Chief of Party, USAID/DRC Resilience and Food Security Activity (RFSA)

Summary:

Save the Children is seeking a Chief of Party (COP) for an anticipated five-year USAID-funded Resilience Food Security Activity (RFSA) in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The RFSA will seek to sustainably improve food and nutrition security and resilience among poor and chronically vulnerable households and communities in selected regions. The estimated implementation timeframe for the RFSA is 2023 – 2028. Hiring is contingent upon successful award of the project and USAID approval of the candidate.

The proposed program will be an integrated, multi-sectoral food and nutrition security intervention. The COP is responsible for the overall management and representation of the activity and is ultimately accountable for the delivery of desired program results, an effective adaptive management approach, relationships with a range of stakeholders, and management of the program team and consortium.

What You’ll Be Doing (Essential Duties):

• Manage the overall administrative, financial and technical activities of the program.
• Lead overall program planning, putting in place team structures, technical and operational approaches, infrastructure, monitoring and evaluation (M&E), and feedback loops required for program delivery and success.
• Lead partnerships within the program consortium, as well as with external stakeholders as needed, to foster the teamwork required for program success.
• Coordinate the Activity’s refinement period’s (initial 12-24 months) formative research studies, ensuring that these remain on track and that findings are synthesized to inform revisions to the program’s design (including its theory of change), scope, targeting methodology and approach.
• Represent the program to donor officials, host government officials, partner representatives, local stakeholders, and team members.
• Review, approve and contribute to major program strategies such as the M&E plan, the learning plan, the collaborating, learning and adapting (CLA) approach, the gender strategy, and technical or thematic strategies. Provide oversight and quality control to the program’s thematic approaches and implementation, leading course corrections as required.
• Lead annual planning processes and associated donor resource requests, monitoring implementation progress as compared to these plans.
• Ensure the quality of all program deliverables, inclusive of activities, outputs, documentation and reporting.
• Ensure sound program financial management and reporting.
• Ensure sound program logistical and operational structures and management.
• Ensure compliance with donor, host government and Save the Children policies and procedures.
• Recruit, develop and manage the program team, ensuring that adequate and appropriate capacity building plans are in place and that human resources policies are appropriate for team retention and high performance.
• Demonstrate a commitment to gender and youth integration in both the programmatic and operational aspects of the activity.
• Ensure that the program deploys an effective CLA approach, such that the activity is able to evolve in a changing context to achieve desired outcomes.
• Oversee the program’s security management approach, working with country office counterparts.

Required Qualifications:

• A Master’s degree in a relevant field (international relations, agriculture, finance, economics, nutrition, public health, business administration, etc.) combined with at least 10 years of progressively responsible experience effectively managing USAID resilience activities involving implementation by multiple sub-awardees.
• Technical expertise in food and nutrition security, agricultural development and resilience programming as well as knowledge of USAID, specifically Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance (BHA) programming priorities.
• Proven leadership skills managing projects of a similar size and scope in developing countries facing complex, volatile, and uncertain contexts.
• Demonstrated ability to build and maintain relationships with host governments, donors, other donor-funded projects and stakeholders, local organizations, and partners.
• Demonstrated commitment to the importance of gender and youth dynamics in food security programming and within staff and management of the activity.
• Ability to review and ensure accuracy of complex budget and expenditure formats.
• Proven ability to lead multi-sectoral, complex programs of a similar size and scope, preferably in DRC or other Central African countries.
• Demonstrated experience recruiting, developing, and managing staff, as well as experience managing programmatic and financial reporting.
• Ability and willingness to travel frequently.
• Excellent oral and written communication and presentation skills in English and French.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Previous professional experience leading development projects in the DRC.
• Familiarity with USG-funded Resilience and Food Security Activities and/or the Government of DRC.
• Familiarity with the complexities of the Great Lakes Region.
• Experience working in fragile contexts including those affected by conflict, natural disasters and other political/socio-economic stressors.
• Experience working with vulnerable populations, in particular women, youth and migrant populations.
• Fluency one or more languages spoken in DRC such as Swahili, Tshiluba or Lingala.

Why you should join the Save the Children Team…

Save the Children US offers outstanding benefits that include health, dental, vision and life insurances, pet insurance, short-term and long-term disability coverage, an Employee Assistance Program, 403(b), generous vacation, personal sick leave, family leave, parental/adoption leave, commuter benefits, dress for your day, and much more.

Click here to learn more about how Save the Children US will invest in YOU!

About Save the Children:

No matter your role when you join Save the Children, each and every day you will challenge yourself to devote your skills, talent and expertise to changing the world for kids. It’s an ambitious goal, and a meaningful one no matter how you see yourself professionally: an accountant, a writer, a data analyst, a teacher, a driver, a designer, or any one of the hundreds of dozens of roles we’re looking to fill every day.

You see, Save the Children believes every child deserves a future. In the United States and around the world, we give children a healthy start in life, the opportunity to learn and protection from harm. We do whatever it takes for children – every day and in times of crisis – transforming their lives and the future we share.

Our work for children and their families requires that we commit—at every opportunity—to work together to identify and dismantle persistent systemic and structural racism, inequality, and any other forms of discrimination in this country and beyond. As an anti-racist organization, Save the Children will not tolerate discrimination in any form—in our employment practices, amongst our staff, in our leadership or toward the people we serve. We stand in solidarity with all people to fight for equal rights, justice, inclusion, and belonging.

We provide equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and qualified applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, ancestry, sexual orientation, national origin, age, handicap, disability, marital status, or status as a veteran. Save the Children complies with all applicable laws.

Save the Children is committed to conducting its programs and operations in a manner that is safe for the children it serves and helping protect the children with whom we are in contact. All Save the Children representatives are explicitly prohibited from engaging in any activity that may result in any kind of child abuse. In addition, it is Save the Children’s policy to create and proactively maintain an environment that aims to prevent and deter any actions and omissions, whether deliberate or inadvertent, that place children at the risk of any kind of child abuse. All our representatives are expected to conduct themselves in a manner consistent with this commitment and obligation.

Save the Children is committed to minimizing safety and security risks for our valued employees, ensuring all are given training, support and information to reduce their risk exposure while maximizing the impact of our programs for children and families. Our shared duty, both agency and individual, is to seek and maintain safe working conditions for all.