Country Director – Angola

The HALO Trust’s mission is to save lives and restore livelihoods for those affected by conflict. HALO is known for its work to clear landmines and disposal of other explosive hazards such as bombs, rockets, and improvised explosive devices (IEDs), and HALO’s work in Angola supports community resilience post conflict with a focus on women’s empowerment and environmental conservation.

HALO has been working in Angola since 1994 and now employs over 1,300 staff working in demining, explosive ordnance risk education, weapons and ammunition management, women’s empowerment and conservation. There are over 70 different types of landmines in Angola from an estimated 41 years of minelaying during the war for independence and civil war which persisted from 1961 to 2002. As a signatory of the Ottawa Treaty, HALO supports the Government of Angola in reaching its treaty obligations. To date, HALO has cleared over 100,000 mines and made over 25km2 of land safe for use across the country.

This is a great opportunity to lead a dynamic and expanding team to deliver impactful projects. The Country Director will lead the strategy of the programme and have the autonomy to progress the programme through internal change and thematic expansion.

About the Role

HALO is seeking to recruit a dynamic and solution-oriented Country Director who will serve as the legal and primary HALO representative in Angola with the overall responsibility for managing HALO Angola’s activities. The Country Director is responsible for ensuring compliance across all departments in the programme in accordance with internal and national regulations and legislation. The Country Director will report to the Head of Region for Southern Africa and coordinate with HALO’s HQ. The Country Director will line manage five direct reports and approximately 1,100 indirect reports, leading on the management of the donor relations team, human resources and finance team and be supported by two deputy Country Directors overseeing operations and other support departments respectably.

The Country Director is responsible for leading the strategic direction of the programme, including the design, review and implementation of the programme’s strategy in accordance with HALO’s organizational objectives and charitable purpose. This includes establishing long-term strategic goals for the programme and developing the capacity and strength of the existing team. The Angola programme has projects spanning across all of HALO’s three strategic goals and is especially focused on the expansion of activities surrounding women’s empowerment and inclusivity, and the linkages between conflict, conservation and mine action. The successful candidate to this role will be a strategic thinker who can demonstrate successfully building capacity to achieve strategic objectives.

The Country Director is responsible for the accountable execution of donor projects, working directly with relevant stakeholders in-country and liaising with others remotely. The Country Director is responsible for the creation of project implementation plans, monitoring and adjustment to ensure successful delivery to donors. The Angola programme currently has sixteen ongoing projects from a variety of governmental and private donors with an annual turnover of circa $10 million. The successful candidate for this role must be able to monitor from a higher level as well as work in the details when needed. The successful candidate will need to have exceptional liaison, organisational and financial acumen.

The successful candidate will need to be an inspiring leader, capable of managing the large and diverse workforce with a focus on empowerment, communication and professional development. The Country Director will be needed to work on improving HR and Safeguarding processes and procedures with a desire to lead on implementing impactful systematic change. This role requires a candidate with strong coordination capabilities, and a commitment to lead by example to maintain high professional standards.

This role will be based in Angola, in HALO’s main office in Huambo. The Country Director’s time will be split between the capital, Luanda and Huambo. Occasional travel to the other offices in other provinces (Bie, Benguela and Kuando Kubango) will be required. The working pattern is 40 hours per week, full time with the office currently work Monday to Saturday midday.

Key Skills and Competencies Required

Essential

• Experience in managing compliance across project management, financial, labour law and other departmental functions
• Experience in strategy building and implementation
• Proven experience establishing and building new stakeholder relationships
• Good donor relationship management, including reporting and other communications
• Experience working with a variety of donor types, such as government, private, corporate and foundations
• Varied contract and budget management experience
• Financial management, including budget building and use of Adaptive Insights
• Proven experience leading and managing teams, building capacity and an inclusive workplace
• Experience in project design, proposal writing and review
• Experience monitoring project performance against indicators
• Results based management experience
• Confident in representing HALO at events
• Project management experience
• Advanced Microsoft Office skills
• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills, and ability to foster a cooperative work environment
• Fluent English

Desirable

• Portuguese language skills or a strong willingness to learn
• Experience implementing professional development plans for staff
• Experience in Safeguarding management
• Experience in mine action
• Experience in international development
• Experience assessing and managing risk
• Experience in incident and/or crisis management
• Experience working on projects relating to gender and women’s empowerment

HALO requires its applicants to work in line with our values, which are:

• Courage
• Discipline
• Integrity
• Respect for Others
• Loyalty
• Selfless Commitment

For external applications, in addition to confirming that you can meet the essential skills, competencies and HALO’s values, job offers may be subject to two satisfactory references, a pre-employment medical and a criminal records check

BENEFITS.

Salary: Depending upon experience.

Accommodation: Shared accommodation with other international staff is available and private accommodation, as well as accompanied posting will be considered.

The HALO Trust is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate against any applicant for employment because of age, race, religion, colour, national origin, disability, gender (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, or marriage or civil partnership/domestic partnership status. The HALO Trust is committed to a culture that is both diverse and inclusive and we seek to recruit, develop, and retain the most talented people from a diverse candidate pool.