Since 1963 and in 148 countries, ACDI/VOCA has empowered people in developing and transitional nations to succeed in the global economy. Based in Washington, D.C., ACDI/VOCA is a nonprofit international development organization that designs and delivers technical and management solutions in agriculture, economic growth, and resilience to promote economic prosperity and social inclusion.

Director of Collaborating, Learning and Adapting (CLA) and Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL), Bangladesh

ACDI/VOCA is seeking a Director of CLA and MEL for an anticipated access to finance program in Bangladesh funded by USAID. The program will increase access to finance for small- and medium-sized agribusinesses, smallholder farmers, and the rural poor to become more creditworthy, and stimulate increased lending from banks, microfinance institutions, and other lenders through the use of blended finance.

The Director of CLA and MEL will co-develop and facilitate learning workshops with MEL and technical leads, engaging partners in identifying evidence-based ways to adapt and scale interventions. S/he will design and manage the CLA and MEL plan and learning agenda on technical and management processes. They will supervise the MEL, KM, and reporting functions to systematically generate, synthesize, share, and apply learning, effective, and adaptive management. The program is anticipated to start in 2023 and this position will be based in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

Responsibilities

• Provide strategic leadership for MEL learning and knowledge exchange
• Create, share, and manage relevant knowledge assets that support program outcomes
• Ensure that programmatic learning and results are fully documented, shared, and used to drive adaptive management processes
• Lead the collection, analysis, documentation, dissemination, and use of best practices and lessons learned
• Design and implement internal and external knowledge exchange and learning events to improve peer-to-peer learning, knowledge sharing and application
• Develop and/or maintain strategic relationships with relevant stakeholders to promote effective coordination, collaboration, and dissemination of program learning
• Support the design of and manage the MEL framework and plan that incorporates CLA principles and components
• Lead the baseline data collection process, develop the MEL plan, and perform other related monitoring and evaluation efforts for the Activity, including leading the MEL team
• Ensure effective reporting, data collection, and monitoring systems are in place
• Provide technical assistance to ACDI/VOCA staff members and partner organization staff in the utilization and management of monitoring and impact assessment tools
• Develop and test instruments for data collection; collect, analyze, and summarize field visit reports from program technical staff and implementing partners
• Evaluate the integration of project design with the program strategy and the impact of business and technical processes to the program
• Conduct qualitative and quantitative program impact surveys to ensure that project goals are met and that the team constantly improves program implementation quality
• Conduct data quality reviews to ensure that all information required for submission to donor is collected in a valid, reliable, and timely manner
• Complete impact assessment, baseline, midline, and end line surveys to assess the impact of the project on livelihoods
• Design learning approaches that enable analysis of data, context, and emerging experience, as well as iterative adaptive management for the Activity’s technical approaches

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in evaluation, development studies, economics, statistics, or relevant field is required; master’s degree is desired.
• Minimum 7 years of experience managing the M&E component of a donor-funded project, USAID preferred.
• Proven experience in quantitative and qualitative research methods, survey design and implementation, and statistical data analysis is required.
• Familiarity with applying the Collaborating, Learning and Adapting (CLA) approach to management is desired.
• Experience working in Bangladesh preferred.
• Fluency in English required, Bangla preferred.

Bangladeshi nationals are strongly encouraged to apply.