Donor Engagement Coordinator

Established in 1977, GOAL is an international humanitarian agency dedicated to alleviating the suffering of the poor and the vulnerable and is currently operating in 14 countries world-wide. GOAL delivers a wide range of humanitarian and development programmes, ranging from humanitarian relief in disaster situations to supporting the development of healthcare services and building sustainable livelihoods. Since its foundation, GOAL has allocated more than €910 million to programmes in over 60 countries.

GOAL has an annual budget of approximately €130 million and is supported by a range of donors including the Irish Government, UK Government, USAID, the European Union, individuals, trusts and foundations. Informed by its track record over the last 40 years, GOAL remains committed to responding to humanitarian crises and tackling extreme poverty around the world.

GOAL identifies, develops and manages opportunities to work with others and further GOAL’s organisational objective of reducing extreme poverty and strengthening resilience through pro-active engagement with an array of global partners, such as donors (institutional and large foundations), international NGOs and commercial entities. GOAL is recruiting a Donor Engagement Coordinator (Europe) to support its Business Development Strategy in Europe.

Overview of the role

Reporting to GOAL’s Strategic Partnerships Director, the Donor Engagement Coordinator (Europe) will take a lead role in driving GOAL’s funding and partnership strategy in Europe. GOAL has adopted an ambitious funding strategy that seeks to develop existing, and build more, strategic partnerships with bilateral and multilateral donor agencies within the European market to increase our income, influence, and programmatic impact. These partnerships will include institutional donors along with trusts, foundations and alternative donors.

GOAL is looking for a determined, passionate individual who can support the Strategic Partnerships Director in developing these partnerships, with a particular focus on the implementation of GOAL’s engagement strategy with the EU and the development of funding relationships with other European bi-lateral donors and UN Agencies.

Applying a high attention to detail to all duties, s/he will have excellent research and analytical skills as well as programme design and proposal writing and development experience and competencies.

A strong communicator who is skilled at building long-term, productive relationships, s/he will play a key role in the implementation of our global funding strategy and work with team members in the Global Funding and Business Development Team along with our Country Programmes.

GOAL receives significant funding from the EU; however, there is significant untapped potential to expand our funding streams in the EU and European market (including across the European Commission) and the space to be innovative and bold in creating and converting important opportunities for financial and programmatic cooperation.

Main responsibilities

Coordinate GOAL’s global strategic relationship with the European Union

· Support the Strategic Partnerships Director in implementing GOAL’s EU Funding Strategy, to meet and exceed funding targets, including developing appropriate relationships with key donor personnel across relevant EU agencies (ie, DG ECHO, DG INTPA, DG NEAR, EEAS, etc.) and identifying appropriate donor contacts for different issues relevant to GOAL.

· Ensure oversight and coordination on all contact with the relevant donor across GOAL, including from the Desk Officers, Regional Directors, Country Directors, Technical Team (TT), Finance, Fundraising and Communications.

· Proactively identify new funding opportunities for GOAL. Research, analyse and maintain a pipeline of donor calls across relevant EU agencies and guide the opportunities through GOAL’s PRDP decision-making and proposal development and submission process.

· Manage the development of new funding applications to secure funding from the EU – this may involve coordinating and at times writing concept notes and proposals. Oversee all internal coordination and guidance for GOAL’s applications under ECHO Humanitarian Implementation Plans (HIPs).

· Provide advice and input on reports when may be required, ensuring any non-achievement of results is explained to the donor’s satisfaction.

· Ensure appropriate GOAL participation in donor(s) early market engagement meetings, thematic events, partners meetings and other donor fora.

· Provide analysis and briefings for donor meetings.

· Coordinate and participate in country-level meetings with relevant EU staff.

Support Business Development Strategy for Europe and globally

· Lead and/or support proposal development as required in a proposal reviewer and/or developer role, which may involve the writing, editing, revising and enhancing of proposals as may be required.

· Continuously support the development of GOALs organisational business case or pitch to partners in Europe.

· Support the Strategic Partnerships Director in the implementation of the European Funding Strategy, including the development and coordination of relationships with existing and new European bi-lateral donors, along with new donors globally, including UN Agencies (eg, WFP, UNHCR, etc).

· Support the identification and analysis of new business opportunities along with the development of win strategies. Advise country programmes on upcoming funding opportunities and prepositioning efforts; providing direct support on proposal development processes where appropriate and required.

· Provide oversight and coordination of GOAL’s donor portfolio in Europe.

· Enhance organisational knowledge on institutional donors in Europe (trends, best practice, policies, innovations).

· Coordination with other key GOAL departments including the Emergency Response team to support GOAL’s responses in new countries or geographies of strategic relevance to the EU as well as the Global External Affairs team to support efforts to influence policy and EU agendas.

· Develop excellent relationships internally with colleagues at HQ and field offices to understand programme budgets, resource requirements and areas of activity to enable strategic applications for funding.

· Provide advisory services across the organisation for the relevant donor(s) including on upcoming and current funding opportunities, strategy and funding trends. Provide guidance on (non-financial) policy development to ensure coherence with donor requirements and expectations.

· Support the development of tools, guidance documents, templates, trainings to enhance organisational knowledge and capacity of European and other relevant donors. This will include the development of marketing materials such as donor newsletters, programme overviews, country profiles for sharing with external stakeholders.

· Co-ordinate GOAL’s engagement and relationship with VOICE and CONCORD networks.

· Provide support in other research and writing tasks as may be required.

Person Specification

Essential

· 4 – 6 years’ experience, at least two of which demonstrate a continued progress of institutional fundraising for humanitarian or development programming.

· Ability to represent GOAL with donors, other INGOs, commercial entities and other external institutions and networks.

· Strong proposal development coordination and writing skills.

· Knowledge and understanding of EU funding mechanisms and priorities.

· Ability to work effectively with diverse groups of people, often on a remote basis.

· Ability to manage a diverse workload, work under own initiative and remain flexible to changing priorities.

· Strategic approach to partnership management, with good communication, networking and influencing skills – both written and verbal.

· Proven analytical skills and the ability to think strategically.

· Educated to degree level

· Willingness to travel (potentially up to 25%) sometimes at short notice, to GOAL’s operational locations and elsewhere.

Desirable

· Educated to Masters level

· Strong track record of securing multiple high-value grants from institutional donors, trusts or foundations globally

· French, German or Spanish language skills

· Extensive overseas management experience within humanitarian and development contexts

· Previous experience working for an institutional donor or foundation

· Knowledge and understanding of other European Institution funding mechanisms and priorities.