Research, Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MERL) Team Lead

About Us

Altai Consulting is a Strategy, Research and Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) firm focusing on the developing world. Altai began operating in 2003 and has since completed over 350 consulting and research assignments in Africa, the Middle East and South Asia. Our clients include major donors (DFID, the European Commission, USAID, etc.) and their implementing partners, international organizations (the World Bank, the United Nations) and INGOs looking for both technical expertise and high-level strategy advice.

For more information, please visit our website: www.altaiconsulting.com.

As part of its Public Policy Practice, Altai Consulting seeks skilled candidates for a Team Leader/ Senior Project Manager position based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, to oversee quality and timely delivery of Altai’s strategy, research and M&E projects in the Ethiopia and the East Africa region.

Context

Altai Consulting supports the FCDO-funded Ethiopia Migration Programme (EMP) with a variety of services including seconding a MEAL Manager, conducting Operational and Programmatic Research, and maintaining a ‘Real Time Learning’ online database for storing and visualising the MEAL data.

The EMP is approaching its final year of programming and is looking to increase its research and M&E capacity to provide targeted research to support FCDO following on from the programme, maintain current atmospheric reporting and provide the programme with ongoing programmatic research and MEAL support. MEAL will be of particular importance as the programme comes to a close, to ensure that outcomes, impacts and lessons learnt are adequately captured.

Job Description

The MERL Lead will oversee EMP’s research and MEAL teams, and will report directly to the EMP Chief of Party (CoP) and Altai’s Ethiopia Country Manager. Responsibilities include:

• Developing EMP’s MERL vision for the year, in coordination with the CoP, and ensuring it is actioned throughout the year.

• Leading the research and MEAL teams (team of 4-5 people), including:

o Ensuring all products align with programme requests and needs;

o Supporting with research and M&E design;

o Supporting analysis of quantitative and qualitative data;

o Providing quality assurance and oversight of all deliverables;

o Identifying, recruiting, and managing field teams to conduct quantitative and qualitative data collection;

o Identifying, recruiting, and managing subject matter experts who contribute to technical aspects of projects.

• Providing overall project oversight, including:

o Supporting the Project Manager with managing the project budget, resourcing and timelines;

o Managing partner relationships, including regular check-ins with the Project Management Unit;

o Ensuring the provision of high-quality services by Altai Consulting, whilst maintaining commercial oversight of the project, including regular check-ins with Altai Management.

• It is envisaged that the role will demand around 10% travel outside of Ethiopia within East Africa.

• It is envisaged that the role will be 1 year in duration although there may be options to extend.

Requirements

• Minimum 5 years of Post Qualification Experience with 3 years working as a Project Manager in a similar context.

• Experience managing or supporting multi-year research, monitoring, evaluation and learning projects.

• Experience in providing programmatic research.

• Experience developing research and M&E methodologies (preferably in the field of migration).

• Experience overseeing budgets and resourcing.

• Experience managing international and national teams (including performance reviews, career development, etc.) and managing corporate partnerships.

• Knowledge of migration and displacement contexts in Ethiopia and East Africa.

• Willingness to relocate full-time to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.