Country Director – Surge Team

Reports to: Head of Emergency Operations overall and between deployments, and relevant Regional Director while on deployment in a CD capacity

Basic salary: €69, 438 to €81,692

Responsible for: All staff in a country programme when deployed in a CD position

Job location: Members of Concern’s Surge Team will be deployed to various Concern country programmes for varying time periods, typically ranging from six weeks up to six months. When not deployed, team members will work from home.

Contract:

• 2 year Full Time Fixed Term Contract
• Unaccompanied position
• 8 weeks annual leave increasing to 10 weeks after completion of first full year and R&R where applicable
• Up to 3 weeks home-based work
• All Surge Team members must be available to travel overseas within 24 hours of being requested to deploy

Job Purpose:

To be responsible for the development and effective management and oversight of Concern Worldwide country programmes in line with Concern’s organisational and country specific strategies, policies and procedures. This could be in a new country of operation where emergency assessments will be part of the role, or in an established country programme. To represent Concern to the government, donors, and other appropriate bodies – including clusters and the HCT, agencies and the media.

To fill appropriate staffing gaps in non-emergency programmes and existing chronic emergencies. This may require deployments in a specialist advisory as well as managerial capacity, both CD roles and in roles that could report to CD level – Programme Director, Systems Director, Area Coordinator, Programme Coordinator etc.

Key Responsibilities:

Emergency Response

• Lead in undertaking emergency assessments.
• Lead in the design, delivery and management and oversight of emergency response programmes.

Programmes

• Manage country programmes in line with organisational policies and procedures, and with external standards such as the Red Cross/Red Crescent Code of Conduct, Sphere, and the CHS standard.
• Overall responsibility for strategic management of the programme, in particular preparing for and effectively responding to humanitarian situations. In some instances, leading a team to be deployed to a new emergency.
• On-going development and management of the funding strategy for the country programme.
• Maintaining an awareness of the current and potential future economic, political and social situation within the country and region.

Security and Representation

• Overall responsibility for security management: ensuring that the security situation is reviewed constantly, a Security Management Plan (SMP) is developed and updated as necessary, and that staff are aware of security procedures and comply with them.
• Representation of Concern nationally, maintaining coordination and networking relationships with the government, donors and other actors in the country, especially the clusters and the HCT.

Staff Management, Administration, Finance, Logistics

• Staff management and development, including in areas such as project design, proposal and report writing, monitoring and evaluation and other key areas. Provide general management support to direct reports.
• Ensuring that support systems (IT, Finance, HR/Administration, Logistics and Transport) are in place and functioning in accordance with good practice and organisational policy and procedures.
• Overseeing the finance function within the country programme with overall responsibility for budgeting, reporting and monitoring of all income and expenditure.
• Overseeing the HR function within the country programme and ensuring that policies and procedures reflect global policies.
• Ensuring all internal and external reports are sent to Regional Desk at HQ in a timely fashion and adhering to high standards of quality.

Communication

• Maintaining good, regular and open communication with the Regional Director and Desk Officer for the region.
• Contributing to organisational learning through liaison with other organisations and Concern fields and sharing lessons to be learned.
• Engaging with the media as required.
• Performing any other related duties as assigned by the Regional Director.

Skills and Experience Required:

Essential:

• Third level degree in a relevant discipline.
• 5 years’ experience working in a senior manager position within an international NGO.
• Proven experience of managing diverse and multi-sectoral programmes such as WASH, shelter, food aid, camp management, NFI distributions, cash transfers and early recovery, etc.
• Emergency assessment and response experience.
• Experience of security management in insecure contexts.
• Experience in management of financial resources and overseeing human resources, administration and logistics functions.
• Experience in building relations with donors and securing external donor funding.
• Excellent communication and presentation skills, including fluency in written and spoken English and a working command of French
• Willingness to travel frequently to rural field locations

Concern Worldwide’s Core Competencies

This is a key leadership position; potential candidates are expected to demonstrate significant ability in the following areas:

• Leadership;
• Communicating and working with others;
• Delivering results;
• Planning and decision-making;
• Managing yourself;
• Creativity and innovation;
• Influence, advocacy and networking;
• Change management.