Director Program Operations

ROLE PURPOSE:

The Director Program Operations supports the Country Director in the overall management of the Country Office and is directly responsible for implementation of all programmes in country, the management of all field offices, emergency preparedness and response and supply chain for the Niger Country Office.

KEY AREAS OF ACCOUNTABILITY:

As a member of the Senior Management Team:

• Support the CD on the day to day management of the Country Office with particular focus on cross departmental ways of working and collaboration for improved quality in programme design, budgeting, compliance and implementation.
• Demonstrate a collective leadership approach taking responsibility for and appropriately representing SMT decisions to staff and partners
• Support a working culture that reflects our values, promotes accountability, diversity and high performance
• Support the SMT in ensuring a field focus and a culture of learning, creativity and innovation that allows our people to deliver outstanding results for children and excellent customer service for our Members and donors
• Support the CD and PDQ Director in building strategic relationships and in representing the Country Office with host government authorities, donors, partner agencies including major institutional donors, and local and international NGOs as well as Members and SCI
• Provide strategic vision and direction for the Country Office, supporting the CD and PDQ Director in positioning SCI in Niger as a partner of choice for child focused programming in Niger.
• Support the development of programme strategies and annual plans ensuring participation of the operations team and active contribution to the CSP.
• Participate in conceptualizing and designing cost effective, innovative and high quality and safe programming to serve difficult to reach children and ensure quality enjoys a strong voice in programme implementation at all times.
• Help design and implement a coherent organizational structure that is consistent with agency practices, appropriate to program needs and cost effective.
• Ensure that the required support is provided promptly, at scale and in line with the rules and principles during emergencies, working closely with the Regional Office

Leadership of Program Implementation

• Provide leadership to the Operations team ensuring overall coordination of program implementation and appropriate delegation of responsibility for field delivery of high quality and safe programming in line with the objectives of the country strategy
• In collaboration with the Director of Program Development and Quality, develop and maintain One Save the Children vision for programming, as well as effective and efficient allocation of Country Office resources to achieve strategic goals and commitments
• In close coordination with the Director of Program Development and Quality and Director of Finance, participate in program proposal process and ensure that all programs progress in accordance with grant agreements, are completed within time and on budget
• Working with Director of Program Development and Quality, participate in conceptualizing and designing cost effective, innovative and high quality and safe programs to serve difficult to reach children
• Serve as overall budget holder for most programming at field level; manage and support budget holders for individual projects and grants
• Ensure programs are implemented in ways responsive to the communities, and children in line with Save the Children principles, values and strategic plan and following Save the Children compliance procedures. This includes working with government and national NGO-partners to strengthen national capacity
• Ensure preparation of timely and high-quality progress reports, program reports, and donor reports supporting project leads where needed to ensure our reports show case our work and remain compliant with donor formats and regulations.

Supply Chain

• Ensure that the CO logistics capacity and systems meet the SCI MOS and are able to satisfy the programming requirements
• Ensure appropriate and adequate emergency logistics procedures are detailed in the Country Office Emergency Preparedness Plan in order to enable rapid scale up
• Provide leadership to the CO Supply Chain department ensuring that all CO supply chain activities (fleet, assets, transport, supply chain, base setup etc) are coordinated
• Ensure goods and services procured are cost effective and of standard quality
• Ensure procurement processes are effectively implemented
• Work closely with the procurement team in negotiating the best deals with suppliers

Humanitarian Response Management

• Strengthen the country office readiness to respond to emergencies in line with global SCI humanitarian goal and benchmarks
• Ensure that the country office designs, updates and implements a full set of humanitarian preparedness actions, drawing on SC member input and resources
• Mount appropriate and timely responses at scale to all emergencies consistent with established benchmarks, plans and organizational policies, and in close cooperation with incoming surge teams
• Ensure that all country office staff across departments and sub offices are familiar with, adhere to and implement the procedures and processes detailed in the Rules and Principles for humanitarian response
• In coordination with Country Director and Program Design and Quality maintain consistent and coherent engagement in key inter-agency emergency preparedness and response coordination mechanisms including the Cluster system

Awards Management

• Ensure full ownership of awards management at field level
• Provide overall leadership to the awards team to ensure donor compliance are met throughout the life of the award
• In collaboration with the Director of PDQ, to ensure quality of reporting is met
• In collaboration with the Director of PDQ, to ensure the country office funding strategy is aligned with the Country Office Strategic Plan and that it is reviewed periodically to capture major changes
• To maintain oversight on the country office portfolio and regularly share main updates with the Country Director and the SMT.

Representation and Networking

• Proactively seek and maintain, active and regular working relationships with host government authorities, development, humanitarian and corporate donors and partner agencies (e.g., USAID, ECHO, SDC, EU, etc.), Scandinavian the UN system, and local and international NGOs for operations matters.
• Interacts regularly with the international donor and NGO community to ensure awareness of SC programmes and to collect up to date information about the plans and programmes of other actors.