Job in Abuja at Mercy Corps for a Project Manager - Income Generation & Livelihood

Mercy Corps has been working in Nigeria since 2012. With a team of over 85 staff, our country program currently focus on conflict mitigation, markets and economic development, adolescent girls’ education, humanitarian response and financial resilience.

Mercy Corps is a sub-grantee for the implementation of the Catholic Relief Services (CRS) led and USAID funded Feed the Future Nigeria livelihoods project. In this five- year project (end June 2018) Mercy Corps helps vulnerable households to improve their incomes by building their business and employment skills to effectively connect to market opportunities. The project, through work with civil society partners, builds the capacities of households in entrepreneurship so that they can engage in viable business and income generating activities.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Project Manager - Income Generation & Livelihood

Location: Abuja, Nigeria

General Position Summary
The Project Manager (PM) will lead the implementation of the project in the following area:

• Support individual beneficiaries to have access to financial options;
• Work with selected micro-finance institutions (MFIs) and micro-finance banks (MFBs) to develop product adapted to the needs of economically disadvantaged youth and women;
• Support MFIs and MFBs to extend their rural outreach through mobile technology;
• Support women and youth to access grants for business start up’s.

• Train beneficiaries in business development, vocational, marketing skills among others needed to pursue economic opportunities.
• Creating linkages for households to access business mentors.
• Support the creation of women and adolescent girls safe spaces for entrepreneurship development.
• Work with private sector companies in designing and implementing micro-franchising models for rural micro-entrepreneurs.
• Build the technical capacity of CSO partners as is relevant to the quality implementation of project activities
• Provide regular and effective monitoring of implementation activities to ensure project quality
• Ensure appropriate and timely documentation and dissemination of key results, deliverables and learning and innovations for maximum project impact as per guidance from the prime implementer.
• Provide technical support in developing and implementing accountability mechanisms, operations research and overall learning agenda of the project.
• Support the documentation of cost share as applicable.
• Ensure gender is mainstream to all program activities.
• Emphasis will be placed on ensuring that targeted individuals have employment and financial options.

• Work closely with counterparts in other NGOs, MFI, MFBs and other stakeholder groups to strengthen and implement a comprehensive income generation project for vulnerable households.
• Provide technical support in the following areas: market-driven economic development, private sector engagement, microfinance, entrepreneurship development, and value chain linkages.
• Manage implementation of program activities, developing work plans in collaboration with the Technical Program Director, monitoring implementation, documenting lessons learned and evaluating impact.

• Oversee the smooth flow of routine project operations in compliance with Mercy Corps and donor policies and procedures.
• Ensure effective and transparent use of financial resources in compliance with Mercy Corps and donor policies and procedures.

• Liaise with private sector actors, local government officials, local NGOs and civil society organizations, local religious leaders and other notables to ensure support for and acceptance of Mercy Corps’ programs.
• Maintain close working relationships with donors, other humanitarian and development organizations, and local partners (banks, training institutes, insurance companies, and microfinance institutions), including representing Mercy Corps at local coordination meetings as assigned.
• Conduct himself/herself both professionally and personally in such a manner as to bring credit to Mercy Corps and to not jeopardize its humanitarian mission.
• Other duties as assigned.

• Ensure that project is implemented with a clear analysis and understanding of security management priorities.

• As part of Mercy Corps’ agency-wide organizational learning initiative, all team members are responsible for spending 5% of their work time in formal and/or non-formal professional learning activities.

• Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts towards accountability, specifically to our beneficiaries and to international standards guiding international relief and development work, while actively engaging beneficiary communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.

• This position will manage one project officer and provide oversight supervision of local implementing partners. He/she will also work with consultants where applicable

• Country Director, Mercy Corps Nigeria; works closely with project Chief of Party and other technical directors.

• Mercy Corps Nigeria team, Catholic Relief Services team, local partners’ team and Mercy Corps Technical Support Unit.

• MA/S in Business, Finance, Economics, Agriculture, Agribusiness, Agricultural Economics, or related field
• At least 8 years work experience with for profit organization, non-governmental organization (NGO)and governmental organizations or for-profit agribusiness working with vulnerable, marginalized groups in West Africa, preferably Nigeria.
• Fluency in English required, including report development, writing and editing.
• Strong management skills, with good understanding of relevant cross-cultural issues.
• Demonstrated experience in training, capacity building of partners and team members.
• Demonstrated attention to detail, ability to follow procedures, meet deadlines and work independently and cooperatively with team members required
• Highly developed computers skills with strong familiarity with Microsoft Word and Excel are mandatory.
• Candidate must be willing to travel and work throughout Nigeria.
• Proven knowledge of international best practices of household economic strengthening for OVC and OVC caregivers.
• Proven knowledge of international best practices of microfinance, micro-insurance schemes and financial inclusion
• Proven experience in one or more of the following: market-driven economic development, private sector engagement, microfinance, village savings and loan associations (VSLA), micro-insurance, entrepreneurship development, and value chain linkages.

• A successful candidate will have strong diplomacy skills in managing a team with different backgrounds, abilities, and technical knowledge and will have contextual knowledge of Northern Nigeria.
• She/he will use effective communication and team-building techniques; have excellent organizational and strong interpersonal skills and display an even temperament and good sense of humour.

• The successful candidate for the position will be based in Abuja, Nigeria with frequent travel to field locations.

• All applications must include the position title in the subject line and not more than 4 pages.
• Only short-listed candidates will be contacted.