Democratic Republic of the Congo: Lead Voice & Empowerment Adviser

This position is contingent on IRC being awarded funding and is anticipated to begin in August 2016.

BACKGROUND:

The International Rescue Committee (IRC) is one of the world's leading humanitarian relief and development organisations. Founded in 1933 at the request of Albert Einstein, the IRC responds to the world's worst humanitarian crises and helps people survive, recover and regain control over their lives. Working in more than 40 countries, the IRC is helping to restore hope and opportunity to millions of people.

IRC governance programmes focus on fostering the voice and empowerment of people and communities along with the organizational development of civil society organizations and public service providers. Implemented in post-crisis and recovery contexts, these programmes focus on:

• Empowering people affected by conflict to that they are better placed to solve their own problems;
• Ensuring that the needs of all groups, regardless of gender, age or ethnicity, are taken into account by local decision-makers, and that people understand and trust the processes by which decisions are made;
• Working to ensure that service providers and people in positions of power at community and government levels are responsive to people's needs and recognise that all people have equal rights that must be respected and realised.

IRC is one of the largest providers of relief and development assistance in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Across a number of DRC's provinces, IRC implements programs directly or through partners in the sectors of health, governance & community development, women's protection & empowerment, education, and emergency response through a network of nine field offices and a range of institutional and community partnerships.

PROGRAMME SCOPE AND OBJECTIVES

The IRC is recruiting a Voice and Empowerment Advisor in preparation for the upcoming DFID Collective Action & Systems Strengthening (CASS) programme . CASS is a seven-year governance programme aiming to support the decentralization process and specifically the Congolese State to become increasingly capable, accountable and responsive to the expressed demands of Congolese citizens. The programme will be articulated in three integrated components: 1) Collective Action (CA) or 'the demand side'; 2) Systems Strengthening (SS) or 'the supply side'; and 3) Evaluation. The expected Outputs are:

• Poor men and women are increasingly empowered to hold a legitimate Congolese state to account (Component 1);
• The policy development, planning and execution capability of the Congolese public administration is strengthened (Component 2);
• DFID DRC's development portfolio is fully integrated, nationally, provincially and locally.

The IRC will be leading a consortium for the CA component of this opportunity. The programme will be implemented across multiple provinces and will involve governance as well as voice and empowerment related activities around health, education, water, livelihoods, security, justice and media, among others.

THE LEAD VOICE AND EMPOWERMENT ADVISER POSITION

The Lead Voice and Empowerment Adviser will be part of the senior management team of the project and placed under the supervision of the Team Leader. She or He will be specifically responsible for producing relevant program materials and tools, providing technical advice, planning and supporting project activities that will work toward ensuring citizens and civil society organizations (CSOs) have a greater voice and that local governments and service providers are more accountable for delivering basic services. This will specifically involve working closely with local community groups and CSOs along with local governments, service providers and programme partners on those issues. The project will be implemented across multiple provinces and will involve regular travel to field sites.

The IRC is requesting applications from candidates with significant experience in voice and empowerment, community driven development as well as civil society development. The selected candidate will also have experience in providing technical advice to large-scale governance and decentralization programs in fragile and conflict affected states and in francophone sub-Saharan Africa in particular.

It is also currently planned that in anticipation of CASS funding, the position would support the DRC Governance Program in its voice & empowerment activities, especially around governance issues in education, health, water, community development and conflict mitigation.

Main Responsibilities:

• Provide leadership in the development or adaptation of programming models which allow for greater participation of communities and civil society in decision-making, greater responsiveness to their needs, priorities and demands, and stronger accountability;
• Develop a methodology to identify and strengthen civil society organizations that can help these organizations to better amplify community voice through understanding, articulating and advocating for communities needs with authorities at the district, provincial and national levels;
• Foster close relationships with government officials involved in decentralization, with a particular focus on district and provincial governments;
• Develop the strategy and work plan for the implementation of the Voice & Empowerment component of the project in collaboration with other programme advisers, key government officials, civil society and other stakeholders;
• Ensure that V&E activities are implemented according to the work plan, ensuring a balance between the need for timely achievement of objectives and the importance of quality processes and methodological rigor;
• Oversee the quality of programming at central, provincial and local levels around voice and empowerment and ensures that implementation strategies reflect the latest available evidence and best practices;
• Support political economy and conflict analyses, monitoring and evaluation activities and help design research initiatives to learn and generate evidence from programme activities;
• Identify priorities for support from the IRC's Governance Technical Unit and other project partners.

Job Qualifications, Skills and Experience:

• Post graduate degree in international development studies, social sciences, economics, public administration or other relevant field or equivalent combination of academic and project implementation experience required;
• At least five years of professional experience providing technical advice and implementing large scale governance and decentralization projects in developing countries and fragile states, with experience of DFID funded interventions in this sector especially desirable;
• Specific expertize and track record around social accountability, community driven development and other related voice and empowerment initiatives in the context of the provision of health, education, water and other basic services;
• Experience working with national and local CSOs as well as supporting their organizational development;
• Knowledge of political economy and conflict analysis as well as adaptive programming approaches strongly desirable;
• Strong personnel leadership skills, as well as mentoring and training abilities;
• Strong computer skills in MS Office (Word, Excel, Power Point, Access, Outlook);
• Ability to communicate and write well in both French and English is essential;
• Ability to work under pressure and a multicultural context;
• Previous work experience in DRC or francophone Sub-Saharan Africa highly desirable.

Note: This position is contingent on IRC being awarded anticipated funding

Please follow this link to apply: http://www.aplitrak.com/?adid=a2F0cmluYW1pbGxlci44MzMzOC4zODMwQGlyYy5hcGxpdHJhay5jb20