The Organisation

We employ approximately 25,000 people across the globe and work on the ground in over 100 countries to help children affected by crises, or those that need better healthcare, education and child protection. We also campaign and advocate at the highest levels to realise the right of children and to ensure their voices are heard. 

We are working towards three breakthroughs in how the world treats children by 2030:

• No child dies from preventable causes before their 5th birthday 
• All children learn from a quality basic education and that,
• Violence against children is no longer tolerated 

We know that great people make a great organization, and that our employees play a crucial role in helping us achieve our ambitions for children.  We value our people and offer a meaningful and rewarding career, along with a collaborative and inclusive workplace where ambition, creativity, and integrity are highly valued. 

We need to keep children safe so our selection process, which includes rigorous background checks, reflects our commitment to the protection of children from abuse.

Save the Children International seeks to always be a child-safe organization by fulfilling its obligations to the community and through programme implementation carried out by the organization for safeguarding children and improve their living standards of the child.

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Position:  Cash and Voucher Assistnce (CVA) Food Security, Livelihood and Economic Recovery Advisor

GRADE: TBD  

CONTRACT LENGTH: 

ROLE PURPOSE: 

The CVA, Food Security, Livelihood and Economic Recovery Advisor will provide strategic direction and technical guidance to the country office (CO) on needs driven strategic planning, programme development and implementation in areas of CVA, Food security, livelihood and economic recovery. Under the general direction and guidance of the PQI director, ensures that programming for CVA, Food Security, livelihood and economic recovery is of excellent technical quality, coherent and aligned with SC and cluster strategies, attracts significant donor funding and contributes significantly to national/global learning, advocacy and program development. The post holder is expected to provide technical advice and support to project staff to ensure program quality is maintained and programming objectives are successfully achieved. 

The post-holder shall also contribute to the development and/review of the country livelihood and economic recovery strategic direction, and actively lead in the development of programme design. S/he represents SC in food security and agriculture cluster (FSAC), participates in cash and market working group and other relevant forums. S/he undertakes regular assessment to understand capacity gaps and initiates capacity strengthening efforts.

KEY AREAS OF ACCOUNTABILITY : 

General Management

• Liaise with the operations department, ensure all food security and livelihoods programme staff receive the necessary and appropriate technical support. In consultation with staff and project managers agree on the range of advice, support, training and/or other assistance required from you to facilitate high quality programming.  This will involve regular visits to Save the Children operational areas. 
• Specifically ensure technical expertise and timely reporting for the Famine Prevention Program: 
  • Support the field teams to analyse the quality of data collected and decide on corrective measures
  • Support the field teams to review the project methodology on a regular basis to ensure a high quality of implementation for both case management and targeting
• Assist in the development of tools for project staff and partners to improve the quality of CVA, food security and livelihoods work. Where necessary provide technical training for project staff and partners as required (HEA, monitoring and evaluation, market assessment, social protection mechanisms, cash and voucher distributions).
• Review relevant monitoring reports to ensure that technical debates are well articulated and reports are of acceptable quality before submission. Provide support where necessary to improve report writing skills. Lead in the evaluation and review process for all CVA, Food Security and Livelihood Projects including the development of Terms of Reference, selection and management of consultants. 
• Build on technical knowledge, latest research in the sector and current/previous programming to develop proposals for new programming in close coordination with the programme staff. Ensure all new programming supports the achievement of Save the Children Country and Thematic/strategic objectives, specifically the reduction of child mortality due to malnutrition. 
• Lead technical capacity development initiatives for SC project implementation staff on FSL technical guidelines, Cash and Voucher programming, integrated nutrition sensitive approaches, technical common approaches.
• Ensure that gender equality and inclusion, safe programming and conflict sensitivity is embedded into needs and response analysis, and programming. 

Strategic Planning and Program Development

• To be fully aware of and actively participate in the development and review of any Country Strategic and Thematic Plans. Specifically lead in the preparation of situational analyses, background information, policy formulations, establishing indicators etc in the area of Food Security and Livelihoods.
• Lead the planning, implementation of labor market analysis, market system analysis, and scoping analysis of youth and women led livelihood opportunities.
• Lead the review and development of livelihood and economic recovery strategic plan for 2022-24. 
• Review locally feasible and successful youth and women empowerment programming opportunities through desk review and stakeholder consultations
• Proactively continue to grow the livelihood and economic recovery portfolio through development of concept notes and proposals to donors 
• Support identification of opportunities for economic and livelihood recovery and development programming initiatives in support of service delivery and/or thought leadership with country program senior management, business development staff and SC Technical advisors.
• Collaborate with partners on the identification of business development opportunities, and the design of new interventions.
• Anticipate, plan and lead programmatic and structural transitions.
• In collaboration with the MEAL team, develop relevant monitoring tools and adapt them to context.
• Actively participate in key relevant internal meetings such as Senior Management Team or Area-based meetings as required. Participate in any Donor visit to project(s) within your portfolio as required.   
• Technical Leadership, Management and Representation
• Liaise with the operations department, ensure all food security and livelihoods programme staff receive the necessary and appropriate technical support. In consultation with staff and project managers agree on the range of advice, support, training and/or other assistance required from you to facilitate high quality programming.  This will involve regular visits to Save the Children operational areas. 
• Assist in the development of tools for project staff and partners to improve the quality of food security and livelihoods work. Where necessary provide technical training for project staff and partners as required (HEA, monitoring and evaluation, market assessment, social protection mechanisms, small businesses, vocational skill development and employability, cash and voucher distributions).
• Represent and advocate for Save the Children with UN agencies, Donors, Government, NGOs and others at the highest levels in both verbal and written communications to ensure Save the Children is seen as the lead international agency in Yemen in terms of innovation and quality of implementation that focus on economic recovery, livelihood and resilience (integrated approach through market, livelihood analysis, skill development, small businneses and agro-based programming and early warning through HEA). Specifically ensure the following:
  • Attend and provide technical expertise when needed to coordination meetings
  • Ensure presence at relevant UN coordination meetings at national and regional levels
  • Ensure active dissemination of programmes findings and lessons learned through the production of high technical quality lessons learned documents and their effective dissemination to key stakeholders.

BEHAVIOURS (Values in Practice)

Accountability:

• Holds self-accountable for making decisions, managing resources efficiently, achieving and role modelling Save the Children values.
• Holds the team and partners accountable to deliver on their responsibilities - giving them the freedom to deliver in the best way they see fit, providing the necessary development to improve performance and applying appropriate consequences when results are not achieved.
• Creates a managerial environment to lead, enable and maintain our culture of child safeguarding.

Ambition:

• Sets ambitious and challenging goals for themselves and their team, takes responsibility for their own personal development and encourages their team to do the same
• Future orientated, thinks strategically and on a global scale

Collaboration:

• Approachable, good listener, easy to talk to; builds and maintains effective relationships with colleagues, Members and external partners and supporters
• Works collaboratively to achieve shared goals and thrives on diversity of people and perspectives; knows when to lead and when to follow and how to ensure effective cross-boundary working.
• Communicates clearly and confidently with others to engage and influence; promotes dialogue and ensures timely and appropriate messages, building confidence and trust. 
• Invests time and energy to actively develop self and others to help realise their full potential, and to build the organisation’s capability for the future. 

Creativity:

• Applies the required technical and professional expertise to the highest standards; promotes and shares best practice within and outside the organization. 
• Develops and implements innovative solutions to adapt and succeed in ever-changing and uncertain global and working environments. 
• Takes effective, considered and timely decisions by gathering and evaluating relevant information from within or outside the organization. 

Integrity:

• Honest, encourages openness and transparency, builds trust and confidence.
• Displays consistent excellent judgement

QUALIFICATIONS AND EXPERIENCE:

Required

• Postgraduate qualification in discipline related to agricultural economics, development economics, agriculture, food security or other relevant discipline or commensurate work experience in lieu of postgraduate qualification.
• Significant international experience in CVA, livelihood and ecnomic recovery programming in developing countries with specific experience and/or advanced understanding of at least four of the following 
  • social protection systems for vulnerable populations especially pastoral and agro-pastoral populations
  • experience of running and monitoring cash and voucher programmes
  • designing and implementing market assessments and analysis of data collected
  • Agro-based livelihood interventions 
  • Market driven technical/vocational skill development and employability 
  • Market driven and locally feasible income generation initiatives
  • relevant training and expertise in using Save the Children Household Economy Analysis 
• Strong commitment to capacity building of national staff and partners with willingness to adopt a participatory and consultative management approach.
• Experience in leading and developing thematic strategy and response plan 
• Good interpersonal skills with the ability to communicate and negotiate clearly and effectively at all levels, taking into account cultural and language difficulties.  Tact and diplomacy are essential
• Experience of working in insecure/conflict situations and security management.
• Willingness to travel regularly and in difficult circumstances
• Fluent in spoken and written English

Desirable

• Knowledge and understanding of SPHERE Standard and other principles of humanitarian work.
• Experience in promoting children’s participation in programme design, implementation and evaluation.
• Good understanding of poverty reduction strategy framework and related processes.
• High knowledge of database management tools and data analysis tools (VBA programming, MySQL, Access, Advanced Excel functions)
• Working experience in planning and response to large-scale food insecurity situations. 
• Fluent in Arabic