The Organization
Search for Common Ground (SFCG) is an international non-profit organization that promotes peaceful resolution of conflict. With headquarters in Washington, DC, SFCG’s mission is to transform how individuals, organizations, and governments deal with conflict - away from adversarial approaches and toward cooperative solutions. SFCG seeks to help conflicting parties understand their differences and act on their commonalities. With a total of approximately 380 staff worldwide, SFCG implements projects from 56 offices in 34 countries, including in Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and the United States.
Search for Common Ground in South Sudan is just starting up an operational presence. SFCG is launching a multi-pronged project aimed at contributing to encouraging tolerance and peaceful coexistence, and reducing violence. SFCG in South Sudan will initially have a team of approximately 10 personnel, with an office based in Juba and programming in seven states. SFCG uses a range of tools to implement conflict transformation and peacebuilding, including radio, television, participatory theatre, mobile cinema, comic books, joint action projects, training, public forums, and arts and culture events, among others.
Summary of Position
The Country Director manages the overall program in South Sudan from a programmatic and operational perspective, as well as leading on fundraising and donor relations. As our South Sudan program is currently in start-up mode, the Country Director will support this process, including the roll-out of the newly funded UNICEF project.
This position reports to the Regional Director for East and Southern Africa and collaborates closely with various Washington-based divisions of SFCG, including the Africa Team, the Institutional Learning Team, Communications, Finance and Operations. The position is located in Juba, with some travel to other areas of South Sudan as part of program implementation and oversight.
Essential Duties and Responsibilities:
Program Development and Implementation
- Define programme priorities, plans and long-term strategy (in close collaboration with the SFCG Regional Director)
- Oversee implementation of funded projects, collaborating with donors, partners, and other staff
- Ensure a successful start-up, putting in place the foundation for a long-term program, in collaboration with the Africa Team
- Manage the country program with the highest quality standards and well-documented results
- Ensure that program planning and management reflects the available resources, and respond to gaps with fundraising and/or operational adjustments as needed
- Reporting to donors based on a credible monitoring and evaluation system for overall program results as well as for specific projects
- Contribute analysis and programmatic capacities to the implementation of programming in South Sudan and other countries in the region as appropriate
- Stay abreast of the international conflict resolution field to ensure that the program’s work remains innovative and professional
- Be directly engaged in the continuing development of the organization, its mission and its staff, through the sharing of experience and knowledge, particularly contributing to its Institutional Learning efforts
- Strengthen existing funding relationships and identify and pursue new potential donors in collaboration with headquarters in Washington, DC and Brussels, Belgium
Financial Management
- In partnership with the Finance Directors, ensure financial compliance both with South Sudanese laws, donor requirements and SFCG procedures across the organisation.
- Identify potential shortfalls and strategize with the organisation’s senior management as necessary to ensure the program’s financial sustainability.
Staff Management and Development
- Develop and manage a team of diverse staff members (expatriate, national and third country nationals) and partners, modelling the kind of interethnic and multi-stakeholder cooperation that SFCG aims to promote widely
- Participate in the recruitment and selection of highly qualified staff, providing information on living and working conditions as well as security briefings
- Strengthen the capacity of national staff and partners, contributing to SFCG’s legacy strategy of conflict transformation in South Sudan
- Ensure compliance with SFCG Operations Manual policies and procedures
- Ensure that country policies, contracts, and disciplinary procedures and processes conform to local labour laws
- Ensure an updated security and evacuation plans are in place
Organizational Representation
- Serve as SFCG’s country representative
- Develop and maintain proactive, positive and professional relationships with partner organizations, other NGOS, donors, clients, key government officials, civil society groups, etc.
- Maintain responsible media coverage of program events and issues related to SFCG mission
- Maintain regular written and oral reporting to Washington and Brussels on key country, regional, program, security and staff issues
- Establish a direct line of communication with other African Country Directors in the region for program guidance toward strategic initiatives
As job descriptions cannot be exhaustive, the position holder may be required to undertake other duties that are broadly in line with the above key duties.
Minimum skills and experience:
- Degree in relevant field (eg. conflict transformation, security studies, media and communications, sociology, political science, or related fields)
- Experience in managing large projects, with multiple grants and donors in a fragile state
- At least five years experience living overseas, preferably in Sub-Saharan Africa
- Knowledge of the conflict dynamics of South Sudan
- At least ten years experience in managing a program, both programmatically and operationally, preferably on media and/or conflict transformation-related issues
- Track record in successful fundraising
- Experience with donor regulations
- Experience in capturing results and overseeing reporting, monitoring and evaluation systems
- Experience in managing multi-cultural teams, preferably in Africa
- Exceptional communication and interpersonal skills
- A problem-solving approach to challenging situations
- Ability to multi-task while leading a complex team
- Salary: Commensurate with experience and education, with excellent benefits
HOW TO APPLY:
Please send cover letter and resume through our application system at:https://sfcg.bamboohr.com/jobs/view.php?id=248. Please be sure to include salary requirements (in currency figures) or current salary, and to mention where you found this posting. No phone calls please. Please see our web site www.sfcg.org for full details of our work. The closing date for this position is May 15, 2015.
