BACKGROUND
Over the past 80 years, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) has
developed unparalleled expertise in responding to emergencies and
helping uprooted communities to rebuild. Founded in 1933 at the request
of Albert Einstein, the IRC offers lifesaving care and life-changing
assistance to refugees forced to flee from war or disaster.
The International Rescue Committee is a global network with its
headquarters in New York. The IRC is on the ground in more than 40
countries, providing emergency relief, relocating refugees and
rebuilding lives in the wake of disaster.
The IRC is committed to a culture of bold leadership, innovation in
all aspects of our work, creative partnerships and, most crucially,
accountability to those we serve. The IRC is a tireless advocate for the
most vulnerable.
The Awards Management Unit (AMU)
Established in January 2016, the Awards Management Unit (AMU) is a
global department with the responsibility for identifying, securing, and
managing all funding from statutory/government donors. The department
is includes the following teams: Program and Award Support, Strategic
Partnerships, Compliance and Policy, Business Development, and Training.
The AMU is a bridge between donors and country programs: providing
expert technical advice to the country teams, while maintaining
portfolio-level visibility to ensure consistency and compliance, and
manage risk. This unit ensures that donor compliance policies and
procedures are implemented consistently, and supports all staff working
across the award management cycle for all restricted funding from global
government sources.
The Crisis Response, Recovery and Development (CRRD) Department
The Crisis Response, Recovery and Development (CRRD) Department has a
growing portfolio of humanitarian relief, post-crisis recovery, and
development programs under their remit. This work focuses support in
five key areas: ensuring safety from harm, improving health, increasing
access to education, improving economic well-being and ensuring people
have the power to influence decisions that affect their lives. In all
these programs, there is a drive to address the unique needs of women
and girls (who represent the majority of those displaced) – and the
universal barriers they face.
The CRRD works across 6 regions globally, including West Africa, East
Africa, Central Africa, Middle East and North Africa, Asia, and Latin
America. The regional teams are the links between country offices and
key HQ departments, and aim to support and provide advice to country
programs with a range of issues from strategic planning, business
development to compliance, awards management and partnerships
management.
The Purpose of the Role
The Program and Award Officer is responsible for providing awards and
partnerships management and operational support to country programs as
well as to the regional unit. This role supports the Program and Award
Advisor and country programs in their efforts to ensure successful
implementation of IRC’s donor award requirements and reporting, ensuring
basic compliance, accurate financial information, and good quality
narratives on program outputs. The position entails the potential for
limited in-country or remote support to country program Grants and
Partnerships teams and/or regional teams. While the Program and Award
Officer will work across East Africa’s donor portfolio, this role will
support a particular on US Government, UN and other US managed portfolio
of awards as agreed with the line manager.
Scope and Authority
No direct reports
Key Working Relationships
Reports to Program and Award Advisor. Works closely with Director
Award Management, all Regional Program and Award Support team members,
and across all teams within Awards Management Unit, Crisis Response
Recovery and Development Department, Global Partnerships and
Philanthropy, and other key departments within IRC.
KEY ACCOUNTABILITIES
Award Management and Compliance (60%)
- Support the Program and Awards Advisors and country programs in the management of the award portfolio for the region.
- Review, edit, and provide substantive feedback on donor narrative
and financial reports, coordinating with and ensuring input from
relevant staff prior to donor submission and submit reports in a timely
manner.
- Assist Program and Award Advisor to provide key programmatic and awards related communications to donors.
- Assist Program and Award Advisor in the preparation, review, and
submissions of new award agreements and award modifications, including
liaising with various departments to obtain signed approvals and helping
to complete modification packages.
- Support budget realignments and award amendments/modifications, where necessary.
- Collaborate with Program and Award Advisor in review of sub-award
and partnership packages, including sub-award proposals, sub-award
agreements and modifications, as well as collaboration agreements and
MOUs, ensuring compliance with donor requirements and IRC’s Partnership
Excellence for Equality and Results System (PEERS).
- Assist Program and Award Advisor with the development and review of program proposals as necessary.
- Support monitoring projects to ensure progress against objectives and compliance with donor guidelines.
- Assist country offices with ad-hoc queries on donor compliance issues.
- In collaboration with Program and Award Support colleagues, track
and document lessons learned from finalized projects and ensure they are
fed into the program development team.
- Inform and refer high level compliance matters to Program and Award
Advisors and Director, Awards Management for consultation with the
Compliance and Policy team.
- Stay informed about programmatic issues and security and political
developments in the region and how they might affect program
implementation.
- Maintain and communicate an accurate record of award deliverables to country program grants teams on a regular basis.
- Maintain the region’s award filing system at HQ and update on a
regular basis regional trackers, including awards trackers – as
specified by region.
- Work with Program and Award Advisor and country office grants staff
to ensure that award opportunities on OTIS (internal web-based grants
management system) are up to date.
- Provide ad-hoc trainings and technical assistance to grants and
partnerships staff on IRC systems, awards management processes, and
donor compliance, as necessary. This includes assisting country offices
with the use of IRC’s Partnership Excellence for Equality and Results
System (PEERS).
- Keep IATI data up to date on a quarterly basis for relevant donors, as required.
Coordination (20%)
- Maintain a strong relationship with the regional team members –
reporting on a regular basis and copying them on relevant communications
through an established communications protocol.
- Maintain a strong relationship with all AMU teams and other
departments to ensure the use of all templates, guidance, policies and
procedures established by AMU, and for participation in AMU work groups
or work streams, as needed.
- Maintain strong relationship with country program awards teams
offering regular support on reporting and compliance issues, in
coordination with Program and Award Advisors.
- Assist with the organization and note taking of conferences, workshops and meetings as requested.
- Liaise with support departments and other teams outside of AMU as
needed in order to provide the best support to country offices.
- Provide additional operational support as needed and requested.
Capacity Building and Training (10%)
- Assist in the development and maintenance of work-processes and checklists for award implementation and report review.
- Assist in the development of training materials and facilitate trainings.
Other Responsibilities (10%)
- Provide coverage for key program/support functions remotely and
in-country as requested, to assist with short-term gaps and emergency
support.
- Provide short term cover when Program and Award Advisors are absent supported by their line manager as needed.
- Attend internal (and where appropriate external) IRC trainings as
available on donor, compliance and awards management, PEERS, or other
relevant subjects to the role.
- Participate in special projects and/or additional duties as needed,
and in agreement with the Program and Award Advisor. This could include,
but is not limited to:
- Being the first point of contact for country programs
- Supporting with negotiation of contracts
- Taking a lead on developing training
- Serving as the focal point for regional donors on certain awards
PERSON SPECIFICATION
Essential
Skills, Knowledge and Qualifications:
- Understanding of institutional donors and their requirements;
experience working with USAID, PRM, and other U.S. Government donors as
well as UN donors.
- Good understanding of humanitarian aid and development programming
- Ability to work collaboratively as part of a diverse team and manage a varied workload
- Ability to multi-task and work to tight deadlines
- Excellent communication skills including active listening and verbal and written English
- Solid organizational skills, detail oriented, ability to multi-task and prioritize tasks, and to learn quickly
- Excellent interpersonal and communication skills, the ability to
successfully and effectively liaise with people within and across
departments in a multi-cultural environment
- Ability to proactively take initiative and ownership for their scope
of responsibilities with minimal prompting needed from others
- Both a team player and independent performer in a very fast paced environment
- A flexible work attitude and a calm manner
- Fluency in English
- Good IT skills (Word, Outlook, Excel)
Experience:
- 2+ years' experience in working in the humanitarian sector, particularly with donors such as USAID, PRM, and the UN
- 2+ years experience writing, reviewing and editing narrative and financial reports and excellent attention to detail
- In-country experience preferred, regional experience in particular
- Experience working in the region desirable, particularly in one of the countries in which the IRC is currently operating
Compensation:
Posted pay ranges apply to US-based candidates. Ranges are based on
various factors including the labor market, job type, internal equity,
and budget. Exact offers are calibrated by work location, individual
candidate experience and skills relative to the defined job
requirements.
Commitment to Diversity and Inclusivity:
IRC is committed to building a diverse organization and a climate of
inclusivity. We strongly encourage applications from candidates who can
demonstrate that they can contribute to this goal.
Gender Equality: IRC is committed to narrowing the gender gap in
leadership positions. We offer benefits that provide an enabling
environment for women to participate in our workforce including parental
leave, gender-sensitive security protocols and other supportive
benefits and allowances.
IRC is an Equal Opportunity Employer. IRC considers all applicants on
the basis of merit without regard to race, sex, color, national origin,
religion, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status,
disability or any other characteristic.
Professional Standards: The IRC and IRC staff must adhere to the
values and principles outlined in IRC Way – Global Standards for
Professional Conduct. These are Integrity, Service, Equality and
Accountability. In accordance with these values, the IRC operates and
enforces policies on Beneficiary Protection from Exploitation and Abuse,
Child Safeguarding, Anti-Workplace Harassment, Fiscal Integrity, and
Anti-Retaliation.
Equal Opportunity Employer:
We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our
company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color,
national origin, sex, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation,
age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status. We will
ensure that individuals with disabilities are provided reasonable
accommodation to participate in the job application or interview
process, to perform essential job functions, and to receive other
benefits and privileges of employment. Please contact us to request
accommodation.
US Benefits:
We offer a comprehensive and highly competitive set of benefits. In
the US, these include: 10 sick days, 10 US holidays, 20-25 paid time off
days (depending on role and tenure), medical insurance starting at $145
per month, dental starting at $7 per month, and vision starting at $5
per month, FSA for healthcare, childcare, and commuter costs, a 403b
retirement savings plans with up to 4.5% immediately vested matching
contribution, plus a 3-7% base IRC contribution (3 year vesting),
disability & life insurance, and an Employee Assistance Program
which is available to our staff and their families to support counseling
and care in times of crisis and mental health struggles.