Project & Partnership Officer

Title: Project & Partnership Officer

Department: Programs

Location: Gaziantep

Reporting to: Protection Program Manager

Technical reports:Grants Coordinator

Budget responsibility:

ABOUT Relief International.

Relief International (RI) is a leading nonprofit organization working in 16 countries to relieve poverty, ensure well-being and advance dignity. We specialize in fragile settings, responding to natural disasters, humanitarian crises and chronic poverty.

Relief International combines humanitarian and development approaches to provide immediate services while laying the groundwork for long-term impact. Our signature approach — which we call the RI Way—emphasizes local participation, an integration of services, strategic partnerships and a focus on civic skills. In this way, we empower communities to find, design and implement the solutions that work best for them.

RI includes the four corporate members of the RI Alliance: RI-US, RI-UK, MRCA/RI-France and RI-Europe. Under our alliance agreement, we operate as a single, shared management structure.

Position Summary.

Under the supervision of the Protection Program Manager, the position will work closely with RI’s implementing partners, to ensure compliance with donor requirements at all stages of the project lifecycle and facilitates effective management of RI’s grants and partners in coordination with Programs, Finance, Operations, and HR departments. This includes, but is not limited to, ensuring timely and quality reporting to RI, facilitating grant review and closeout processes, grant’s documents archiving, support coordinating proposal development or modification processes, following up the capacity building plan of the implementing partners, in addition following up the implementation of the project’s workplan.**

ESSENTIAL RESPONSIBILITIES AND DUTIES

Project & Partnership Officer will work closely with Grants department and will be responsible for the following:

· Partnership Identification and assessment

· facilitate pre-award due diligence processes, including vetting, and enhanced due diligence.

· Coordinate the organizational capacity assessments using RI standard tools as per the partnership management framework;

Partnership Management

· Support the development of sub-grant agreements and any subsequent modifications;

· Coordinate and ensure the effective startup of partnership, including sub-grants kickoff meetings and close out meetings with partners, programs, MEAL, technical and other departments, as relevant.

· Organize regular grant review meetings in close coordination with the implementing partner and keep the record of action points and meeting minutes.

· Maintain up to date programmatic and financial reporting schedule and ensure information sharing to all relevant departments, providing a complete monthly reporting package with the all the required supported documents and sources of verification.

• Coordinate with the RI Finance Team to facilitate partner payments, as per agreed terms.
• Evaluate activities progress conducted by the partner, define performance indicators, structure operational data collection in coordination with M&E department with reporting to the Protection Manger on progress.

· Monitor partner suppliers’ and programmatic activities.

· Support the development of a tailored capacity building plan for each partner to address the gaps identified through due diligence and organizational capacity assessments and monitor the successful implementation of those plans and organise trainings as necessary;

· Ensure and coordinate feedback process to partners with regards to the quality and performance of the partnership against the sub-award i.e. partnership scorecards;

· Maintain a comprehensive and up-to-date filing system on all aspects of sub-grants management;

· Improve partnership practices by periodically assessing RI Syria’s partnership management approach taking into account diverse perspectives (both RI’s and partners’), developing case studies to capture lessons learned and best practices, and making recommendations for improvement.

· During proposal development processes, support Grants Coordinator in identifying partner capacity building needs and activities including stronger integration of gender and inclusion priorities.

· Ensure adherence to the standard of RI and Donor procedures and policies in relation to Logistics, Finance, HR and Programs.

· Communicating to partners for any issues and assisting them in resolving issues of non-compliance.

Safeguarding

• Uphold and promote RI’s commitment to ensuring the safeguarding and safety of the vulnerable communities we serve.
• Consistent with RI’s safeguarding and protection policies, ensure all people who come into contact with Relief International are as safe as possible.

QUALIFICATIONS & SKILLS REQUIREMENTS

This position will require a demonstrated ability to achieve results in a demanding and fast paced environment.

· University degree in business management, development studies, social sciences, finance, or other related fields.

· Fluent English speaking, writing, and reading skills.

· At least two years of work experience in the humanirarian sector, preferably within the grants department.

· Good understanding of donor reporting, grants management, and partnership management.

· Preferable : Familiarity with the rules and regulations of major institutional donors and UN agencies, such as OCHA, UNFPA, ECHO, BHA etc…

· Strong inter-personal written and verbal communication skills.

· Ability to work well in a team and in a multi-cultural setting.

· Excellent critical thinking skills and ability to exercise good judgment and solve problems quickly and effectively.

· Proficiency in Microsoft Office;

· Flexibility, positive attitude, willingness to support are always highly valued attributes.

RI Values:

We uphold the Humanitarian Principles: humanity, neutrality, impartiality and operational independence. We affirmatively engage the most vulnerable communities.

We value:

• Inclusiveness
• Transparency and accountability
• Agility and innovation
• Collaboration
• Sustainability

Relief International is committed to protecting our staff and the communities we work with from abuse and harm including sexual exploitation, sexual abuse and sexual harassment.

All staff are expected to abide by our Code of Conduct.

RI Has a zero-tolerance policy towards any behavior that violates its code of conduct, including sexual harassment, exploitation, abuse, as well as lack of integrity, corruption, and fraud. RI also adheres to strict safeguarding principles.