Program Development and Fundraising Consultant

Job Purpose

The Consultant will support the Country Director and other country program staff to grow AAF’s income and partnerships in order to resource our program strategy in Iraq, Yemen and Ukraine.

To achieve the country program ambitions, the Consultant will be responsible for developing and implementing resource mobilization strategies to forge strategic partnerships between AAF and institutional donors, identifying and developing new funding opportunities. The post holder will be expected to work in achieving the funding strategy.

Key Responsibilities

Planning/Strategy

• Support the CD, and the Management Team, lead in the implementation of AAF Strategy, and accompanying annexes, and achieve its commitments
• Identify new funding opportunities that goes with the programs of AAF
• Ensure program compliance with donor regulations, local government regulations, and AAF internal control processes
• Lead, develop, implement the Fundraising Strategy, and associated documents (donor mapping, donor engagement plan, action plan etc.
• Lead on the identification of potential new development opportunities, such as new funder or programs opportunities with good synergy with AAF Strategy and programs priorities and the context.

Funding and Donor Engagement

• Supports staff to adhere to funding policies and guidelines of the confederation.
• Collaborates with other affiliates to co-create or develop global or multi-country funding opportunities.
• Establish and maintain up-to-date funding grids and donor logs.
• Responsible for the coordination of funding opportunities including high-level external relationship building with current and prospective funders.
• Responsible for managing and building AAF’s relationships with donor representatives in Iraq, Ukraine and Yemen.
• Proactively engages on a strategic basis with institutional donors in order to facilitate technical program exchanges, influence policy and thinking, and identify key areas of potential cooperation, including program funding.

Proposal Development and Reporting

• Identification of adequate upcoming calls for proposals in cooperation with the project team;
• Writing of project proposals for upcoming calls for proposals including: fulfilling project application forms; fulfilling project budget forms; pre-fulfilling partnership agreements to be signed by applicant and co-applicants; fulfilling any other additional forms required for project application. For this purpose, project proposal writer will be in charge of collecting all necessary data from local stakeholders which may be used for fulfilling different parts of project application in collaboration with Program and Finance Manager of AAF
• Regularly consulting AAF at different steps of projects’ development.
• Updated Fundraising Strategy
• Updated Fundraising plan and mapping of potential donors
• Draft and submit concept notes/proposals to interested donors.
• Contribute to substantially increasing AAF’s co-funding
• Communication and fundraising materials could be helpful for visibility and fundraising activities.
• Identify new potential donors and refer potential funding opportunities.
• A final report containing information about the implemented strategy identified opportunities, challenges, and recommendations for further actions.
• Lead, and responsible for coordinating, developing and/or reviewing proposals in collaboration with Program and Finance Manager
• Based on analysis of donor trends, and priorities, provide an overview of programmatic and support priorities of the donor/funding call (solicited and unsolicited funding opportunities), to guide the respective stakeholders with an in-depth understanding of required response
• Coordinating, and managing the timelines, template and quality control of the proposal development process
• Copy editing, and reviewing the proposal package, including technical (donor and AAF) compliance comments, as well as programmatic inputs
• Create an evaluation tool to benchmark the quality of proposals and reports, guide future processes, and identify areas for improvement, including the current Grants Tracker and donor logbook.

Fund Management

• Lead on negotiating donor contracts in line with AAF standards.
• Develop and maintain overview of all grants, donor requirements, rules and regulations, and internal and external deadlines, including filing of grant documents as well as track and share donor priorities and calls for proposals.
• Coordinate the development and revision of funding proposals, budgets and donor reports to achieve donor compliance and quality control as well as support external donor audits.
• Document, analyze and share learning from proposal and reporting process, compliance with donor rules to achieve continuous improvement of internal grant management systems. Responsible for overseeing and ensuring efficiency, quality and smooth running of the entire grants cycle management, harmonizing approaches and ensuring adequate feedback is provided for the continued development of grants function
• Build positive relationships and support development of high-quality proposals.
• Uphold AAF’s core values and principles of partnership during the establishment of relationships and guide the evolution of strategic partnerships over time to strengthen and increase the impact of AAF’s programming whilst enhancing local capacities for response

Qualifications & Preferred Skills

Desirable

• Demonstrable experience and success in engaging with bilateral and multilateral donors for AAF.
• Demonstrated ability to devise and implement resource mobilization strategies.
• Proven ability to identify new opportunities and partnerships.
• Experience of collaborating with and leading technical teams to develop program proposals that are funded by institutional donors.
• Strong networking, representational and negotiation skills.
• Superior verbal and written communication skills in English with the ability to analyze and synthesize complex issues.
• Good familiarity with government decision-making processes, both political and technical, including budget processes, appropriation, protocols, and communications.
• Ability to make effective, timely decisions and take prudent risks.
• Knowledge of NGO programming in emergencies.
• Strong proven ability to identify and articulate strategic and policy issues through effective oral and written briefs.
• Excellent knowledge of Operational programs
• Proven track record of project fiche preparation and success rate (i.e., number of projects developed, and number of projects approved)
• Creativity and resource investigation skills.
• Experience working with INGOs, foundations, large corporations, and government bodies, would be an asset.

Profile

• Proven successful track record in fundraising for the non-profit sector, minimum of five years of professional experience in fundraising; managing and growing donor programs, in a non-profit setting.
• Good communication and writing skills.
• Knowledge of Ukraine, Yemen and Iraq context.