Democratic Republic of the Congo: Emergency Grants Officer - DRC

****** Position is contingent on new funding Estimated start early June

About Mercy Corps

Mercy Corps is a leading global organization powered by the belief that a better world is possible. In disaster, in hardship, in more than 40 countries around the world, we partner to put bold solutions into action — helping people triumph over adversity and build stronger communities from within. Now, and for the future.

Program / Department Summary

Mercy Corps has been operating in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) since August 2007, with a staff of around 300 people working in North and South Kivu, with the overall country goal to support vulnerable communities through crises, while fostering programs that build resilience and promote long-term change. Mercy Corps' national office is in Goma with sub-field offices in Mweso (North Kivu) and Bukavu (South Kivu). Mercy Corps' key programming areas include a combination of longer-term development and immediate humanitarian response programs in order to:

1) Improve water service delivery and ensuring equitable access to Water, Sanitation and Hygiene services, in urban and rural areas;

2)Improve food security and nutrition;

3) Promote diversified livelihoods, economic recovery and development.

Mercy Corps DRC's humanitarian programs aim specifically to provide assistance to populations affected by the conflict and crisis in Eastern Congo. With funding from OFDA and Pooled Fund, Mercy Corps currently delivers emergency WASH assistance to displaced populations and host communities in North Kivu. With funding from UNICEF Mercy Corps leads a consortium of 3 organizations in the provision of multi-purpose cash assistance, emergency WASH, health and education services to displaced populations and host communities in Eastern Congo. With funding from ECHO and SDC, Mercy Corps delivers multipurpose cash assistance in Eastern Congo. Mercy Corps currently is expecting to integrate food security assistance to this cash program with anticipated funding from Food For Peace (FFP). All Mercy Corps interventions in DRC are implemented in a conflict, protection and gender sensitive manner.

General Position Summary

The Emergency Grants Officer is responsible for daily grant management of emergency programs and ensuring appropriate systems and support mechanisms are in place to track, analyze and report on results, as well as engagement with Program Managers and Sector Manager to ensure grant compliance. The Emergency Grants Officer is highly motivated, s/he is an effective communicator, s/he is highly motivated, self-driven and able to move forward complex projects with limited daily support and direction; s/he is able to work remotely with internal and external stakeholders to achieve common objectives.

Essential Job Responsibilities

Program Support

• Ensure that program implementation is responsive to communities and partners and consistent with Mercy Corps' relevant program guidelines, principles, values, quality standards and strategic plan.
• Supporting Managers, identify any gaps or capacity needs within the team and ensure training and capacity building is incorporated into program planning.
• Ensure high level of coordination between program team and finance, HR, procurement and logistics departments to ensure operational systems are in place and are followed to support program activities. Provide corrective measures and propose solutions to improve planning and efficiency, avoid last-minute requests and bottlenecks.
• Lead and oversee the application and integration of Mercy Corps' Program Management Minimum Standards ('PM@MC'), to help ensure Program Managers and teams are meeting the requirements.
• Conduct regular audits of adherence to PM@MC.
• Ensure coordination with communications team so that program information shared with stakeholders is presented in languages, formats and media that are appropriate for, accessible to, and can be understood by the target population.

Program development

• Support or lead the conceptualization and design of cost effective, innovative and high quality programs, ensuring relevance to stakeholders and agency strategy.
• Coordinate development of concept notes and proposals, including coordinating closely with Mercy Corps' DRC's technical, finance and operational staff, as well as headquarters and regional Technical Support Unit to facilitate input, and ensuring donor compliance.
• Ensure that all proposals incorporate lessons learned from past or ongoing programs.

grants compliance

• Provide technical and management support for the reporting requirements to the emergency portfolio.
• Prepare schedule of all official donor and partner reports and inform the relevant counterparts about deadlines.
• Review and coordinate all official donor reports for Mercy Corps emergency programs after drafting by program staff.
• Ensure project reports comply with donor and Mercy Corps' procedures and best practices.
• Draft program updates for donors and other key stakeholders.
• Produce other reports as required by supervisor.
• Work closely and in coordination with Mercy Corps offices in the USA and UK to establish a strong working relationship with HQ program officers.
• Build the capacity of DRC staff and local partners in the area of reporting and in capturing lessons learned to enable them to develop high quality reports and other documents.

Organizational Learning

• As part of our commitment to organizational learning and in support of our understanding that learning organizations are more effective, efficient and relevant to the communities they serve, we expect all team members to commit 5% of their time to learning activities that benefit Mercy Corps as well as themselves.

Accountability to Beneficiaries

• Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically
  to our beneficiaries and to international standards guiding international relief and development work, while actively engaging beneficiary communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.

Supervisory Responsibility

None

Accountability

Reports Directly To: Emergency Programs Director

Works Directly With: Program and Sector Managers, Emergency M&E Department, Finance Manager, Support Managers, Gender Advisor, Accountability department, HQ-based desk teams, and TSU staff, regional humanitarian response team.

Knowledge and Experience

• BA/BS or equivalent in international studies, economics or other relevant field; MA/S preferred.
• 2-3 years of experience with European and US institutional donors, including grants and proposal development experience.
• Field experience in conflict and development environments. Exposure to gender, protection, conflict mitigation.
• Ability to work in a sometimes solitary environment with moderate to high levels of insecurity and significant restrictions on personal movement.
• Demonstrated ability in proposal development and program design required.
• Excellent oral and written English and French skills required.
• Ability to deliver high quality reports within short deadlines.
• Demonstrable knowledge of DRC
• Ability to multi-task and juggle several tasks and relationships at one time.
• Excellent communication skills, experience in representing an organization.
• Demonstrated proficiency with the MS Office software (i.e., Word, Excel, PowerPoint) is required.
• Experience in designing and rolling-out operational research is preferred.
• Proven ability to work effectively in multi-cultural teams and with technical and administrative staff and consultants.

Success Factors

The successful Emergency Grants Officer will combine exceptional writing skills and experience in providing support to emergency programs. S/he will also have proven experience with cross-cultural team and will possess high level of adaptability and be able to adjust to the constantly changing working environment. S/he will have previous experience working on emergency programs in insecure and conflict context. Prioritizing, problem solving, ability to seize opportunities, attention to detail and strategic vision are essential. The most successful Mercy Corps staff members have a strong commitment to teamwork and accountability, thrive in evolving and changing environments and make effective written and verbal communication a priority in all situations.

Living Conditions / Environmental Conditions

This position is an unaccompanied position. Shared accommodation will be provided in Goma according to Mercy Corps DRC housing policy. Goma is a provincial capital of over 800,000 inhabitants. Travel may be required up to 15% of the time to program areas within North and South Kivu and Kinshasa. Living in Goma is comfortable, although water and electricity can be unstable. Outside Goma, travel can be dangerous and unpredictable due to armed forces and rebel activity.

While conditions in the country are improving, and security is quite stable in Goma, there are still pockets of violence and insecurity. Mercy Corps' sub-offices experience variable levels of insecurity, with the situation closely monitored by UN peacekeepers. Air travel is necessary to get from one end of the country to the other. Mobile phones and cellular service are widely available. Internet is available in all Mercy Corps offices. Travel to field sites will be required where living conditions are clean and secure, but basic. There are a number of health services available with evacuation options for serious illnesses. There's reasonable access to most consumer goods, although they can be expensive.

Mercy Corps Team members represent the agency both during and outside of work hours when deployed in a field posting or on a visit/TDY to a field posting. Team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner and respect local laws, customs and MC's policies, procedures, and values at all times and in all in-country venues.

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