Organisation Background
Founded in 2011, the International NGO Safety Organisation (INSO) is a British charity that supports the safety of aid workers by establishing safety coordination platforms in insecure contexts. INSO provides registered NGOs with a range of free services including real-time incident tracking, analytical reports, safety related data and mapping, crisis management support, staff orientations and training.
INSO services help NGOs with their day-to-day risk management responsibilities and improve their overall situational awareness to support evidence-based humanitarian access decisions.
The Organisation has grown from innovative start-up to become a globally recognised charity and a highly-valued component in the humanitarian safety coordination system.
The strong focus on humanitarian principles and exclusive NGO-only membership criteria have meant that INSO is now accepted as a standard component of modern humanitarian response offering independent frontline reporting and coordination services that save lives, strengthen operational practice and enable humanitarian access.
Today the organisation provides daily support to more than 1000 NGOs in eleven of the world’s most insecure countries and has earned a strong reputation for performance, principles & professionalism.
We are now seeking a suitable candidate to join our team as a Deputy Director, based in Abuja, with at least 60% travels throughout the region.
INSO Nigeria Country Office
Since becoming registered in Nigeria, INSO has developed a strong country wide approach, supporting NGOs working on Lake Chad Basin Crisis from all neighbouring countries. A coordination office is opened in Abuja, and an operational office in Maiduguri. The opening of a new sub-office in Cameroon is foreseen in 2017. INSO Nigeria will focus its operations on North Eastern part of Nigeria and in the greater area of Lake Chad Basin (Cameroon, Niger and Chad).
Job Summary
This is a truly unique and rewarding role, and will effectively help bring vital aid to millions of people that have been trapped and displaced by violence. The Deputy Director will provide essential inputs in INSO’s strategy and role across the Lake Chad Basin region, and support its extension in Cameroon. The successful candidate will have a strong background in NGO safety and security, be outgoing, inquisitive and detail oriented, and have significant experience building and leading high performing teams. He/she will also have the ability to analyse complex security issues and contexts, communicate to an excellent standard of English both verbally and in writing, and above all else share INSO’s commitment to humanitarian principles.
Major Responsibilities
1. Analysis and development of new products:
- Supervise the sourcing, processing and analysing of complex information for the production of regular safety reports (weekly list of incidents, alerts, reports, bi-weekly reports) and quarterlies in conjunction with the Director, for an NGO audience, and ensuring those reports have high quality standards (writing, presentation, reference notes)
- Responsible for the production of special reports (identifying trends in the current Lake Chad Basin context, providing lessons learnt from incidents occurrence and projections based on referenced historical and current information) as well as maps and other relevant documents (position papers, best practices handbooks, briefing papers)
- Responsible for the general organization of the data and information gathering structure, in link with the Nigeria Director (geographic coverage organization, reliability assessment, credibility of information)
- Responsible to maintain and develop the Incident Tracking Database and propose new services relevant to NGOs based on this database
2. Trainings:
- The deputy director will be in charge of the training department of both programs in Nigerian and Cameroon:
- Design and develop course packages in partnership with third parties’ implementers, and in link with the Safety and Training manager at INSO Headquarters.
- Co-facilitate training courses, deliver classroom inputs both in Nigeria and Cameroon
- Monitor & evaluate the training delivery and impact
- Manage the administration and logistics (in link with the country Administration, manager) of the training, post-course reports, and other statistical reports for the INSO Director.
- Organise and lead internal capacity-building staff retreats
3. Operational support
- Fill for other safety advisors during their leaves, and to provide additional program support both in Nigeria and Cameroon
- Support the Director for the opening and implementation of a new sub-office in Maroua (Cameroon) and advise operational staff
- Participate in coordination meetings and other humanitarian-related forums across Lake Chad Basin region
- Effectively represent, promote and protect INSO's mandate of independence, impartiality and neutrality across the entire Lake Chad Basin
- Establish and maintain an active information network, which includes NGOs, the UN, military forces, and other national and international security actors to obtain credible and relevant safety information thorough the region
- Participate proactively to the definition of INSO strategy and to the drafting of proposals based on the strategy
- Support the country director in the development of best practices including security and access and in the implementation of INSO SOPs.
4. Reporting:
- Participate senior management team meeting, staff meetings, analysis meetings and other requested internal meetings
- Participate on request to the drafting of donor reports
- Regularly brief and share information / analysis with other team members
Mandatory Requirements:
- Exemplary command of both the English and French languages (written and spoken).
- Masters level education or equivalent in a relevant field (please specify).
- Minimum of five (5) years in post conflict/emergency environments in the humanitarian sector.
- Acceptance and strong understanding of humanitarian principles
- Solid and up to date understanding of principles and practices in broad humanitarian action, NGO safety and risk management, humanitarian access, and civil-military coordination.
- Outgoing and confident personality.
- Excellent networking, diplomatic, and representative communication skills.
- Proven writing, editing, and analytical skills and the keenest eye for detail - the position entails a lot of report editing and reviewing
- Independent drive, motivation, and excellence, and ability to operate and sustainably manage staff and teams under strict systems and deadlines
Preferred Characteristics:
- A year’s (recent) experience working on Nigeria or North Cameroon - ideally in an NGO safety role or equivalent - and demonstrable understanding of the context.
- Experience in staff capacity development and training
- Direct experience and involvement in a crisis management role
- Prior experience in an inter-agency role.
- Employment history that reflects experience in both security and civilian fields.
- Existing information networks and/or local language skills.
- Detailed understanding of INSO mandate & services.
Key Personal Competencies:
- A good listener
- An effective communicator
- Excellent analyst
- Team player
- Excellent interpersonal skills
- A people manager
Terms & Conditions: 12-month contract with expected start date of 1 May 2017, €5000 per month salary, 4 days annual leave per month and 3 days of R&R every three months, global medical coverage, €150,000 AD&D coverage.
HOW TO APPLY:
Interested applicants are requested to send the following to jobs@ngosafety.org by 31 March 2017 and reference “INSO Nigeria Deputy Director" in the subject line of the email. Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted.
- Cover Letter specifying how you meet the mandatory requirements, any preferred characteristics, your motivation for applying, and what you hope to bring to INSO (2 page maximum).
- Updated CV (5 page maximum).
- One relevant and substantive writing sample in English that demonstrates your analytical and report writing abilities (10 page maximum).
Please do not send any additional information (such as copies of certificates, copies of diplomas, other writing samples, etc.) and keep the total size of your application under 2MB if possible.
