TRÓCAIRE – Panel of consultants for IF proposal writing

Context of Work

Trócaire’s strategic plan 2021-2025 places continued emphasis on diversification of income to fund our work on human rights, climate and environmental justice, women’s empowerment and gender-based violence and humanitarian response. Our ambition is that Trócaire will have stable and sustainable income streams from a strong portfolio of institutional donors – both governments, UN agencies and other non-governmental sources.

The institutional funding environment continues to be very competitive and requires very high-quality applications in order to be successful.

The purpose of this expression of interest is to update our database and identify a small pool of experts that Trócaire head office and country teams can call upon to support the development of institutional funding applications for a range of Trócaire’s work and to various donors, including ECHO, EU, FCDO, UN agencies, USAID, SIDA, Danida. (Not an exhaustive list)

Scope of the Work

It is envisaged that the main support needed will be:

1. Develop proposal development plans in consultation with the country office, taking on board the specific donor guidance and prior experience of the donor.
2. Lead the proposal writing process both narrative and budget, to a standard of excellence, facilitating programme development workshops with staff and partners as necessary, consulting with technical advisors and other Trócaire subject matter experts.
3. Support or lead proposal development processes for consortia proposals as required.
4. While most applications are grants, some commercial contract bids are envisaged so expertise and experience in writing commercial bids would also be valuable.

Timeline

The panel will be in place by end October 2022 for a period of two years. Thereafter the panel will be reviewed and a new RTF issued.

For panel members that are contracted to support a funding application, the average consultancy is likely to be 10- 20 days. Some contracts will require travel to the country.

Experience/Skills:

Essential:

• Prior experience of at least five years in accessing institutional funding in an INGO environment.
• Proven experience in writing at least ten successful funding applications both narrative and budget, to a range of institutional donors
• Up to date knowledge of donor guidelines, policies and procedures
• Proven experience in budget preparation, to maximise cost recovery
• Proven experience in leading proposal writing including local partners and/or other consortia type applications with other INGOS, research institutes or private sector entities.
• Prior experience of in at least one of the following thematic areas; human rights, sustainable livelihoods (including agroecology and market systems development) and environmental justice, women’s empowerment and GBV, humanitarian response
• Excellent writing, facilitation, analytical, finance, communication and presentation skills.
• Experience in a Results Based Management (RBM) approach to MEAL.

Desirable

• Knowledge and experience of using various international standards and guidelines
• Expertise and experience in preparing commercial bids to FCDO and/or EU
• Prior expertise and experience in working on proposal development with local NGOs.
• Ability to work and write applications in French and/or Spanish