Lead Technical Adviser Service Overseas (VSO)

Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) is the world’s leading
international development organisation that works through
volunteers to fight poverty.

Working in 24 countries around the world, our unique role in
international development is to place committed volunteers with
carefully selected organisations where their skills can have the
greatest impact. Our extraordinary volunteers live and work in some
of the world’s poorest communities; sharing their unique skills and
experience to generate new ideas and new ways of doing things,
helping the communities they work in lift themselves out of
poverty. We’re not about delivering quick fixes, but instead we
focus on long-lasting, sustainable change, that will impact
generations to come. Join us and help us work towards our vision of
a world without poverty.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Lead Technical Adviser – Rural
Livelihoods

Location: VSO Office Abuja, Nigeria or
Phnom Penh, Cambodia – Based within the Knowledge for Impact Team
as well as the Resilient Livelihoods Core Programme Area Team
Contract type: Permanent
Full Time: 35 hours per week
Start date: ASAP

Role Purpose

• You will provide technical leadership in resilient livelihoods
  to a globally dispersed team of staff and volunteers to identify,
  test, and document new and promising practices across VSO’s Rural
  Livelihoods programmes, specifically in Nigeria, but also in
  Cambodia and other countries in Africa and Asia that have Resilient
  Rural Livelihoods programme activities.
• The overall aim of the position is to support improvement in
  the quality and impact of VSO’s Resilient Rural Livelihoods
  programmes globally to enable VSO to document, replicate and expand
  effective approaches, with the aim of helping more of the world’s
  poor and marginalized people to achieve their livelihood
  aspirations.

Job Responsibilities
Leadership:

• Lead the implementation of the resilient livelihoods strategy
  and theory of action, with its assets and capabilities core, around
  which VSO is seeking to build a unique identity in its livelihoods
  programming.
• Review progress made with programme implementation and
  documentation of promising approaches against the theory of action
  and identify where additional or modified approaches are
  required.
• Track areas where the assets and capabilities approach can be
  developed further in resilient rural livelihoods programming.

Promote good practice:

• Ensure completion of the learning and guidance documentation
  work around the promising approaches identified in the resilient
  livelihoods theory of action.
• Support the conduct of vulnerability context analyses in
  Nigeria and Cambodia, especially with regard to the analysis of
  social differentiation and power relations.
• Lead work in identifying value chains and the associated market
  actors that are most suitable for VSO’s primary actors (poorer
  households, women, youth and Persons with Disabilities).
• Support the development of work around sustainable agricultural
  practices and the development of more balanced and resilient rural
  household food security and livelihood strategies.
• Ensure that the implications and lessons learned from analyses
  are used to influence new project and signature programme designs,
  including with respect to who VSO targets, where, how, and with
  which other actors we should be collaborating

Improve Programme Quality:

• Provide support and advice to programmes to improve programme
  design and the quality of our interventions, through signature
  package development in particular.
• Explore the perceptions of VSO Nigeria and Cambodia staff,
  volunteers, partners and key stakeholders about VSO capacity, value
  adds, niche, strengths and weaknesses in Rural Livelihoods
  programming and their views about future programming.
• Support all country offices with rural livelihoods activities
  in the replication and adapting of the promising approaches
  identified and documented, and in the continuous learning of how to
  improve these approaches.

Knowledge management and dissemination:

• Promote the generation and or use of quality internal and
  external evidence, practice and learning within VSO.
• Contribute to the improvement of the Resilient Livelihoods
  evidence building and impact assessment practices, particularly at
  outcome and impact level, and in the use of digital
  technologies.
• Work with the Evaluation and Research Specialists to identify
  gaps and areas for improvement in monitoring and evaluation and
  documentation of learning and assess key tools and use of
  innovative methods for this purpose.
• Identify and recommend key lessons that can inform VSO’s work
  within Rural Livelihoods Programme.

External communication and influencing:

• Support the building of VSO’s external identity and
  reputation.
• Represent VSO at conferences, workshops and task forces and or
  support programme actors to participate as appropriate.
• Contribute to the development of communications for internal
  and external VSO audiences.
• Play a leading role in supporting Country Offices to raise more
  programmatic funding, including through donor liaison where
  appropriate, and in developing high quality project proposals and
  donor communications.

Team working and sustainable development approaches:

• Work as a member of the Resilient Livelihoods Core Programme
  Area Team (CPAT) and with other thematic leads and core approach
  advisors, as well as Country Office programme managers and
  livelihoods coordinators.
• Work as part of the Resilient Livelihoods CPAT to implement the
  Resilient Livelihoods “Volunteering for Development” investment
  strategy and to continue the implementation of the Resilient
  Livelihoods strategy and improvement of programme quality and
  funding.
• Support the implementation of an overall Volunteering for
  Development framework for VSO and the development of a clearer
  programme identity for the organisation.

Skill Required
Essential:

• Master’s in Development Studies, Agriculture or other relevant
  qualification, or equivalent experience.
• Extensive experience and knowledge of innovations in assets and
  capabilities enhancement in rural livelihoods programming,
  especially on-farm and off-farm; enterprise development; market-led
  approaches.
• Proven experience of securing external funding and grants,
  including proposal development. Evidence of understanding the
  challenges of donor and contract management and the implications
  for programme management.
• Proven experience in financial management, including building a
  budget, monitoring and managing expenditure. Experience of having
  compiled financial reports.
• Excellent understanding and demonstrated experience of project
  cycle management, organisational assessment, planning and M&E
  tools and processes.
• Experience of compiling donor reports.
• Leadership and people management skills; including handling
  complex situations to an effective conclusion; experience of
  developing, coaching and managing high performing teams.
• Self-motivated, ability to use own initiative,
  flexibility.
• Strong representation and negotiation skills; ability to
  negotiate and maintain relations with external stakeholders.
• Oral and written fluency in English, with ability to
  communicate effectively with a wide range of audiences.
• Able to travel, including work away from the home base for up
  to 30% of time, both within the country and occasionally
  internationally with some weekend and evening work.
• Excellent coordination and planning skills with experience of
  working under pressure. Time management skills.

Desirable:

• Practical experience gained within a volunteering NGO context
  and of managing a volunteer programme.
• Evidence of ability to provide effective support to
  international and national volunteers.
• Experience and knowledge of the country and region.
• Experience of working in a matrix organization with multiple
  reporting lines across different locations.

Salary
N20,400,000/annum

Application Closing Date
27th June, 2019

Interview Date
ASAP

How to Apply
Interested and qualified candidates should:
Click here to apply
online^[1]

Click here for more Information^[2] (Ms
Word)

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