Interim Director Youth Employment, UK, NL, US or other locations

Location: UK, NL, US or other Mercy Corps locations – flexible working environment Position Status: Full-time, permanent Salary: Edinburgh:circa 62K, London: circa 73K, NL: circa 71K – other locations to be benchmarked based on local scales and depending on experience Closing Date: apply with CV and Cover Letter by August 21th

Candidates must have the right to work in the place of hiring at the time of appointment.

About Mercy Corps

Mercy Corps is a leading global organization powered by the belief that a better world is possible. Our mission is to alleviate poverty, suffering, and oppression and work to build secure, productive, and just communities in over 40 countries around the world. Empowering people with bold solutions to help them become drivers of their economic well-being and become major players in their economy is a cornerstone to our strategy.

We are at a turning point – the contexts in which we work are evolving, the youth population is exploding, technology is rapidly changing the way youth engage in the workforce, and there are more needs than ever to deploy tactical programs that empower youth and allow them to contribute significantly to the economy.

Mercy Corps is implementing a large number of impactful programs focused on enabling young people to obtain safe and decent work. These programs have been grounded in a market systems development approach toward employment, rooted in deep analysis that supports employment pathways, and focused on the supply of job seekers and their capabilities, job creation and the demand for labor, and the networks and platforms that link the two. Our impact has been supported by a focus on innovative models and tech-focused jobs in complex settings.

Program / Department Summary

Our Program Department supports field-led work that delivers measurable impact. Mercy Corps’ Technical Support Unit (TSU) is a key part of the Program Department. It houses subject matter experts whose mission is to help our global teams apply the most effective solutions to the world’s toughest challenges, while building our global reputation and resources to do so. The TSU helps set agency-wide strategy and develops strategic approach documents and other technical briefs for their practice area to inform the entire organization’s work. In addition, it offers technical expertise to offices worldwide – supporting country strategy development and assessments, and engaging throughout the program life cycle from project design and proposal development to quality implementation and evaluations.

TSU Team members are well versed in global practices and abreast of sector specific trends. They represent Mercy Corps with donors and other strategic partners, and inform and influence both internal approaches and global understanding on how to move the needle on some of the most intractable humanitarian and development challenges of our time.

General Position Summary

The Interim TSU Director for Youth Employment will shepherd Mercy Corps’ global team, which supports employment programming in fragile contexts. They will continue to implement the vision for youth employment programming across our portfolio, drive critical technical and funding partnerships, provide leadership and technical support to our country teams, and lead the youth employment workstream. They will be a member of the TSU Leadership team composed of other Directors and Senior Directors and work closely with other TSU teams on complex, multi-disciplinary programs.

Essential Job Responsibilities

STRATEGIC VISION AND LEADERSHIP

• Implement the distinctive strategic vision for Youth Employment in close coordination with the Jobtech program, country teams and other agency departments and ensure it is continuously updated to reflect trends, learning over time and emerging capacities.
• Manage the balance of strategy development, program design and implementation, knowledge management and technical influence to maximize talents and impact of the team.
• Feed into the Agency’s new strategy to ensure youth employment is clearly represented and supports the agency’s outcomes and commitments.
• Spearhead innovative technical partnership initiatives (including social enterprises), including with businesses that care about addressing the youth employment challenge—all with a focus on linking young men and women to actual income-generating opportunities.
• Serve as key external communicator for Mercy Corps in a wide range of public fora.

PROGRAM DEVELOPMENT AND SUPPORT

• Provide counsel on strategic funding opportunities through technical design processes and lead on technical design of proposals.
• Explore and maximize new lines of revenue, especially relating to “big ideas”, multi country or TSU-led initiatives. Emphasis will be on growth of the Youth Employment portfolio among strategic donors such as USAID; private corporations; and US and European institutional donors.
• Guide teams to facilitate multi-team/multi country shared learning to standardize best practice, develop comparative advantages for new program development and advance strategic partnerships.
• Engage technical teams effectively on priority monitoring, evaluation and minimum standards relating to technical approaches.

TEAM MANAGEMENT

• Fully embrace the Agency’s culture and values and actively work to achieve its goals relating to Gender, Diversity and Inclusion.
• In collaboration with the Jobtech program, engage regularly on team workplans and budget issues, work collectively to advance coherence across the unit, and ensure communications flow up and down in a timely manner.
• Manage TSU teams and financial resources to ensure they are working in line with Agency’s Impact, Innovation and Influence objectives and TSU strategic priorities.
• Help team members identify and take advantage of opportunities to ensure professional growth and provide advice and encouragement to help them reach their full potential.
• Develop innovative ways of growing the team and resources.

REPRESENTATION, THOUGHT LEADERSHIP, AND PARTNERSHIP DEVELOPMENT

• Strengthen Mercy Corps’ profile and representation through expert interaction with internal stakeholders, partner agencies, donors and other networks and groups in the area of Youth Employment.
• In collaboration with the Jobtech Program. position Mercy Corps as a thought leader in the sector, particularly around the role technology can play, how to help youth get more out of the gig economy or other informal employment opportunities, how to address youth employment in fragile settings, how to apply a market system approach to employment, and how to empower young women, specifically.
• Participate in developing TSU knowledge management practices that lend coherence to TSU technical products as a whole and maximize impact through coordinated and creative dissemination practices. Liaise regularly with Knowledge Management and Communications teams to maximize impact.

Supervisory Responsibility

The position has technical supervisory responsibility over the Youth Employment technical team.

Accountability

Reports Directly To: Senior Director Economic Growth

Works Directly With: The Economic Growth TSU, the TSU leadership group (composed of all TSU Senior Directors and Directors); the Jobtech program; other members of the Program Team including the Senior VP of Program; Regional Directors and teams, Country Directors and teams, and others.

Accountability to Participants and Stakeholders

Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our program participants, community partners, other stakeholders, and to international standards guiding international relief and development work. We are committed to actively engaging communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.

Knowledge and Experience

• S./M.Sc. or equivalent or above in a relevant technical field is required
• At least 7 years experience in international development with a strong focus on employment generally and gender-sensitive youth employment specifically. Candidate should have experience:
  • Working overseas and managing employment focused field-based projects.
  • Strong understanding of and experience leading a market system approach, preferably to youth employment.
  • Strong understanding of the informal sector and the role young women can play.
  • Understanding of technology applications that support efficient labor markets (i.e. job matching), technology jobs, and the “gig” economy.
  • Experience writing and supporting proposal development
  • Strongly established professional networks and partnerships with key actors in the sector to increase scale and impact.
  • Management and supervisory experience preferred, including:
    • Effective coaching, development, and management of individual staff and teams.
    • Proven leadership, self-motivation, and interpersonal skills.
    • Leading matrixed teams for successful results in non-hierarchical settings.
    • Working with teams of diverse backgrounds.
  • Exceptionally strong verbal and written communications skills and organizational skills are required.
  • Willingness and ability to travel frequently to Mercy Corps project sites and field locations, including traveling to insecure environments, is required.
  • Familiarity with major donors such as USAID, DFID, the EC and relevant foundations and corporations.
  • Fluency in English is required; fluency in a foreign language, especially French or Arabic, strongly preferred.
  • Additional skills will include knowledge in human centered design / behavioral science, data analytics, and agile monitoring and learning.

Success Factors

The interim director must be a superb team player who has the technical and functional skills to be a leader in a strategic and field-responsive best in class technical unit. The interim director must be able to guide a team ensuring coherence of vision and strategy across groups as well as be able to identify and pursue new paths forward. They must guide vision and plan for their team(s) in ways that are mutually reinforcing with other parts of the TSU and the Jobtech program and contribute to the Agency’s new strategy. Directors interact expertly with other directors and senior directors and also with executive team members, peers and high profile donors to maximize MC influence and impact. In addition, the interim leader must have strong interpersonal and communication skills to effectively reach across departments within the agency and to networks and associations outside it to build critical partnership to further thought leadership, program innovation and ensure MC relevance and impact on the industry. The interim Director must have high proficiency for working in varied cultural, political, and religious environments, and must be able to travel and work successfully in austere environments and maintain poise in stressful situations.

Living Conditions / Environmental Conditions

This position is located in one of Mercy Corps’ headquarter or regional hub offices. The position requires travel at least 30% time to the field where living conditions may be exceptionally rugged or be in volatile environments where security protocols will need to be followed. Team members must be ready to deploy to field environments on short notice in response to any emergency or crisis. When in the field the team member must be able to work in remote settings and possibly over weekends and/or evenings as required by the schedule.

Ongoing Learning

In support of our belief that learning organizations are more effective, efficient and relevant to the communities we serve, we empower all team members to dedicate 5% of their time to learning activities that further their personal and/or professional growth and development

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

Achieving our mission begins with how we build our team and work together. Through our commitment to enriching our organization with people of different origins, beliefs, backgrounds, and ways of thinking, we are better able to leverage the collective power of our teams and solve the world’s most complex challenges. We strive for a culture of trust and respect, where everyone contributes their perspectives and authentic selves, reaches their potential as individuals and teams, and collaborates to do the best work of their lives.

We recognize that diversity and inclusion is a journey, and we are committed to learning, listening and evolving to become more diverse, equitable and inclusive than we are today.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Mercy Corps is an equal opportunity employer that does not tolerate discrimination on any basis. We actively seek out diverse backgrounds, perspectives, and skills so that we can be collectively stronger and have sustained global impact.

We are committed to providing an environment of respect and psychological safety where equal employment opportunities are available to all. We do not engage in or tolerate discrimination on the basis of race, color, gender identity, gender expression, religion, age, sexual orientation, national or ethnic origin, disability (including HIV/AIDS status), marital status, military veteran status or any other protected group in the locations where we work.

Safeguarding & Ethics

Mercy Corps is committed to ensuring that all individuals we come into contact with through our work, whether team members, community members, program participants or others, are treated with respect and dignity. We are committed to the core principles regarding prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse laid out by the UN Secretary General and IASC and have signed on to the Interagency Misconduct Disclosure Scheme. We will not tolerate child abuse, sexual exploitation, abuse, or harassment by or of our team members. As part of our commitment to a safe and inclusive work environment, team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner, respect local laws and customs, and to adhere to Mercy Corps Code of Conduct Policies and values at all times. Team members are required to complete mandatory Code of Conduct elearning courses upon hire and on an annual basis.

As a safeguarding measure, Mercy Corps screens all potential US-Based employees. This is done following the conclusion of recruitment and prior to assuming full employment.

Our screening process is designed to be transparent and completed in partnership with new Team Members. You will have the opportunity to disclose any prior convictions at the conclusion of the recruitment process before the check is initiated. We ask that you do not disclose any prior convictions in your application materials or during the recruitment process.