BACKGROUND ON IMPACT AND REACH

REACH was born in 2010 as a joint initiative of two International NGOs (IMPACT Initiatives and ACTED) and the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) Operational Satellite Applications Programme (UNOSAT). REACH’s purpose is to promote and facilitate the development of information products that enhance the humanitarian community’s decision making and planning capacity for emergency, reconstruction and development contexts, supporting and working within the framework of the humanitarian reform process. REACH facilitates information management for aid actors through three complementary services: (a) need and situation assessments facilitated by REACH teams; (b) situation analysis using satellite imagery; (c) provision of related database and (web)-mapping facilities and expertise.

IMPACT Initiatives is a humanitarian NGO, based in Geneva, Switzerland. The organisation manages several initiatives, including the REACH Initiative. The IMPACT team comprises specialists in data collection, management and analysis, GIS and remote-sensing. IMPACT was launched at the initiative of ACTED, an international NGO whose headquarter is based in Paris and is present in thirty countries. The two organizations have a strong complementarity formalized in a global partnership, which allows particularly IMPACT to benefit from ACTED’s operational support on its fields of intervention.

We are currently looking for a REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer to support our REACH team in South Sudan.

Department: REACH

Position: REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer

Contract duration: 6 months

Location: Juba, South Sudan (potential for remote work at start, depending on COVID-19)

Starting Date: ASAP

COUNTRY PROFILE

IMPACT, through its own activities, or through REACH, has been implementing programming in South Sudan since 2012. Responding to the Sudan Border Crisis, REACH initially engaged through coordinated information management support – in the form of refugee camp mapping and service provision analyses, thematic assessments, and multi-sectorial needs assessments – in Maban County, Upper Nile State and Pariang County, Unity State.

IMPACT was engaged by DFID to provide a series of impact evaluations of their BRACE programming across Greater Bahr el Ghazal and Upper Nile States in 2013; a programme with run for two years, included 5 total assessments, and touched a total of more than 20,000 households. Immediately following the conflict of December 2013, REACH expanded its programming to include the IDP response, participating in Initial Rapid Needs Assessments of conflict affected areas, providing mapping and monthly service provision analyses for major IDP sites around the country, and running large-scale IDP return intentions assessments.

In the coming year, IMPACT and REACH programming will focus on integrating ongoing assessments into a common data stream, expanding the geographic scale of activities, connecting information streams to surrounding countries that are impacted by events in South Sudan, and continuing to adopt a beneficiary-centric approach to data collection that puts that needs of affected populations, and the return of information to them, at the centre of our work.

POSITION PROFILE

REACH is seeking to fill the position of Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer based in Juba, South Sudan. As a member of the Population Movement and Protection Unit, the Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer is responsible for the design and implementation of assessments focusing on Accountability to Affected Populations (AAP), Communication and Community Engagement, and Protection[1] in South Sudan and the development of community outreach and engagement strategies. The REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer will be required to engage with relevant partners to identify existing gaps in knowledge within the humanitarian response and design assessments to fill the identified gaps.

Moreover, the Assessment Officer undertakes to strengthen internal accountability, which will include mainstreaming AAP initiatives and key Protection principles within REACH South Sudan’s existing research cycles through close collaboration with all other REACH South Sudan units. The role will require prior experience in AAP, research methods, risk communication and ideally, a working understanding of key Protection principles. This position maintains a qualitative focus and requires an Assessment Officer who is flexible and confident in working independently, often with limited structure. This position brings with it the potential for deployment to the field and deep-field locations, which requires a considerable amount of resilience and independence. As well, this position also has the potential to be tasked with supporting mission expansion in neighbouring countries, or short to mid-term surge support for sudden onset disasters globally.

FUNCTIONS

Under the supervision of the REACH Research Manager, Country Coordinator and IMPACT HQ in Geneva, the REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer is responsible for the design, management, and implementation of all REACH assessments in country relating to Accountability to Affected Populations (AAP), including community perception surveys, informing AAP work across the wider humanitarian response in South Sudan.

He/she will also support in developing REACH’s internal AAP mechanisms and community engagement strategies (i.e. ensuring REACH research findings are communicated back to affected populations through mutli-channel dissemination strategies; enhancing respondent participation in the research process and mainstreaming AAP and Protection principles throughout REACH research cycles). Furthermore, he/she will also be responsible for related logistics, partner coordination, external engagement, reporting, and finance requirements and will be required to provide input to the strategic development of the Population Movement and Protection Unit within REACH South Sudan

Summary

The REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer shall be responsible for:

  • In coordination with the REACH Country Coordinator and Research Manager, design and implement REACH assessment strategy and methodology in relation to AAP and community engagement;
  • Expand REACH South Sudan’s existing work on AAP and explore and identify gaps in knowledge in AAP and Protection within the humanitarian response in South Sudan.
  • In coordination with REACH Country Coordinator and Research Manager, strengthen internal accountability and community outreach practices, specifically through staff capacity building (trainings, AAP mainstreaming) and the development of relevant Standard Operating Procedures;
  • Management of the REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Field Officer to ensure a smooth and timely implementation of activities;
  • Ensure that assessment strategies are implemented in a structured and coherent manner in line with project and strategic objectives;
  • Coordinate and ensure timely data collection, analysis and, in partnership with GIS team, mapping of datasets;
  • Ensure the writing of timely and accurate assessment reports and factsheets;
  • Keep track of all projects and assessment schedules and work with field staff to design and implement REACH assessment procedures relating to protection and accountability to affected populations;
  • Supporting the development/revision of assessment/programme strategies, reports or new proposals;
  • External representation of REACH to donors, partners and the broader humanitarian community through clusters and sectoral working groups;

REACH Assessment Management and Coordination

Objective 2.1: Development and management of assessments process

Under the supervision of the REACH Research Manager, the REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer is responsible for designing the methodology and tools associated with each assessment, according to REACH requirements and principles. He/she will manage the planning, implementation, and follow-up of all REACH and project-specific assessment activities conducted in country. In operations in which REACH is a project component of a wider ACTED intervention, the REACH Assessment Officer is required to contribute to the preparation and follow up of the Project Management Framework and ensure that activities are properly coordinated and implemented as per the Project Cycle Management.

The REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer shall manage logistics, financial, administration and HR processes directly related to REACH and liaise accordingly with the relevant ACTED counterpart. He/she is directly responsible for the implementation of proper ACTED FLAT procedures in all REACH interventions.
Objective 2.2: Implementation of Assessments and Strengthening of Internal Accountability

Under the supervision of the Research Manager and Senior GIS officer, the REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Research Officer is responsible for contributing to the implementation of assessment projects focused on Protection and AAP, providing support to the development of assessment, database and GIS tools with the REACH team. This will specifically include, with the GIS team, designing of data collection tools (household surveys, focus groups, and more); development or review of databases; contributing to GIS data collection procedures and mapping thereof through ARC GIS and other ESRI products in particular; and analysis of spatial and other information to contribute to reports and the like.

Furthermore, in close collaboration with the REACH Country Coordinator and Research Manager, the REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer will build systems and protocols that entrench key AAP principles as part of REACH research cycles. This may include designing strategies to communicate research findings back to affected populations; designing internal Community Feedback Mechanisms (CFMs); designing and delivering trainings on accessing referral pathways and/or key protection principles and, identifying and maintaining partnerships with key actors on the AAP and risk communications space
Objective 2.3: Coordination

When requested by the REACH Country Coordinator and REACH Research Manager, the REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer shall provide technical support to the relevant ACTED department in terms of the preparation of new project proposals, development of programme strategies, implementation of project activities, and any other required REACH input to ACTED projects for added-value.

When requested by the REACH Country Coordinator and REACH Research Manager, the REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer is responsible for the timely and accurate preparation of narrative and financial reports related to REACH activities in country through close liaison with the Project Development and Finance departments.

The REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer shall liaise with other REACH Officers in the region and throughout IMPACT Initiatives’ and ACTED’s networks to provide and receive support in the expansion of REACH globally.

REACH Reporting

The REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officeris responsible for consolidating all analyses and conclusions from each assessment into REACH products such as factsheets, reports and briefs using standard formats. He/she will liaise with the Research Manager and Senior GIS Officer in order to represent data in interactive web map or static map format, as relevant.

The REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officeris responsible for following the designated timeline of reports to be submitted to project partners and donors. He/she must ensure the writing of timely and accurate assessment reports and factsheets, ensuring the quality and accuracy of technical information provided as well as the confidentiality and protection of collected information. He/she will ensure that assessment reports contribute to aid coordination and planning and add to the general base of field knowledge in the country for all organisations working in the areas.

The REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment officer is responsible for drafting Standard Operating Procedures for activities designed to strengthen REACH’s internal accountability described in under Objective 2.2

When requested by the REACH Country Coordinator or Research Manager, he/she will also manage the drafting of narrative reports and contribute to the development of financial reports through regular budgetary follow-up.The REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer will also store, organize and disseminate assessments, project documents and best practices among REACH. He/she will coordinate timely and accurate reporting to IMPACT Headquarters.

REACH HR Management

Staff Management

Under the direct line management of the REACH Research Manager, the REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer is responsible for day-to-day management of the REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Field Officer. This includes defining work streams/responsibilities; developing work-plans and managing appraisals and career development. This role also includes the management of project and field staff both directly and remotely. The REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer will be required to take the lead in the recruitment of REACH field assessment staff in coordination with the ACTED HR Officer. This will include the preparation of ToRs, observation of recruitment procedures by planning recruitment needs in advance, and undertake interviews.

The REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer will ensure that all field teams are comprehensively briefed on the objective, expected outputs and that the overall implementation strategy of any given activity is clearly understood. He/she will ensure that project/field staff are given training and complete all the necessary documentation in line with program requirements set by REACH.
Representation

In close coordination with the REACH Country Coordinator and REACH Research Manager, representation of REACH in cluster and multi-sector meetings/ technical working groups in country and follow up on technical issues identified in cluster meetings. This specifically will include liaising with external partners to identify potential for data sets to be integrated into existing databases and mapped to support the coordination of the broader humanitarian community.

Success in this role is predicated on proactive and sustained engagement with external partners. While the position has several central partnerships built into it, the candidate should be very comfortable in identifying, nurturing and capitalizing on partnerships related to AAP and community engagement.

More generally, the REACH Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer is expected to contribute to the creation of a positive image and overall credibility of the organisation, notably through the application of REACH’s vision, ethics, values and standpoint with regard to other actors.

ACCOUNTABILITY TO COMMUNITIES AND BENEFICIARIES

The staff member is responsible for ensuring that all relations within the communities we work are conducted in a respectful and consultative manner. Due attention must be paid to ensuring that communities are adequately consulted and informed about REACH programme objectives, activities, beneficiary selection criteria, and methodologies. This is the responsibility of every REACH staff member.

REQUIREMENTS

  • Experience in AAP and/or Communication and Community Engagement strongly preferred;
  • Excellent academic qualifications, including a Master’s degree in relevant discipline;
  • At least 2 years of relevant working experience in humanitarian and/or conflict settings;
  • Excellent analytical skills required;
  • Excellent communication and drafting skills for effective reporting required;
  • Prior experience working in South Sudan an asset;
  • Prior experience in project management and managing staff preferred;
  • Ability to work independently required;
  • Ability to operate in a cross-cultural environment requiring flexibility;
  • Familiarity with the aid system, and understanding of donor and governmental requirements preferred;
  • Fluency in English required;
  • Ability to operate Microsoft Office applications;
  • Ability to operate Adobe Suite programs an asset;
  • A good sense of humour about bugs and bucket showers required;

CONDITIONS

  • Salary defined by the IMPACT salary grid; educational level, expertise, hardship, security, and performance are considered for pay bonus
  • Additional monthly living allowance
  • Lodging provided at the organisation’s guesthouse/or housing allowance (depending on contract length and country of assignment)
  • Transportation costs covered, including additional return ticket + luggage allowance
  • Provision of medical, life, and repatriation insurance + retirement package**

[1] Protection is an enumerated, but not primary, responsibility of this position. The Accountability and Community Engagement Assessment Officer will be expected to advise on protection issues throughout REACH research cycles and maintain relationships with protection partners, but this will be a tertiary responsibility in light of the role’s focus on accountability and community engagement with affected populations.

This vacancy is archived.

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