Job Vacancies at Save The Children

ROLE PURPOSE: 

Save the Children is looking to add a dynamic, organized Head of Business Development who is passionate about being a part of a global team of individuals committed to improving the lives of children in Nigeria. 

The Head of Business Development is a key position to support successful pursuit of new funding for the country program. His/her actions and decisions in managing multi-divisional proposal response teams directly impact the quality and competitiveness of Save the Children’s proposals for new funding.

The Head of Business Development provides technical assistance, support, and training to technical advisors for new business development strategies and tasks from pre- positioning through proposal submission. This position also oversees a unit that provides support to technical and cost proposals. 

Strategically, s/he will take the lead in coordinating appropriate internal advance planning in coordination and communication on potential new opportunities. S/he provides quality control and support to technical leads’ efforts to achieve greater program impact through the successful pursuit of larger and more strategic funding opportunities.

KEY AREAS OF ACCOUNTABILITY:

General Management

• Identify and track relevant upcoming funding opportunities – through advance intelligence gathering, partner relationships, and other available resources – and inform Country Office SMT and relevant technical leads.
• Lead the development, implementation and consolidation of private sector engagement processes. Serve as a point of contact on area of responsibility with public, private and non-government stakeholders, when needed.
• Conduct ongoing proactive monitoring and research to identify potential partnerships with foundations, private sector and high net-worth philanthropic individual donors within the sector, both locally and internationally.
• Facilitate the development of innovative funding products, including but not limited to diversification into social venture initiatives and other funding channels that could improve the Country Office bottom line. 
• Coordinate proposal development, including providing quality control to proposals through the design, implementation, and/or review of response strategies and action plans for technical and cost proposals, including writing, reviewing and editing proposal sections, graphics, work plans, budget spreadsheets and narratives; managing partner relations; and overseeing final proposal production for submission to donors.
• Develop and/or maintain appropriate systems, procedures, policies, and materials to support the identification, selection and response to strategic opportunities.
• Manage major open solicitations and other proposal submissions, including teaming agreements, oversight of technical design and cost proposal, capacity statements, internal review/quality control processes, drafting sections of the proposal where appropriate.
• Conduct prospecting visits to field offices to identify and prepare for upcoming funding opportunities.
• Represent Save the Children as appropriate on strategic opportunities with donors, partners and others, participating as needed in meetings and conferences.
• Strengthen staff capacity to respond to strategic opportunities through the creation and/or delivery of formal and informal training and tools.

SKILLS AND BEHAVIOURS (our Values in Practice)

Accountability:

• Understands and respects the need for procedures, policies and planning for safety and security management in delivering humanitarian assistance
• Holds self accountable for making decisions, managing resources efficiently, achieving and role modelling Save the Children values
• Holds the team and partners accountable to deliver on their responsibilities - giving them the freedom to deliver in the best way they see fit, providing the necessary development to improve performance and applying appropriate consequences when results are not achieved
• Creates a managerial environment across the team to lead, enable and maintain our culture of child safeguarding

Ambition:

• Sets ambitious and challenging goals for themselves and their team, takes responsibility for their own personal development and encourages their team to do the same
• Future orientated, thinks strategically and on a country-wide scale

Collaboration:

• Approachable, good listener, easy to talk to; builds and maintains effective relationships with colleagues, Members and external partners and supporters
• Values diversity and different people’s perspectives, able to work cross-culturally.

Creativity:

• Develops and encourages new and innovative solutions

Integrity:

• Honest, encourages openness and transparency, builds trust and confidence
• Displays consistent excellent judgement.

QUALIFICATIONS AND EXPERIENCE AND ATTRIBUTES

Essential

• Master’s degree in social sciences and any of the development sectors.
• 8-10 years of experience in international development, including at least 5 years of experience in successful proposal development for institutional and corporate donors, including pre-solicitation preparation. Experience with major funding donor solicitations is required; substantive relevant experience in proposal development for other multilateral or bilateral donors may be considered within the years of experience sought.
• Experience training staff and creating training modules and materials.
• Experience managing a small team.
• Master’s degree in international development or related field.
• Preference for a candidate with overseas field experience.
• Must be willing to travel to state offices up to 20%.
• Ability to coordinate multiple projects simultaneously, work well under pressure and meet deadlines.
• Ability to effectively communicate with and coordinate activities of multiple partners, including field-based staff.
• Excellent technical skills in writing, editing, formatting, research, negotiation, and verbal communications, and attention to detail required.

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Level 3: the role holder will have contact with children and/or young people either frequently (e.g. once a week or more) or intensively (e.g. four days in one month or more or overnight) because they work in country programs; or are visiting country programs; ore because they are responsible for implementing the police checking/vetting process staff.

• The child protection coordinator will provide technical support and strategic oversight on the child protection component of the FCDO-funded education project in Kaduna, Kano, and Jigawa to eliminate barriers to education and respond to the protection concerns of children and their families.
• The CP coordinator will strengthen the child protection systems in the three states. As a single project integrating education and child protection, the CP coordinator must also have the capacity to manage and track results in other components of the project and coordinate activities on behalf of the project manager.
• S/he will build the capacity of partners and the government to establish new or strengthen existing child protection and case management responses for children who are vulnerable to abuse, exploitation, neglect, and violence.
• S/he will address child protection-related barriers to education by establishing or strengthening community-based referral systems and specialist services to support children in need.
• S/he will work to transform the social, cultural, and religious norms that discriminate against boys and girls, including children living with a disability, and affect their ability to access education.
• It entails the integration of child protection into the community-level catch-up clubs, incorporating family strengthening activities using the ecological model to build a support system around the child.
• In close collaboration with the Programme Manager, manage project field activities, ensuring project objectives are being achieved and ensuring the efficiency and effectiveness of our field work.
• Promote a Child Protection Systems Strengthening approach as the overarching framework, that supports working in collaboration and partnership with governments and local partners and working towards impact, scale and sustainability.
• Working closely with the Project Manager, ensure that the project implementation strategy is clearly understood by the implementing partners, teams, and ensure that project plans and strategies are adhered to during implementation,
• Establishment/strengthening of child protection referral pathways
• Work with government child protection services, community and LGA-level actors and other service providers to strengthen referral and response mechanisms for child protection concerns as well as data collection and reporting platforms.
• Lead CP project planning, including development of work plans (Annual and Monthly) with the project team
• Ensure quality  timely reporting on progress as per SC and donor required quality standards.
• Provide technical support, capacity building and on the job supervision to build the capacity of the respective Save the Children’s field staff and partner staff to effectively deliver the project
• Monitor integrated programming in a way that increases overall impact of child protection programmes at the community level.
• Train key CP team members and resource people within the state and community on CP concerns
• Working closely with Save the Children’s CP team, contribute lessons learnt and best practice experiences from the project inform SC’s strategic planning and the design of future programming strategy and direction, including funding proposals
• Participate in regular meetings with government, local authorities, partners and other stakeholders to draw lessons, share experiences and monitor progress of the project.
• Ensure effective coordination and collaboration with key stakeholders and partners at field level – NGOs, civil society organizations, Government and other FCDO projects.

Program Management and Implementation:

• Coordinate and liaise with field and national support teams to ensure quality project support in HR, logs, procurement, finance etc.
• Ensure that other technical sectors in the state (e.g. Education, Community Mobilization) are coordinated, integrated and support each other to optimise the project purposes and objectives.
• Provide updates to the Programme Manager at regular intervals
• Ensure project team is undertaking monthly Awards review meetings and all actions implemented.
• Inspire, lead and motivate the state team to deliver project objectives; including technical advisors and consultants, and the finance and admin staff working on the project.
• Oversee the development and successful implementation of state work plans for the programme components.
• Ensure compliance with all grant provisions, and timely fulfilment of the State programmatic reporting requirements.
• Support the development of Detailed Implementation Plan (DIP) and procurement plan.
• Oversee timely expenditure of approved state budgets, avoiding both under spending and overspending on grant line items.
• Take full responsibility for the delegated budget holding function on the programmatic aspects of the managed grant, participate actively in finance meetings and contribute to financial decision making.
• Ensure programme delivery happens in strict adherence to security policy and procedures.
• Document programme learning, and incorporate analysis and lessons learned into new strategies/activities and advocacy work.

Human Resources Management and Administration:

• Supervise assigned advisors: maintain updated job descriptions for each position, conduct annual performance evaluations, identify staff skills development needs.
• See that all staff and partners are aware of and understand SCI policies and procedures; take appropriate disciplinary measures as needed.
• Ensure all administrative procedures are followed, such as those regarding vehicle use and procurement; ensure logistics/administrative staff provides sufficient and timely support to the team.
• Lead, manage and motivate the programme’s staff, ensuring they have clear objectives and receive meaningful feedback on their performance regularly, in collaboration with the human resources department.
• Lead on capacity building of staff through coaching, mentoring and training.
• Create and maintain a cooperative and positive working environment where staff have clear roles and responsibilities, participate in decision-making and are supported in progressing towards their objectives.

Safeguarding

• Ensure safe programming in the planning and implementations across the project period.
• Adhere to the Do no Harm principles across the entire steps of the project within the Programme Management Cycle.
• General:
• Comply with Save the Children policies and practice with respect to child protection, code of conduct, health and safety, equal opportunities and other relevant policies and procedures.

Additional Job Responsibilities:

• The duties and responsibilities as set out above are not exhaustive and the role holder may be required to carry out additional duties within reasonableness of their level of skills and experience.

Qualifications

Essential:

• Bachelor’s or master’s degree in social work or relevant field experience.

Experience 

• At least Nine (5) years post NYSC relevant experience in child protection programming
• Demonstrable commitment to a holistic vision of children’s welfare
• Substantial management experience, preferably in development and emergencies
• Excellent written and spoken English; local language skills a major advantage
• Demonstrable competence in report writing
• Experience of financial planning and expenditure monitoring as applied to grants management
• Experience of working with communities, and supporting their participation, ownership and empowerment
• Strong representational and communication skills sensitive to the cultural and military/political environment
• The ability to plan and ensure the implementation of projects, and to oversee the management and report on resources effectively.
• Able to work calmly under pressure in a rapidly changing context
• Proven team management skills
• Adaptability and flexibility; ability and willingness to live in the field
• Competent in Outlook, Word and Excel
• Commitment to upholding Save the Children’s Child Safeguarding Policy, and other Global Policies.
• Strong experience in providing technical assistance and mentorship.
• Demonstrated ability to work effectively with a range of stakeholders including government representatives, donors, and other stakeholders.
• Excellent communication, interpersonal and writing skills.
• Demonstrated experience in project and time management.
• Familiarity and understanding of donor policies and procedures is a plus.