Lead Investiment Relations Specialist, PAIF at African Development Bank - AfDB

Reference: ADB/20/087
Location: Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire
Grade: PL2
Position N°: 50097567
Publication date: 27-Jun-2020

The Complex

• The President plans, supervises and manages the business of the Bank Group. Under the direction of the Boards of Directors, the President conducts the business of the Bank and the African Development Fund and manages operations and activities in accordance with the Agreements establishing the African Development Bank and the African Development Fund.
• The President supervises several Departments and Units including Office of the President; Independent Development Evaluation Department; Integrity and Anti-Corruption Department; Compliance Review and Mediation Unit; Secretariat to the Sanctions Appeals Board; Administrative Tribunal; Office of the Auditor General; Group Risk Management Directorate; General Counsel and Legal Services Department; Communication and External Relations Department; Staff Integrity and Ethics Office and Office of the Secretary General & General Secretariat.

The Hiring Department

• The Africa Investment Forum in The Office of the President assists the President in planning, supervising and managing all activities related to the efficient and timely delivery of the mandate of the Africa Investment Forum.
• Africa Investment Forum (AIF) is a multi-stakeholder, multi-disciplinary platform dedicated to advancing private and public-private-partnership projects to bankable stages, raising capital, and accelerating the financial closure of deals. The AIF is Africa’s investment market place, through which the African Development Bank, along with its partners, is structuring transformational deals, screening and enhancing projects, attracting co-investors, and facilitating transactions to close Africa’s investment gaps.
• The AIF objectives are to reduce intermediation costs, improve the quality of project information and documentation, and increase active and productive engagements between African governments and the private sector as well as increase regional integration for developmental impact. The AIF offers investors access to a structured platform offering bankable projects within an enabling environment.
• The Africa Investment Forum facilitates awareness raising about the investment opportunities in Africa for international investors, social impact investors, institutional investors (pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, and others) both local and global. It provides an opportunity for the Africa Investment Forum partners to determine the investment needs of these various categories of investors, facilitate tailored structures and showcase Africa’s investment successes and enabling policies that would be attractive to these various classes of investors who are looking to deploy funds in Africa.
• The Africa Investment Forum seeks to deliver on the proposed strategic approach via its pillars as defined below:
  • The Platform - selects, supports, and facilitates the origination, structuring and closure of high-impact deals in Africa’s critical sectors through facilitating financing for project preparation & advisory services directly or through its network of advisors. It includes a digital platform for investors and project sponsors to profile their investment interests and deals respectively.
  • The Market Place - leads productive engagements and roundtables with both existing and new stakeholders’ thereby deepening relations and diversifying the sponsor, investor and partner base.  
  • The Market Days - physically convenes investors, project sponsors and key decision makers at a bespoke platform for investment conversations and closing deals.
  • The Deal Tracker - a pioneering structured mechanism designed to facilitate the progress of Boardroom deals, accelerate investor’s commitments, and advance projects further towards and until deal closure.
  • Knowledge/Policy Environment - seeks to foster investment friendly regulation, a pro-investment climate to remove bottlenecks to deal closure, as well as disseminate knowledge products.  
• The Africa Investment Forum will track the implementation of commitments made at the actual event to ensure transactions reach financial close and policies and bottlenecks to facilitate Africa Investment Forum projects are implemented.  

The Position

• The Lead Investment Specialist reports to the Senior Director, Africa Investment Forum, in the Office of the President.
• The key objectives of the position of Lead Investment Specialist are to:
  • Identify and develop defined long-term strategic partnerships and sponsorships with key institutions, organizations and investors, continentally and internationally.
  • Provide leadership assistance to the Senior Director in building efficient processes, strategic thinking and a robust engagement strategy for the Africa Investment Forum.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Drive and support the Africa Investment Forum platform under the leadership of the Senior Director, of the African Development Bank.
• Build solid AIF work streams with defined outcomes.
• Develop AIF strategic partnerships and sponsorships with the Bank’s stakeholders (private sector, development institutions, government, foundations, etc).
• Support the Senior Director in internal and external engagement plans.
• Strong coordination capacity and the day-to-day running of the office of the Africa Investment Forum.
• Internally, collaborate with all Complexes, Regions and Teams across the Bank to develop the pipeline of private sector and PPPs deals and relationships needed to make the Africa Investment Forum a success and subsequent Forums.
• Lead related investment fora organized by the Bank’s Sector complexes.
• Lead the development and management of strategic relationships and partnerships related to the event management and the technical programme in relation to the Africa Investment Forum. This includes event management company and related companies, host government, media, etc. This includes supervision of the vendors and service providers.
• Contribute towards business and deal flow development in identifying suitable class of investors – DFIs, Institutional investors - Pension Funds, insurance, Sovereign Wealth Fund, Commercial banks, private equity funds.
• Be responsible for expanding the base (attracting/acquiring) of non-traditional investors - Pension Funds, insurance, Sovereign Wealth Fund to the AIF platform, across the AIF platforms, in addition to traditional investors, including on the AIF Digital Platform.
• Build and maintain strong relationships with a network of high net worth sponsors, financiers – Institutional investors, private equity, SWFs, Commercial, DFIs, pension funds, family offices, etc, and .
• Coordinate the Department work program and budget.

Selection Criteria

• Hold at least a Master's degree or equivalent in Management Science, Business Administration, Economics, Finance, International Development, or related discipline.
• Have a minimum of eight (8) years of relevant experience out of which 3 years should be at a managerial level at increasingly senior levels in the knowledge sector, in global institutions, with proven experience in developing countries.
• Public and/or private sector experience
• Experience in building and maintaining very strong and successful partnerships.
• Experience in core initiatives supporting private sector business growth such as resource mobilization.
• Private sector experience in business environment and/or financial sector as well as an experience in interacting with institutional investors is desirable.
• Demonstrated ability to lead relevant, meaningful dialogue with proven experience in providing high quality strategic and policy advice at high levels to national governments and private sector entities.
• Strategic mind-set; strong capacity to analyse actions from the perspectives of stakeholders and translate strategic thinking into compelling plans of action and to take prudent business risks to make effective, timely, and well-thought decisions.
• Evidence of ability to build and utilize talent and expertise of motivated and committed teams across functional boundaries in a productive way.
• Demonstrated ability to present and win support for ideas; a good listener; and cultural sensitivity, commitment to diversity
• Capacity to initiate and manage innovations and change.
• Range of inter-personal skills and an ability to vary the use of them according to the audience
• Effective consultation and advisory skills coupled with a client orientation
• Strong convening power and techniques with a knowledge of event organization
• Ability to communicate effectively (written and oral) in English and French
• Demonstrated ability to coach junior staff
• Excellent people management skills and openness to feedback, new ideas, and ability to guide staff to solve problems.
• Strong planning organization and time management skills
• Good capacity for innovation, creativity, and ability to work in a team to solve problem.
• Highly developed negotiation skills proven to yield positive outcomes with counterparts, both internal and external.
• Competence in the use of Bank standard software.