Initiative & Innovation Manager

Company Vision

We seek a world of hope, inclusion, and social justice, where poverty has been overcome and all people live with dignity and security.

Company Mission

CARE works around the globe to save lives, defeat poverty, and achieve social justice.

Job Description

About CARE

CARE International is a global leader within a worldwide movement dedicated to ending poverty. CARE works around the globe to save lives, defeat poverty, and achieve social justice. We put women and girls in the center of our work because we know that we cannot overcome poverty until all people have equal rights and opportunities. CARE has been working in Uganda since 1969 and we work across all the regions of Uganda. The goal of our 2021-2025 business plan is to reach 10 million people, through our lifesaving and gender-transformative humanitarian, development, and nexus programs. We are committed to working with the government, private sector, and local civil society, especially women-led and women’s rights organizations.  Our annual portfolio is $15 million, funded through a diverse range of donors.

Project Summary

The SPA II program is a four-year DANIDA-funded climate resilience program that will be implemented in seven countries namely, Uganda, Somalia, Ethiopia, Bangladesh, Bukina Faso, Mali and Niger. The Uganda component will be implemented in Karamoja and the Southwestern District of Kikuube with the objective of strengthening food and energy security among 13,000 poor and vulnerable households (60% women and girls). Based on the innovation cycle, the project will promote gender-transformative solutions for food production (both crop and livestock) and energy, some of which have been tested under the CAMP+ project. Beyond the innovations, the project will catalyze actions for disaster preparedness and response and will support actions of relevant civil society organizations, the private sector, and coalitions to influence the enaction and implementation of green and just policies.

Job Summary

The Senior Initiative and Innovation Manager (SIIM) will provide overall leadership to the SPA II project, ensuring that it is implemented as an innovation project. Primarily, the SIIM shall exhibit the knack for fostering individual and collective creativity.  The SIIM will create a strategy and culture that sustain ongoing ideation, and experimentation, moreover, balancing the right resources and at the right level, to support experimentation and scaling.  On the other hand, S/He will provide project management oversight, as well as technical guidance on program quality and learning (PQL). The SIM is responsible for partnership management, strategic engagement of stakeholders, capacity building of partners as well as advocacy in relation to the project. The SIM will ensure that the innovative solutions are gender transformative and achieve the best impact and value for money.

 

SPECIFIC RESPONSIBILITIES

Responsibility #1: Innovation leadership (30%)

• The SIIM shall provide individual and collective leadership for the creative and vision domains.
• The SIIM shall identify innovation opportunities and shall be comfortable applying the innovation core skills (pls. see the section on skills below) to nurture ideas from the vision stage to scaling (ideation, prototyping, and scaling).
• The SIIM shall balance the risks against the potential rewards of the work done on the SPA project.

Project MANAGEMENT Oversight (20%)

• The SIIM will take lead on processes for identifying and onboarding partners for the different stages of the innovation cycle.
• The SIIM is responsible for ensuring the timely delivery of CARE’s planned deliverables as per the approved proposal and budget, working closely with the innovation partners.
• The SIIM will coordinate the project team and innovation partners in the monitoring of budget utilization to ensure a culture of zero tolerance to overspends and underspending and ultimately, zero No-Cost Extensions (NCEs).
• The SIIM will closely work with project partners and the grants team to ensure value for money, and the utmost impact for women and girls, in the delivery of innovation packages.
• The SIIM will coordinate the project team and partners to review project risks from time to time and devise timely mitigation measures, with the use of appropriate risk management tools.
• The SIIM will be responsible for the consolidation of reports, both financial and narrative, and ensure timely quality reporting to the donor as per respective grant agreements.

Responsibility #2: Program QUALITY and LEARNING (10%)

• The SIIM will plan, organize and manage the planning, and regular reflection meetings, ensuring that the lessons are captured and inform ongoing improvement in project delivery.
• The SIIM will steer the project innovation processes from ideation to scaling, ensuring that each stage is implemented according to the required standards and in record time.
• The SIIM will work closely with the MEAL advisor and the innovation and partnership specialists to ensure continuous iteration and learning and that this feeds into the different stages of the innovation cycle.
• The SIIM will work with the gender advisor, to integrate and monitor gender aspects at all stages of the innovation cycle.
• This SIIM will be required to embrace and embed other CARE quality markers of resilience, and governance across the project cycle, reporting on progress using the established MEAL system and other reporting systems like PIIRS.
• The SIIM will ensure quality engagement at PQL platforms including monthly Program Review Meetings (PRMs) and quarterly PQL workshops.
• The SIIM will work closely with the MEAL advisor and the MEAL coordinator to carry out the day-to-day project monitoring as well as the three-phased evaluation of the project, closely linking this to the research and iteration that will be carried out by the innovation partners and ensuring that concrete lessons and emerging issues are captured and used to inform project delivery and/or future innovative project designs.
• The SIIM will ensure robust communications and visibility of the project across different platforms like CARE shares, social media, and any other relevant platforms that may present themselves, using quality content.

Responsibility #3: Strategic ENGAGEMENT and NETWORKING (15%)

The SIIM is responsible for external engagement, representation, and influencing systemic change at all levels using different platforms, networks, alliances, and coalitions. To this end.

• The SIIM will be responsible for the advocacy and influencing of actors within the food and energy sectors, Government, CSOs, and Private sector to expand innovative climate solutions for refugees and their host communities.
• The SIIM will be the main link between the project partners and key leadership structures and/or technical working groups at the settlement level (including within OPM, UNHR, and Sub County) as well as the subnational and national level (including Kikuube DLG, Ministry of Energy, Ministry of Agriculture Animal Industries and Fisheries, CSOs etc.,) ensuring representation and contribution to on-going initiatives and policy debates within the relevant sectors.
• The SIIM will be responsible for articulating project progress and outcomes to the relevant stakeholders including CARE member partners, relevant Embassies, innovation communities of practice, and CARE Uganda country office among others when called upon.

Responsibility #4: Business Development (5%)

The SIIM will leverage his/her own experience and expertise, as well as the experience from existing CARE projects, to build and grow climate innovations. In this:

• The SIIM will be responsible for documenting and/or design of clean energy and food production models using the experience of the SPA II project, CAMP+, and other related projects within the Kikuube and Karamoja region.
• The SIIM will work closely with the CJ program manager to identify and pursue viable multi-year funding opportunities and to establish critical partnerships for building a robust energy and food innovations portfolio at CARE.
• The SIIM will work closely with the CJ program Manager, and the CJ team, to prepare winning proposals in response to identified funding opportunities.

Responsibility #5: Team management (10%)

• The SIIM will be directly responsible for the management of the performance of supervised staff, based on the provisions of CARE’s performance management guidelines.
• The SIIM will do whatever is necessary and within CARE policies, to build a cohesive and effective team for delivery on the SPA II program as well as the other Country Office deliverables.
• The SIIM will ensure the visibility of team tasks to the rest of the Climate Justice team and other relevant CARE platforms.
• The SIIM will work closely with the Program Manager and the HR function of CARE to promote staff growth, including recommending and/or delivering mentorship, coaching, and training to the project team as may be deemed necessary.
• The SIIM will coordinate the project team to ensure timely and quality contribution to Program and Country level tasks and processes.

Responsibility #6: Promote Gender Equity and Diversity and Safeguarding Practices (5%)

• Practice a behavior consistent with CARE core values and promote gender equity and diversity goals.
• Play a leadership role in identifying and implementing initiatives that enhance CARE’s commitment to gender and diversity.
• Ensure that CARE Safeguarding policies and procedures are adhered to by all and the staff that S/he supervisors both directly and indirectly.
• Ensure that He / She and consortium personnel under the project are familiar with the following organizational policies and procedures and can identify when needed how these may have been breached, The CI Safeguarding policy, Protection from Sexual Harassment, Exploitation and Abuse and Child Abuse, The anti-discrimination and harassment policy, The code of conduct and the organization\’s Values.

Responsibility #6: Any other duties assigned from time to time (5%)

• Any other duties incidental to the role or assigned by the supervisor.

EDUCATION, EXPERIENCE, SKILLS, AND KNOWLEDGE

Essential:

v  A Master’s degree in community development, development studies, Climate change and disaster management, agribusiness, or any other relevant field from a reputable institution is a MUST.

v  Ten (10) years of project management experience with substantial exposure to climate innovation processes.

v  Experience in private sector engagement is a MUST.

v  A good understanding of the humanitarian innovations ecosystem within Uganda and beyond.

v  Demonstrated experience in design, proposal writing, and resource mobilization.

v  Experience in research/evidence generation especially in relation to the innovation’s iteration.

v  CORE Innovation skills: *creativity, *critical thinking, *compound problem solving, *questioning, *observing, * networking and *Experimenting

v  Skilled at communicating and presenting to executive and high-level audiences.

v  Organizing skills and capacity to multi-task in rapidly changing and fast-paced environments.

v  Knowledge of and demonstrated personal commitment to relevant organizational codes of conduct including anti-fraud and anti-corruption, safeguarding, etc.

v  Good interpersonal skills especially in an environment that embraces diversity.

v  Willingness to live and work in a hard-to-reach environment

 Desired:

• Professional training and experience in project management, Monitoring, and Evaluation.
• Professional training in budget management, people management, and communications.
• Professional training and experience in gender equality women and girls’ empowerment