Project Officer Sr - Social Cohesion and Governance Capacity Strengthening at Catholic Relief Services (CRS)

As a lead for the Social Cohesion and Governance Capacity Strengthening for Advancing Cross-border Resilience and Opportunities for Safety and Stability (ACROSS) Project, you will facilitate the achievement of project objectives through coordinating and reporting on all social cohesion and local governance capacity strengthening project activities and providing technical guidance and advice to staff and implementing partner(s) advancing Catholic Relief Services’ (CRS) work serving the poor and vulnerable. Your coordination and relationship management skills will ensure that the project for which you are responsible applies best practices and constantly works towards improving the impact of its benefits to those we serve. 

Roles and Key Responsibilities:

• Organize and lead the implementation of all social cohesion and local governance capacity strengthening assigned project activities as outlined in the detailed implementation plan in line with CRS program quality principles and standards, donor requirements, and good practices.
• Ensure learning properly accompanies project activities throughout the project cycle. Support accountability through coordinating project evaluation activities and guiding partners in their efforts to reflect on project experiences. Analyze implementation challenges and report any inconsistencies and/or gaps to inform adjustments to plans and implementation schedules. 
• Coordinate and oversee working relationships with all local project stakeholders and serve as the liaison between them and the project team to mobilize local actors and promote project activities and impact,
• Supervise and perform ad-hoc inspections of various processes and resources at project sites to ensure timely local governance capacity strengthening project activities implementation and adherence to established process standards and procedures. Ensure proper tracking of resource use for project activities through periodic budget reviews and follow-up with, and assistance to the implementing partner.
• Support and coordinate capacity building and technical support to Local government structures and LGA leaders to ensure assigned project activities are implemented per project guidelines and standards. This will include developing program/project documents and tools, as well as technical manuals or guidance, training materials, and quality improvement and assessment guidelines for all local governance capacity building activities.
• Coordinate stakeholder engagement in violence prevention, manage training programs for peace clubs, facilitate collaborative solution implementation, and support community-led conflict resolution mechanism development, including logistical and administrative support.
• Ensure project documentation for social cohesion and local governance assigned activities is complete with all required documents and is filed according to agency and donor requirements.Assist with the preparation of trends analysis reports and documentation of case studies and promising practices – including gender equity and social inclusion, and protection success stories and lessons learned.

Required Languages -English is required. Knowledge of Hausa as a second language is appreciated.

Travel - Must be willing and able to travel up to 60%.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities

• Analysis and problem-solving skills with the ability to make sound judgment
• Good relationship management skills and the ability to work closely with local partners
• Proactive, results-oriented, and service-oriented
• Attention to detail, accuracy, and timeliness in executing assigned responsibilities

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience working with partners, participatory action planning, and community engagement.
• Experience in monitoring projects and collecting relevant data.
• Experience using MS Windows and MS Office packages (Excel, Word, PowerPoint).
• Knowledge of the latest technological tools that have the potential to be applied in gender and protection.
• Experience in Nigeria and particularly the Northwest will be a bonus.
• Staff supervision experience is a plus.

Basic Qualifications

• A bachelor’s degree in international relations, political science, public administration, or a relevant field would be a plus.
• Minimum of four years of work experience in project support, ideally in the field of local governance capacity strengthening and for an NGO.