Cash Programming Analysis Consultant at Save the Children

Save the Children is the leading independent organization for children in need, with programs in over 120 countries. We save children’s lives. We fight for their rights. We help them fulfil their potential. Save the Children is working in Nigeria because one in five children in Nigeria dies before their fifth birthday. About 40% of children miss out on school and have to work to survive while nearly 2 million children have lost one or both parents to an AIDS-related disease.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Cash Programming Analysis Consultant Job No.: 200000WE Location: Maiduguri, Borno Employee Status: Fixed Term

Child Safeguarding - Level 3

• Level 3 - The responsibilities of this post may require the post holder to have regular contact with children and young people
• In the overseas context, all posts are considered to be level 3.
• As part of these responsibilities, the post holder will support the establishment of child safeguarding systems, promote a culture of keeping children safe, and ensure that potential harm to children (by our own staff and/or as a result of how we do our work) is identified and addressed on an ongoing basis
• The post holder should report and respond to interventions as determined by position related responsibilities identified in the Child Safeguarding Policy.

Joint Response Nigeria The Nigeria Joint Response (NJR) is being delivered by a consortium of 5 Dutch Relief Alliance (DRA) member organizations and five national partners who work together to provide life-saving humanitarian assistance to the affected population in Borno state of northeastern region of Nigeria. NJR is providing emergency assistance to affected people in 5 target local government areas (LGAs) of Borno state and would directly reach to 90000 affected people during current implementation year of 2019. NJR partners are striving to provide integrated humanitarian assistance in FSL, WASH, Protection, Health and Nutrition sectors to affected population of Konduga, Mafa, Dikwa, Monguno and Gwoza LGAs with financial and technical assistance provided by DRA, an intermediary body between Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and its partner organizations. 1st July 2019 is the start date of one-year additional funding approved by Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA). As part of this additional funding, the NJR focused on scaling up and piloting different modalities of cash transfer programming. By using unrestricted Multi-Purpose Cash (MPC), secondly a cash-for-health pilot and lastly, a cash-for-protection pilot These life-saving services are being rendered to most vulnerable groups in the target LGAs of Monguno, Dikwa and Mafa LGAs in Borno State Nigeria. The findings from the pilots will serve as learnings for future cash programming in Nigeria and NJR partners aim to showcase the feasibility and effectiveness of using the piloted modalities in Nigeria. Evaluation Objectives The NJR is seeking to procure the services of an independent external evaluator to:

• Conduct a comparative evaluation and to assess the 3 different cash pilots within the NJR project against the OECD DAC criteria to determine the suitability of each modality in the context of North-East Nigeria.
• As part of the comparative evaluation study, conduct an assessment to determine the capacity of the NJR partners (both INGOs and local partners) involved in the cash programming on design and delivery of cash programming.

To this end the evaluator will:

• Comparatively assess the 3 pilots’ performance and achievements against the NJR project’s objectives identifying factors of success or failure;
• Measure how the different pilots impacted the local economy (market), affected population, local partners and DRA members.
• Evaluate how the pilots have been adhering to basic cross-cutting issues including gender, conflict sensitivity, do no harm principles, localization and inclusion while undertaking the intervention.
• Examine how the ever-changing context in the project area has affected the implementation of the project and how pilots have been adaptive to the operational context.
• Assess the replicability of the pilots and sub-sequent outcomes in other similar settings for upcoming phases/cycles of joint response in Nigeria.
• Draw conclusions, lessons learned and recommendations which could inform future programming, policy-making and overall organizational learning.

Evaluation Methodology:

• The consultant shall use mixed methods including desk review, key informant interview, sample survey, and observation using simple but numerically sensitive tools to collect data
• The sample size must be statistically representative of the population. The analysis will involve statistical and content analysis using appropriate packages as deemed fit by the consultant
• The analysis among others should show trends and to the extent possible should be disaggregated by gender and location. There should be adequate female representation and participation throughout the data collection process. Where necessary, focus group discussions should be conducted separately for men and women.
• Consultant will closely work with MEAL Community of Practice (CoP) established as part of the NJR programme to ensure effective engagement of all NJR partners in the designing of data collections tools and methodology
• The research design shall be participatory in its core and engage all the consortium members, implementing teams, external stakeholders, main and subgroups of the affected population.

Scope of Work:

• Save the Children International requires the services of a Cash Programming Expert to work with the NJR consortium coordinator and other joint response partners to ensure the learning from the cash pilots are captured and can be shared with the wider humanitarian community and factored in for multi-year planning and program designing by other joint responses
• In order to do so, the consultant will visit project locations in Borno state of Northeast Nigeria and engage all the partners (local and international), cash working group in Borno and Abuja, private sector service providers and affected population (beneficiaries)
• The consultant will also need to develop necessary tools to enable the project staff to track the progress of the different pilots. The tools should be delivered as an annex to the inception report.
• Tools developed will include:
  • Tracking tool for actual implementation
  • Tracking tool for learnings
  • Tracking tools for cross-cutting themes (including gender equality and diversity & inclusion)
• Tools and criteria for measurement should be based on global humanitarian standards.
• This assignment will be undertaken in June 2020, with (remote) development of the required tools starting from February.

Key Questions on Comparative Analysis:

• The consultant will conduct a comparative evaluation of the newly piloted MPC modalities based on OECD DAC criteria. Guiding questions are set out below.

Relevance / Appropriateness: The interventions designed under “additional funding” are relevant to the needs of most affected and vulnerable groups in northeast Nigeria. The cash modalities are tailored in line with local context, target populations are benefited appropriately and in a dignified manner. Cash programming help implementing agencies to establish a lasting and trustworthy, credible relationship with communities they serve as well as partner delivered cash programming in a more accountable and transparent manner:

• Were the pilot designs appropriate in the local context?
• To what extent have the pilots addressed the identified problems or real needs on the ground?
• Was affected population’s short term need covered by the interventions?
• To what extent are the objectives of the program still valid?
• What alternative strategies would have been more effective in achieving its objectives?

Coherence: The project design complies with DRA MPC framework as an exclusive and separate sector of humanitarian programming, national and state level cash working group’s guidelines and ensures the service provision in line with national (EFCC) and state level government policies and regulatory frameworks. To assess and capture the evidence about the coherence of intervention in line with Grand Bargain commitments and defined guidelines for adopting cash as a tool to deliver humanitarian assistance keeping affected populations’ dignity fully intact:

• Are the pilot designs fully coherent with DRA MPC framework and Grand Bargain Commitments?
• Are the pilots interventions in compliance with guidelines set out by cash working group in Nigeria?
• Do members deliver the assistance in line with national and state-level policies and regulations?

Efficiency: The consultant should assess the overall quality and quantity of the cash programming designed and delivered by all members of joint response in northeast Nigeria. He/she should also evaluate the different cash modalities/approaches adopted by multiple members for delivering humanitarian assistance to target populations in project LGAs of Borno state. Timeliness (delivery on time, within stipulated time frame and in line with people’s needs) would be assessed as a key contributory factor to the success or failure of the programming:

• Was the process of achieving results efficient? To what extent were the pilots implemented in a timely and cost-effective manner?
• Do the results in terms of quantity and quality justify the resources used? What factors contributed to implementation efficiency?
• What are the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of the project implementation process?

Effectiveness: Cash programming is intended to achieve certain objectives and purposes well defined in the project documents. A core component of this assignment is a comparison of various approaches/modalities adopted by JR members in order to capture the evidence from the field and establish effectiveness of the programming, in line with recommendations set out by sector Nigeria Cash working group:

• To what extent have the planned results (outputs, outcomes) been achieved?
• How effective were the strategies, methodologies and activities used in the implementation of the pilots?
• What were the supporting factors and barriers that affected these achievements?
• How did the project coordinate with and/or complement other similar actions in the field - geographical and thematic?
• Which actions have been most successful in addressing cross-cutting themes, including gender inequalities and why?

Impact: Assessing overall impact of the cash programming and how it contributed to achieving intended and unintended results in the field:

• To what extent has the project contributed to longer-term outcomes and goals?
• Do the cash pilots support resilience building of the target population, if so, to what extent?
• Is there any possible unintended positive or negative impact or consequences of the pilots on target population as well as on implementing national and international partners?
• Does sustained multipurpose cash assistance influence beneficiary’s expenditure behavior [capacity of planning and investing] or a handout mentality?
• Does the implementation of the cash pilots help local partners gained significant experience of designing and delivery of cash intervention?

Sustainability: To assess the elements of sustainability of the intervention through finding and negotiating various financial support mechanism for ongoing northeast response in Nigeria, is there an enabling environment that supports ongoing positive impacts?

• To what extent are the outcomes and results of the project likely to be sustained after the completion of the project?
• What are the contributing factors and constraints that require attention in order to improve prospects of sustainability of the project outcomes and the potential for replication of the approach?

Key Questions on partNer Capacity: The cash pilots of the JR intend to strengthen the capacity of partners in the field of cash programming and the study must assess and capture the evidence of enhanced capacity of partners through implementing cash pilot in the field. The availability of in-house capacity at national and international members of JR should also be considered as a factor to the sustainability of intervention:

• What was the capacity of national and international partners in the NJR consortium for cash programming at the start and at the end of the program?
• How has partners’ in-house capacity changed in terms of regulatory policy framework, procedures, internal controls, accountability towards affected populations and compliance with national and international regulator frameworks and policy regimes as a result of their experience implementing the NJR cash pilots?
• What (further) capacity is needed to implement future cash pilots efficiently and effectively?

How to Apply Interested and qualified candidates should: Click here to apply