Application Deadline: July 31, 2020 midnight (GMT)
The Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) is an advocacy and grant making foundation that forms part of the global Open Society Foundations Network. OSIWA is based in Dakar, Senegal and works to support the creation of open societies in West Africa marked by functioning democracy, good governance, rule of law, basic freedoms, and widespread civic participation. It has offices in Abuja, Monrovia, Freetown and Conakry.
The Economic Governance and Advancement Program Manager is responsible for managing OSIWA’s economic governance and advancement portfolio across the countries covered in OSIWA’s strategy. This will include overseeing the work of program strategy design and development, management, monitoring and evaluation, and grant administration under OSIWA’s Economic Governance and Advancement portfolio. The Program Manager will report directly to the Executive Director and provide oversight over the sub-themes under the economic governance and advancement thematic area and supervising the compliance of programmatic interventions with the strategic goals and objectives of OSIWA’s strategy.
The Program Manager’s overall tasks will be a weighted balance of program-related and administrative tasks that can change based on program objectives.
Key Job Responsibilities
- Develop and manage OSIWA’s economic governance and advancement programmatic activities to achieve the organization’s strategic objectives and collaborate closely with the program managers managing other portfolios to ensure synergy
- Provide leadership and guidance on matters relating to OSIWA’s economic governance and advancement program strategy development and implementation
- Plan OSIWA’s economic governance and advancement program including the development of OSIWA’s strategies and policies for economic governance and advancement support and ensure that they are adhered to
- Identify new opportunities, assess applications for support and prepare materials, including recommendations for project funding approvals
- Supervise and provide substantive guidance, feedback and support to implementing partners for projects in countries where OSIWA operates
- Supervise and provide substantive guidance, feedback and support directly to the subthemes under the economic governance and advancement portfolio and support any initiatives related at a country level as required
Network and liaise with stakeholders and donors
- Keep current with developments in the economic governance area throughout the region and attend meetings of relevant organizations to keep informed of issues, concerns, needs
- Provide assessments of the future needs of area throughout the region for OSIWA’s strategy
- Coordinate effective collaboration with OSF network programs and strategic networking/partnerships with other development partners/organizations. Network and liaise with donors and stakeholders in the OSIWA focus countries.
Monitor and evaluate OSIWA’s economic governance and advancement programmatic activities
- Work with the LM&E team to design criteria for evaluating projects supported by OSIWA and ensure timely evaluations
- Evaluate the Programs’ overall work regularly and use this information to inform the future direction of OSIWA’s involvement in the development of area of work
- Consistently monitor projects supported by OSIWA for their effectiveness.
Manage the use of the economic governance and advancement program’s administrative and grants budget
- Maintain proper records on grants such as correspondence and reporting on grants usage
- Process new grants applications which include acknowledging receipt of applications and obtaining adequate information about these applications to enable informed recommendations to be made to the Board of Directors
- Supervise the preparation of program documents for Board meetings to ensure the optimal program quality of all materials, participate in Board meetings and supervise the implementation of program-related Board decisions
- Ensure timely and accurate financial and narrative reporting from grantees.
- The Program Manager may stand-in for another Program Manager in case of absence or vacancy.
Qualifications
- Excellent written and oral communication skills in English and French
- Computer skills including the ability to operate spreadsheets and word processing programs at a highly proficient level
- Comprehensive knowledge of West Africa in the context of economic governance and advancement and wide relationship networks across political actors and civil society organizations
- Experience in project/program management and grant making, learning, monitoring & evaluation and budget and financial management
- A self-starter, able to take initiative
- Ability to work in teams, listen and communicate clearly and effectively with people from diverse cultures and backgrounds
- Five years previous work experience at a senior management level in an international/regional organization working on similar issues to OSIWA (e.g. governance, justice, human rights in West Africa).
- Post graduate degree in law, economics, development studies, international relations, political science, social sciences or related humanities.
To Apply: Send resume (in English), cover letter, detailed CV including 3 references, and salary expectations by midnight (GMT) on July 31, 2020 to: osiwarecruitment@osiwa.org. No phone calls, please.
