Senior Assessment Officer – INGO Forum Analyst

We are currently looking for aSenior Assessment Officer to support our team in Syria.

Department:REACH

Position: Senior Assessment Officer – INGO Forum Analyst

Contract duration:12 months

Location: Syria

Starting Date: 1 January 2023

Country profile

After more than a decade of conflict, conditions in Syria remain volatile and marked by violence and socio-economic deterioration. The scale, complexity, and severity of humanitarian needs in Syria extends the necessity for up to date, timely, and accurate information. Evidence-based planning and programming remains paramount to ensure that the response adequately meets the needs of the most vulnerable people and is tailored to different realities across communities and over time. REACH has been conducting assessments on the humanitarian situation in Syria since 2013 and has since grown significantly as an actor in the response.

POSITION PROFILE

REACH is currently recruiting for a Senior Assessment Officer (SAO), dedicated to support the INGO Forum as an Analyst. Under the day-day supervision of the Inter-Sector Working Group Coordinator, the Analyst will support the INGO Forum to improve and strengthen response analysis, operational coordination, and mapping of gaps and needs.

The INGO Forum has the responsibility for several core functions, including operational coordination, representation with external stakeholders, information management, and policy and advocacy. The role of Analyst aims at improving the overall objectives of the INGO Forum through the analysis and production of humanitarian needs and response data, with the view to improve operational coordination and gap analysis. The Analyst is a key member of the INGO Forum coordination team and is responsible for the handling of the implementation and management of an adequate strategy for the collection and analysis of data and information sharing, needed to ensure that the INGO Forum and its members are in a capacity to take well informed and data-based strategic decisions. This includes the direct engagement with key information management partners, sector working groups and partners to identify key information needs and establish a mechanism to answer these questions. The Analyst will regularly engage with a variety of stakeholders including INGO Forum coordination, sector working groups, NGO partners, UN, and IM partners.

FUNCTIONS

Under the management of the IMPACT Deputy Country Coordinator, the Senior Assessment Officer / Analyst will report to the Inter-Sector Working Group Coordinator. He/she will work closely with the Advocacy and Access manager, sector coordinators, information management (IM) officers, IM and operational partners.

RESPONSIBILITIES

The Senior Assessment Officer / Analystwill perform the following tasks:

Response & Gap Analysis

• Support the information management (IM) unit, with the analysis of 4Ws and response data to produce regular products, including inter-sector snapshots and area-based products;
• Support the IM unit with collection and consolidation of response data, based on monthly reporting schedules, working on identifying ways to improve reporting;
• Work with Whole of Syria IMs as well as Sector IMs, to support efforts to improve reporting and analyse response information, in close coordination with the inter-sector working group coordinator;
• Share response information and relevant data with response partners (contact list, activity reporting, operational presence, gap analysis and factsheets) at agreed frequencies;
• Facilitate the analysis of information between WGs and sectors when relevant;
• Establish contact with appropriate partner agencies when basic or special needs are identified;
• Liaise with humanitarian stakeholders.

Information Management

• Support the IM unit to conduct initial IM diagnoses to help identify areas and means of improvement to support core coordination functions;
• Develop and/or operationalise common data standards together with relevant Working Groups (WGs) or sectors and promote the standards with partners;
• Work with INGO coordination to support the success of specific objectives e.g. Cholera response engagement with IM partners

Strategic Planning

• Support the Inter-Sector WG coordinator in defining response strategic objectives/indicators and priority activities upon needs and challenges of the humanitarian community;
• Working with IM partners to facilitate area-based workshop preparations, including required response analysis and defining priorities for data visualization and analysis;
• Ensure linkage between IM partner assessments and response analysis with specific sectors to facilitate humanitarian response prioritization (activities / geographical locations / groups).

Technical Guidance

• Inform and feedback on inter-sector and sector led methodologies, indicators, tools, and analytical frameworks to gather primary data for operational purposes;
• Working with the IM unit, individual sectors, and their Whole of Syria counterparts to better understand sector level methodologies and standardize these across the response;
• Support sectors on specific workstreams and visualization of response information;
• Support sector working group IMOs, with capacity building and technical guidance, with the view to improve reporting and capacity for sector led analysis.

REQUIREMENTS

• Excellent academic qualifications, including a Master’s degree in relevant discipline, or an equivalent combination of relevant training and experience in humanitarian related activities;
• 2 years of relevant working experience in a humanitarian setting; an added asset is knowledge of the Syrian response.
• Knowledge of the humanitarian community, specifically with regards to inter-agency coordination.
• Experience in the context of partnership building and consensual decision-making.
• Proven ability to conceptualize, develop, plan monitor and evaluate IM in relation to programming, as well as to teach skills and build team capacity.
• Excellent English writing, communication, and negotiation skills; ability to prepare clear and concise reports.
• Understanding of different data collection methodologies and their strengths and weaknesses, to be able to assess quality/reliability of secondary sources and to advice on areas of improvement.
• Ability to compile, triangulate and holistically analyse diverse and large datasets.
• Experience with handling confidential and sensitive data.
• Ability to work effectively and harmoniously in a team and in the inter-agency context with colleagues from a variety of cultures and professional backgrounds.
• Willingness to travel at short notice, resilience, stress tolerance and work under difficult conditions.
• Fluently spoken and written English is mandatory. Arabic or Kurdish an asset.
• Data capture and analysis:
  • MS Excel (Essential): Strong knowledge of statistical, conditional, and text-based functions;
  • Mapping (Asset): ArcGIS, QGIS, Basic understanding of geospatial data management, analysis, and map making processes.
  • Report writing (Asset): Use of Adobe Suite, specifically inDesign for report writing.