Program Quality, Evidence & Learning Director - Nigeria OCHA Program at Mercy Corps

General Position Summary

The Program Quality, Evidence & Learning Director position is proposed in anticipation of potential funding from UNOCHA to support life-saving humanitarian programming in Northeast Nigeria, particularly in Borno State. This role will be critical in strengthening systems and ensuring high standards of program quality, community accountability, learning, and strategic communication across the portfolio.

He/she will oversee the PaQ unit in Nigeria, ensuring the establishment and implementation of organization-wide systems that promote consistent standards, processes, and best practices in program management. The position will play a central role in fostering evidence-based programming and adaptive management, while building a strong culture of training, coaching, and technical rigor to improve program effectiveness and efficiency.

A key expectation of the role is to institutionalize strong Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability, and Learning (MEAL) systems, including robust Community Accountability and Response Mechanisms (CARM). The PaQ Director will ensure that program data, research, assessments, and field learning are systematically captured, analyzed, and integrated into ongoing and future program design.

In addition, the position holder will be responsible for producing high-quality learning documents, reflection briefs, case studies, and best-practice notes. These outputs will be strategically communicated to donors, state stakeholders, and partners to showcase Mercy Corps’ approaches, achievements, innovations, and impact in humanitarian response. The PaQ Director will strengthen program visibility and external positioning by translating field-level results into clear, evidence-driven narratives that support donor engagement and future resource mobilization.

Essential Job Responsibilities

STRATEGY & SYSTEMS STRENGTHENING

• Provide strategic leadership to ensure clearly defined roles, accountability structures, and alignment with life-saving humanitarian priorities in Borno State.
• Lead the integration of program data, context analysis, and evidence into country and sector strategies to ensure evidence-based, adaptive programming.
• Establish and institutionalize systems that strengthen program quality, monitoring, learning, reporting, and community accountability mechanisms across the portfolio.
• Develop processes that ensure cross-program learning is systematically captured and integrated into program adaptation and future design.
• In collaboration with other departments, strengthen cross-team coordination to ensure coherence, technical rigor, and operational efficiency across all sectors.

PROGRAM QUALITY, PERFORMANCE & ACCOUNTABILITY

• Lead the design and oversight of robust MEL, research, reporting, and Community Accountability and Response Mechanisms (CARM) systems aligned with humanitarian standards and donor expectations.
• Ensure technical excellence and quality assurance across all sectors (WASH, Nutrition, Food Security, Cash, Protection, Shelter, etc.), including participation in start-up reviews, quality audits, field spot checks, and program close-outs.
• Promote adaptive management by ensuring real-time data informs operational decisions in rapidly evolving humanitarian contexts.
• Ensure efficient and transparent data capture systems that support evidence-based decision-making and timely internal and external reporting.
• Support proposal development processes by integrating lessons learned, sector evidence, and strong accountability frameworks into program design.

LEARNING, KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT & STRATEGIC COMMUNICATION

• Lead the production of high-quality learning products, including evaluation briefs, lessons learned reports, case studies, reflection notes, and best-practice documentation.
• Translate field-level evidence and results into clear, compelling narratives that showcase Mercy Corps’ approaches, innovations, and impact to donors, government stakeholders, and coordination platforms.
• Ensure timely, high-quality internal and external reporting that demonstrates accountability, results, and value for money.
• Institutionalize mechanisms for capturing impact stories, evidence, and operational insights to strengthen donor engagement and future resource mobilization.
• Ensure high-quality evaluations and internal data quality assessments to demonstrate measurable outcomes and accountability.

GENDER, SOCIAL INCLUSION & COMMUNITY ACCOUNTABILITY

• Strengthen and institutionalize Community Accountability and Response Mechanisms (CARM), ensuring communities can safely and effectively provide feedback.
• Ensure compliance with Gender and Social Inclusion (GESI) standards, including SADD data minimum requirements and protection mainstreaming.
• Promote inclusive, gender-sensitive, and protection-aware programming across all life-saving interventions.
• Support the integration of Do No Harm and safeguarding principles throughout the program lifecycle.

LEADERSHIP & TEAM MANAGEMENT

• Build and lead a high-performing PaQ team with a culture of accountability, collaboration, and continuous improvement.
• Provide supervision, coaching, and performance management to ensure technical excellence and alignment with strategic objectives.
• Ensure effective internal communication and coordination between field offices, sectors, and support departments.
• Recruit, orient, and develop team members to strengthen mission-wide program quality and learning capacity.

REPRESENTATION & EXTERNAL ENGAGEMENT

• Represent Mercy Corps in donor engagements, coordination forums, and technical working groups related to program quality, learning, and accountability.
• Share best practices and contribute to sector-wide learning at state, and national levels.
• Engage with regional and global PaQ team to ensure Nigeria contributes to and benefits from organizational learning and innovation.

Safeguarding Responsibilities

• Actively learns safeguarding and integrates it into their work, including safeguarding risks and mitigations related to their area of work.
• Practices the values of Mercy Corps including respecting the dignity and well-being of participants and fellow team members.
• Encourages openness and communication in their team; encourages team members to submit reports if they have any concerns using reporting mechanisms e.g., Integrity Hotline and other options.

Supervisory Responsibility:

MEL Manager, CARM Coordinator, and Senior Learning and Communication Officer

Accountability

Reports Directly To: Programs Director - OCHA

Works Directly With: Senior Programs Manager, Sector Program managers, Finance Department, Human Resources Department, Operations Department, and the Regional and Global team, and TSU teams.

Knowledge And Experience

• Bachelor’s degree required, master’s degree in Humanitarian Studies, International Development, or a related field preferred.
• Minimum 12 years of progressive experience in humanitarian or development programming, including 4 years of leadership and coordination in complex, high-risk contexts (Africa experience preferred).
• Strong expertise in Program Quality, Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability, and Learning (MEAL), including remote monitoring, mobile data collection, evaluations, and data quality assurance.
• Strong knowledge of statistical packages and software
• Demonstrated ability to institutionalize systems for program quality, community accountability, adaptive management, and evidence-based decision-making.
• Proven experience in producing high-quality reports, learning documents, and donor-facing communications that showcase program impact and best practices.
• Strong analytical, facilitation, and capacity-building skills, with the ability to work independently and meet tight deadlines.
• Willingness and ability to travel frequently to field locations, including insecure environments.
• Fluent written and spoken English required.