Word, Excel, PowerPoint), Knowledge of SAP is highly desirable.