Project Coordinator/Community Facilitator

Vacancy Announcement

Program / Department Summary

Aasaman Nepal (ASN) ‘A pioneer organization for education and nutrition,’ is one of the leading Terai based NGOs led and managed by social activists since its establishment in Dhanusha, Janakpur in 1999. ASN has been engaged in developing and implementing programs aimed at protection, promotion, and fulfillment of child rights in Nepal. Currently ASN has been working in 24 districts under 6 Thematic Areas as: Education/Child Protection, Women Empowerment, Livelihood/ Natural Resource Management, Disaster Risk Reduction, Health/ Nutrition and Good Governance.

Aasaman Nepal in partnership with Mercy Corps is implementing the Zurich Climate Resilience Alliance (ZCRA) program in Madhesh Province. The Zurich Climate Resilience Alliance (ZCRA) is an alliance of nine organizations including international NGOs, private sector, and academic organizations, who have come together with the support of the Zurich Foundation to drive better policy and practice to reduce the negative impact of multi hazards (floods and heatwaves) on peoples’ and communities’ ability to thrive. The Alliance finished its first phase in 2018, second phase in Dec 2023 and third phase will run till Dec 2027. During this time, the Alliance will take a system approach and implement a combination of pilot programs, research, knowledge management and work to influence community donors, policy makers, and practitioners to invest in climate resilience through:

• Strengthened DRRM and CCA governance in Province and Local Level.
• Increased financing Government’s financing on DRRM and CCA at all levels of government.
• Enhanced Private Sector’s role in supporting DRRM and CCA efforts.

Mercy Corps is leading the ‘influencing and advocacy’ work within the Alliance, as well as making substantial contributions to work streams on knowledge management, research, and piloting innovative field programming with communities, private sector, and government.

1. Project Coordinator (PC) -1 based in Janakpur office (at least 50% field visit)

Job Summary

The Project Coordinator assumes responsibility for implementation and quality assurance of community intervention of ZCRA phase III project including Palika and Provincial level advocacy and influencing. S/He will ensure alignment of the project activities with the project’s Theory of Change. S/He will supervise the field level community facilitators and ensure the achievement of high-quality program delivery and results ensuring Gender and social inclusion and governance as cross cutting components. S/he will directly collaborate with the Province Coordinator (Madhesh) from Mercy Corps and take leadership on province level influencing actions and field level activities implementation. S/he will collaborate/ interact with government (both local government and provincial government), UN, NGOs/ INGOs and private sector representatives at province level. The Project Coordinator will play a leading role in advancing Alliance work in Nepal (specially in Madhesh province).

Essential Job Responsibilities

The specific duties and responsibilities of the Project Coordinator include, but are not limited to the following,

PROGRAM MANAGEMENT (50%)

A. PROGRAM IMPLEMENTATION

• Constantly align project activities with project’s Theory of Change and work plan of ZCRA phase III.
• Ensure set targets, work plans and schedules for each month and achieved on regular basis.
• Ensure the quality of climate resilient actions implementation at community level.
• Provide technical and management inputs to project staff to enhance effectiveness of program implementation and program cycle management. E.g.: quality planning, stakeholder engagement and implementation of the project activities.
• Ensure high quality program reports are generated and shared with donors within the given timeline.
• Participate in strategic events to provide technical input and influencing.

B. FINANCE & COMPLIANCE MANAGEMENT

• Work closely with the finance and program team for budget management and reporting to Aasaman and MCN (Mercy Corps Nepal) team on regular basis.
• Monitor expenditures against budget and suggest modifications, as necessary.
• Ensure all internal control procedures are adhered to and that necessary measures are put in place to ensure high standards of accountability and compliance.
• Work closely with finance/compliance to mitigate fraud, conflict of interest and legal ramifications of activities.
• Support and orient on ASN and donor Code of Ethics and uphold the Zero tolerance of corruption policy.

C. TEAM MANAGEMENT

• Promote accountability, communicate expectations, and provide constructive feedback to project staff for quality performance and mitigate frequent turnover.
• Organize periodic capacity building exercises for staff based on capacity needs assessment.

ADVOCACY, INFLUENCE & REPRESENTATION (30%)

• Represent the project to government and other external stakeholders. Ensure regular and on-going coordination with key government, non-governmental, donor, private sector and stakeholders related to the climate and flood resilience agenda at provincial level.
• Coordinate with MC-Province Coordinator on stakeholder mapping including climate and flood resilience interventions and planning at provincial level.
• Coordinate with MC-Province Coordinator to Identify, document, and communicate the changes in context and policy at province level to develop and or modify project’s influencing strategies if necessary.
• Implement project influencing strategies at provincial level, municipality level and at community level.
• Suggest and support MC-Province Coordinator to develop appropriate influencing materials for effective implementation of influencing strategies.
• Network in the province to establish and maintain strategic relations with relevant local stakeholders, to continually inform, challenge, and improve Project advocacy, strategy, and program development.

KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT & MONITORING AND EVALUATIONS (20%)

• Lead the database management of the project progresses regularly (as there will not be separate Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning- MEL function).
• Support to execute research initiatives to support the program's influencing agenda. Provide support to MC province coordinator to identify and disseminate strong cases to influence communities, governments, and donors to improve investment for climate and flood resilience.
• Ensure proper integration of GESI (Gender Equality & Social Inclusion), CARM (Community accountability & Response mechanisms) aspects into sector-specific program planning and implementation.
• Support planning and production of effective, thoughtful, and timely written products that advance policy perspectives in brief reports.
• Support appropriate actions for institutional memory of produced knowledge products.
• Monitor and evaluate the impact of advocacy and communication work at province level.

OTHERS

• Conduct himself/herself both professionally and personally in such a manner as to bring credit to Aasaman Nepal and Mercy Corps Nepal and to not jeopardize their humanitarian mission.
• Expected to be part of humanitarian and emergency response in addition to their regular roles and responsibilities in such situations.
• Other duties as assigned by the direct Supervisor.
• Proactively ensure that team members operate in a secure environment and are aware of policies.

ACCOUNTABILITY TO BENEFICIARIES

• Project team members are expected to support all efforts toward 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.
• Team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner and respect local laws, customs and ASN's policies, procedures, and values always and in all in-country venues.

SUPERVISORY RESPONSIBILITY

Admin and Finance Officer, Community facilitators

ACCOUNTABILITY

• Reports Directly to: ASN DRR Thematic lead and MCN Province coordinator 
• Works Directly with: MCN Province Coordinator

KNOWLEDGE AND EXPERIENCE

• Bachelor’s degree in Environment Science/Engineering/DRR/ Forestry/Agriculture another relevant field. Master’s degree is preferred.
• 3-5 years of experience successfully managing similar projects.
• Good knowledge of Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Change Adaptation, and Resilience at community and all tier of government.
• Good in community mobilization with sound coordination and communication skills.
• Experience of providing capacity building training and orientations to diverse teams.
• Strong organizational skills and ability to effectively handle multiple tasks, work under pressure and meet tight deadlines.
• Understanding of system change, influencing, research, monitoring and evaluation and knowledge management is an added advantage.
• Demonstrated proficiency with the MS Office software (i.e., Word, Excel, PowerPoint) is required.
• Ability to work effectively with an ethnically diverse team in a sensitive environment.

2. Community Facilitator (CF)-5 (based in Targeted Palikas of Saptari, Sarlahi & Rautahat districts)

JOB SUMMARY:

Community Facilitator will be responsible for implementing the Zurich Climate Resilience Alliance (ZCRA) field interventions in the targeted Palika. He/ She will be based at targeted Palika as per requirement of the project and spend 100 percentage time in field to ensure effective implementation of the project interventions, maintain regular coordination and communication with project team, communities, community-based organizations, Palika representatives and Palika thematic line agencies and other stakeholders.

Essential Job Responsibilities

The specific duties and responsibilities of the Community facilitators include, but are not limited to the following, 

1. Program Planning and Implementation

• Prepare Implementation Plan (IP) at Palika level with coordination of Project Coordinator. 
• Assist supervisor to disaggregate project plan as per requirement.
• Ensure the timely implementation of project interventions with on-site direct supervision. And ensure the activities are implemented as per the quality standards.
• Coordinate regularly with project team, communities, community-based organizations, Palika representatives and Palika thematic line agencies and other stakeholders
• Able to conduct assessments, surveys, focus group discussions, Key informants' interview as per project requirement.
• Able to use the mobile phone/tablet based digital data collection/ survey.
• Prepare field reports at Palika level and submit them to supervisor.

2. Palika level Advocacy: 

• Maintain close and regular coordination with communities, gov stakeholders and other relevant stakeholders in respective Palika for effective program implementation, leveraging resources, policy strengthening of Palika.
• Represent the project relevant meeting, workshop and discussion arranged by the line agencies, stakeholders at project level if required.

3. Training, workshop/meeting.

• Organize and facilitate capacity development training/ workshop/ meeting in community, ward, Palika.
• Organize and manage the monitoring field visits by donors, government, senior management team, BoD.

OTHERS

• Conduct himself/herself both professionally and personally in such a manner as to bring credit to Aasaman Nepal and Mercy Corps Nepal and to not jeopardize their humanitarian mission.
• Expected to be part of humanitarian and emergency response and their regular roles and responsibilities in such situations.
• Other duties as assigned by the direct Supervisor.
• Proactively ensure that team members operate in a secure environment and are aware of policies.

ACCOUNTABILITY TO BENEFICIARIES

• Project 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.
• Team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner and respect local laws, customs and ASN's policies, procedures, and values always and in all in-country venues.

SUPERVISORY RESPONSIBILITY

NA

ACCOUNTABILITY

• Reports Directly to: ASN Project Coordinator

KNOWLEDGE AND EXPERIENCE

• At least Intermediate Level in any discipline.
• Strong community mobilization skills.
• Proven experience (at least 2 years) in community development, disaster risk reduction and management, climate change adaptation, livelihood, and other related fields.
• Proven field report writing. 
• Ability to work at pace across multiple work streams.
• Strong management and social mobilization skills.
• Excellent ability to work across cultures, time zones and disciplines with a wide range of stakeholders.

Languages: Strong command of Nepali, English (oral and written) and local language preferred/required.   

Aasaman Nepal has zero tolerance of abuse and exploitation of vulnerable people. We expect all our employees/volunteers to ensure we are protecting children, young people and vulnerable adults from harm and abide by our safeguarding policy.

Other Attributes for all positions: Excellent quality of work and commitment to high standards, strong communication skills, team building and willingness and motivated for good service delivery with strong networking and interpersonal skills and comfortable to work under stress and emergencies.

Age Limit: Candidates between 21 years to 55 years are only eligible to apply for the above position, depending upon the nature of job they will carry. For Teaching and Learning Mentor candidates between 18 years to 40 years are only eligible to apply for the above position, depending upon the nature of job they will carry

All employees must adhere to child safeguarding in person’s provisions covered in the project agreement.

Monitor staff and partners’ and ensure adherence to Aasaman Nepal's policies and internal procedures, protocols, Aasaman Nepal's code of Conduct with special attention to Safeguarding Standards and Procedure, Case Handling Framework, Child Protection and Do No Harm Policies. Also, immediate reporting and redress of any complaints and issues based on its severity.

Notes:

Locals, especially women and members of ethnic or marginalized communities are encouraged to apply for this position and (PC-Madhesh Province, CF- same district) are encouraged to apply.

• Applications received after the deadline will not be considered and only shortlisted candidates will be notified for the further process.  
• Canvassing at any stage of the recruitment process shall lead to automatic disqualification of the candidate.

Application Method

Interested candidates are asked to submit their application with an updated CV within 7 days through the link below (05:00 pm, 23 April 2024).

https://forms.gle/7a3tvTBm399T45799

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted for participation in the recruitment process. No telephone enquiry is entertained. ASN reserves the right to qualify/disqualify any applications without any reason.