Organizational context
International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC or “the Federation”) is the world’s largest volunteer-based humanitarian network. The Federation is a membership organisation established by and comprised of its member National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. Along with National Societies and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the Federation is part of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. The overall aim of the IFRC is “to inspire, encourage, facilitate, and promote at all times all forms of humanitarian activities by National Societies with a view to preventing and alleviating human suffering and thereby contributing to the maintenance and promotion of human dignity and peace in the world.” It works to meet the needs and improve the lives of vulnerable people before, during and after disasters, health emergencies and other crises.
The Federation is served by a Secretariat based in Geneva, with regional and country offices throughout the world. The Secretariat is led by the IFRC Secretary General and provides the central capacity of the International Federation to serve, connect, and represent National Societies. The Secretariat’s focus includes providing support to the IFRC governance mechanisms; setting norms and standards; providing guidance; ensuring consistency, coordination, and accountability for performance; knowledge sharing; promoting collaboration within and respect for the RCRC Movement; and expanding engagement with partners. The Secretariat’s headquarters is organized in three main business groups: (i) Partnerships, including Movement and Membership; (ii) Programmes and Operations; and (iii) Management Services. The Global Innovation team is part of the Partnerships business group, sitting within the Policy, Strategy and Knowledge Department. The Innovation team builds and implements strategies that enhance the capacity of the IFRC and National Societies to innovate. The team also secures and manages global partnerships and develops global initiatives. There is a particularly strong focus however on supporting local innovation efforts to thrive across our large ground network in 190 countries.
Job Purpose
Under the supervision of the Response and Recovery Lead, the Senior Officer Response and Recovery supports and enables a risk informed and holistic approach to disaster and crisis preparedness, response and recovery programmes and operations. This includes the provision of quality assurance of operations, supporting National Society capacity development, and global level networking in close coordination with other functions within the DCPRR Department, regions, National Societies and key partners. The Senior Officer will contribute to thought leadership and knowledge sharing across all areas of focus, and support global representation and policy positioning as required.
Job Duties and Responsibilities
Provide support in strengthening response and recovery coordination and management:
- Provide thought leadership, innovation and strategic direction in response and recovery programming;
- Support the mobilisation of programme resources.
- Ensure quality and accountability in response and recovery practice.
- Promote and support innovation and knowledge management in approaches to response and recovery programming.
- Support response and recovery across all areas of focus within National Societies and the Secretariat.
Support to the quality assurance of IFRC response and recovery operations:
- Lead and coordinate the response and recovery inputs into the review and revision of DREF and Emergency Appeal procedures and systems to support efficient and effective decentralized disaster operations coordination and management functions.
- Support the revision of DREF, Emergency Appeals and the Plan of Action narrative and budget templates to enhance operational information and reflect integrated programming and accountable impact across all areas of focus as appropriate.
- Advise regions on the development of DREF proposals and Emergency Appeals consistent with agreed quality and accountability standards, and ensure effective quality control and sign off.
- Coordinate the Emergency Support Group, including the provision of briefings, analyses and consolidation of input from the thematic functions, and ensure senior management is informed on emerging or significant humanitarian situations as required.
- Provide surge capacity to field offices during the start up or early phases of an operation.
- On the request of the USG for Programmes & Operations, assume lead coordination function for operations where the capacity of the region is deemed to be insufficient.
Support quality operational management capacity and standards at all levels of the IFRC:
- Coordinate the development of response and recovery norms and standards and support the dissemination, monitoring and evaluation of the adherence to these standards.
- Coordinate the commissioning of real-time, mid-term, final and longitudinal evaluations of response and recovery operations, and contribute to the management response plans where appropriate.
- Contribute to the development of Federation response and recovery training courses and learning opportunities.
- Collaborate with relevant colleagues on the analysis and dissemination of timely and accurate disaster threat, impact and response information before during and after disasters.
- Facilitate the development of improved communication protocols within the programmes and operations teams across the global Secretariat.
Secure representation and information management across the global response and recovery network:
- Network and coordinate with Red Cross Red Crescent Movement partners, governments, NGOs, UN agencies, private sector and others.
- Represent the Federation Secretariat on response and recovery related issues in internal and external fora and establish effective working relationships with key organizations and institutions.
- Provide regular information updates and briefings as required on response and recovery trends, innovations and emerging best practices.
Be responsible and accountable for the overall management and administration of related projects:
- Provide financial management, monitoring and coordination of project activities, and the delivery to time, budget and agreed quality standards of project outputs with related reporting and representation.
- Ensure the integrity of financial and administrative procedures and the consistent application of IFRC rules and procedures related to project activities.
- Contribute to the overall planning, budgeting and reporting of the team and the department.
Contribute to an effective, high quality IFRC team:
- Provide progress reports on results against objectives and risk analyses as required.
- Accommodate flexible working practices including working as part of time-limited, task-oriented teams to enable the IFRC to respond to new scenarios, operational needs or requests from Governance or the wider membership.
- Contribute to a client-oriented approach that values proactivity, continuous improvement, innovation, high performance and cost effectiveness.
- Foster a collaborative working environment with colleagues in the Secretariat, Regions, National Societies and external partners.
- Be available to deploy to Regions, Country Offices, or Operations to provide support as necessary.
HOW TO APPLY:
Interested candidates are invited to apply via the following link:
