Violence Prevention and Response Regional Lead, West Africa at International Rescue Committee (IRC)

Job Overview 

Violence Prevention and Response (VPR) West Africa Regional Lead provides coherence and direction to the provision of technical support for Women’s Protection and Empowerment, Child Protection, and Protection - Rule of Law in West Africa. As a member of both the regional team and the technical unit senior management team, the VPR West Africa Regional Lead has accountability for technical quality and responsibility for assuring the advice from Technical Advisors is taken into appropriate action by the country office.

The VPR West Africa Regional Lead will lead a highly effective, strategic violence prevention and response regional team to ensure the West Africa Region has high quality, sound technical support needed to deliver on global program goals and effectively serve our clients. The role will serve as a functional leader, advisor, and a thought partner to both TU leadership and Regional leadership, with a particular focus on leading the operationalization of the Safety strategy in West Africa, multi-sector and sub-sector program integration, mainstreaming of Gender Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion across programming, evidence-based design, business development, and quality assurance for high-impact and scale strategic projects. The VPR West Africa Regional Lead will coordinate across individuals and projects, ensuring clear priorities are set and communicated, and navigating the challenges inherent in being an advisory function. They will be an excellent people manager, with great team building/animation skills, able to help technical staff succeed and grow in their careers. The VPR West Africa Regional Lead will invest deeply in understanding the context and dynamics of the country and regional teams and the challenges they face. They will ensure coherent ways of working within and across the regional technical team, as well as within the wider VPRU, to align high quality technical support with the operational realities of the country offices. The Regional Lead will champion technical external representation in regional fora for promoting learning, advocacy and showcasing IRC's programming as well as engage with regional colleagues on donor facing engagement. By doing so, the Regional Lead will ensure high quality programming across the Child Protection, Protection – Rule of Law, and Women’s Protection and Empowerment practice areas in West Africa, high quality coordination and partnership with regional teams, effective team performance, and efficiency and impact of technical excellence service offering to the West Africa region and country programs. 

Major Responsibilities 

Functional Leadership, Coordination and Implementation Support:

• Provide technical leadership across the region, including by contextualizing the Safety Strategy at the regional level in partnership with Technical Advisors, DRD, + Deputy Director of Programs (DDP) and in line with Country Program Strategic Action Plans
• Promote programming coherence and strategic direction of the VPR programming portfolio including identifying opportunities for intra and cross-sectoral integration
• Closely coordinate with Global Practice Leads and HQ functions to facilitate translation of global standards to the region and of country-generated innovation and learning to global practice 
• Support regional Technical Advisors to address implementation bottlenecks and critical quality concerns in the region’s programming portfolio, in partnership with the Deputy Regional Director (DRD)
• Increase quality of technical collaboration across the region by fostering cross-regional dialogue with other regional technical teams
• Provide technical oversight of regional strategic projects in collaboration with the Global Practice Leads as appropriate and/or budgeted, escalating quality assurance challenges as needed
• Foster relationships with a wide range of both internal and external stakeholders to make strategic connections and identify opportunities
• Provide stop-gap direct implementation support as/if appropriate and budgeted on CP-grants

Staff management, learning, and development

• Lead and line manage a high performing team of VPR Technical Advisors and GEDI in Programs staff to design and support VPR programming across the region, and generate evidence and learning for local and global strategies
• Accountable for ensuring TAs maintain core knowledge and expertise and apply global best practices to their work across health sub-sectors
• Work closely with Regional and CRRD HQ People & Culture colleagues to devise strategies of attracting, onboarding, developing, and nurturing diverse regional technical staff at the Advisor and Coordinator levels, and ensuring an inclusive work environment.  In collaboration with the DRD, Regional and CRRD HQ P&C, and Global Practice Leads, plan and implement professional development for staff ensuring targeted learning. 

Program Design and Business Development

• Provide technical leadership and oversight to region-led (multi-country) business development, as well as particularly large single-country opportunities, together with the Technical Advisors, Global Practice Leads and others as relevant.
• Support and promote technical and programmatic innovation in the region, based on technically-sound and contextually-grounded creativity and/or insights
• Collaborate with other technical area Regional Leads and Technical Advisors to promote regional uptake of solutions that are proven to increase scale and deepen impact, with close attention to where integrated programming would multiply efficacy and efficiency
• Work with DRD, Director of Awards Management and DDPs for country programs to understand the region’s donors for the protection sectors, the donors’ priorities in the region, and the regional funding priorities of Country Programs for the Safety Outcomes
• Support regional donor engagement to deepen donor understanding of IRC’s work the region, strategically foster and develop new donor relationships in close coordination with the regional team, and support the development of regional business development opportunities
• Support the development and growth of strategic partnerships with mission-aligned organizations at the regional level who share commitments towards scale and impact and have complementary areas of expertise for collaboration towards delivering better outcomes for clients
• Accountable for coordinating across expert staff to better integrate cross-cutting issues into VPR programs (e.g., gender equality, diversity and inclusion, climate adaptation, etc.).

Knowledge Management, Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning

• Lift up program learning for sharing across the region and to inform global strategic direction of (relevant) Global Practice Areas
• Facilitate interpretation and use of sector data in regional learning routines and put in place routines and accountability mechanisms to encourage uptake of data-driven recommendations made by TAs
• Collaborate with Regional Measurement Advisors to ensure that Regional Technical Advisors support good MEAL practice for VPR programming in West Africa, including the use of high-quality indicators, the use of IRC standard data tools, and the inclusion of MEAL activities in project plans

External Influence and Representation

• Engage in regional sector coordination groups and bilateral relationships as appropriate, to represent IRC, and support priority policy and practice shifts
• Support regions in addressing policy & practice shifts needed to enable program impact and scale
• In close collaboration and partnership with the DRD, regional Awards Management and Advocacy focal points, ensure effective networking and representation in relation to Child Protection, Protection – Rule of Law, and Women’s Protection and Empowerment, through mobilizing input from global practice leads. 

Key Working Relationships 

Position Reports to: Dual reporting line to Deputy Director, VPRU and DRD, West Africa

Direct Reports:  

• Women’s Protection and Empowerment Technical Advisors
• Child Protection Technical Advisor
• Protection Rule of Law Technical Advisor
• Regional GEDI in Programming staff, if applicable

Key Internal Relationships: 

• VPRU Deputy Director 
• Global Practice Leads for Child Protection and Protection – Rule of Law
• VPR Regional Leads across 5 other regions 
• Regional Measurement Advisor
• Regional Leadership Team, Country Directors, DDPs, CRRD colleagues across multiple roles 
• Regional Advocacy and Comms leads
• Regional Safety & Security lead
• West Africa Awards Management Unit team
• CRRD Senior Management Team and Leadership Group; Regional Leadership Teams 
• Global HQ and AMU focal points  

Key External Relationships: 

• Global Protection Cluster leads and stakeholders, INGOs, Red Cross/Crescent Movement counterparts, International Protection Coordination Platforms and Coalitions, Donor and policy makers, GBV counterparts in relevant UN agencies

Desired Experience and Skills 

• Highly seasoned professional with at least 8+ years of progressive technical and management experience leading and managing technical teams 
• Established technical expertise in at least one of the VPR Global Practice Areas relevant to West Africa. Professional and/or lived experience in West Africa context and sound understanding of the region is a huge advantage.
• Excellent management and leadership skills including coaching, mentoring, and performance management 
• Strong track record of leading multi-location technical programs
• Strong track record of driving uptake of evidence-based practice
• Experience managing multiple projects with multi-disciplinary collaborators
• Demonstrated ability to influence across a wide range of diverse stakeholders internally and externally
• Strong track record of identifying and converting business development opportunities (when leading and managing the leader) 
• Knowledge and understanding of the respective regional context
• Ability to work, manage, and meet deadlines in a fast-paced environment; outstanding business acumen, critical thinking, problem solving and decision-making skills required
• Superb inter-personal, written and verbal communication skills with ability to collaborate across countries, cultures, and departments 
• Fluency in English and French required
• Ability to travel regionally and globally up to 35% of the time, occasionally on short notice

Education: Masters’ degree in Social Sciences, International Law and/or related fields or an equivalent professional experience background is required. Sound training on the use of data and research evidence for programmatic decisions and rigorous analytic skills are an advantage.