Job Description

The Organisation

We employ approximately 25,000 people across the globe and work on the ground in over 100 countries to help children affected by crises, or those that need better healthcare, education and child protection. We also campaign and advocate at the highest levels to realise the right of children and to ensure their voices are heard. 

We are working towards three breakthroughs in how the world treats children by 2030:

• No child dies from preventable causes before their 5th birthday 
• All children learn from a quality basic education and that,
• Violence against children is no longer tolerated 

We know that great people make a great organization, and that our employees play a crucial role in helping us achieve our ambitions for children.  We value our people and offer a meaningful and rewarding career, along with a collaborative and inclusive workplace where ambition, creativity, and integrity are highly valued. 

We need to keep children safe so our selection process, which includes rigorous background checks, reflects our commitment to the protection of children from abuse.

Save the Children International seeks to always be a child-safe organization by fulfilling its obligations to the community and through programme implementation carried out by the organization for safeguarding children and improve their living standards of the child.

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Position: Area Director, South Yemen 

Location: Aden, South Yemen

Contract Length: 12 months

The Opportunity:

ROLE PURPOSE: 

As the most Senior position in South Yemen for Save the Children (SCI), the Area Director will provide day-to-day oversight of all of SCI’s activities in the South. The post holder will have responsibility for a team of approximately 300 staff and 400 incentive workers across 2 Field Offices with an annual portfolio of USD 20+ million, which includes programming in the sectors of Child Protection, Education, Nutrition, WASH, and LFS. The post holder will play a key role in ensuring that SCI responds to the changing context and needs in South Yemen, including building the capacity of field staff on the operational platform to meet the increasing needs of children in both existing operational areas and new locations.

Reporting to the Deputy Country Director/Operations Director and as a member of the Extended Senior Management Team (ESMT) for Yemen CO, the South Area Director will not only be expected to lead the South team but also to contribute to the wider strategic leadership and direction of Yemen and ensure good collaboration with other agencies and Government in the South.

The post-holder will be required to effectively and efficiently coordinate operations systems, processes, and activities across the South, ensuring that programmes are delivered on time and in line with the organizational strategy, donor requirements and within allocated budgets. S/He will take leadership all aspects related to program delivery, staffing structure and management, security, logistics, finance, IT, and M&E systems. 

KEY AREAS OF ACCOUNTABILITY:

Strategic Program Direction and Management

• Provide leadership and accountability for the implementation of South Yemen programmes assuring full and timely delivery of results, appropriate coordination, and cooperation to assure excellent narrative and financial reporting, monitoring, evaluation, and learning.
• Lead on strategic engagement with NGO (local and international) and UN partners that are active in the SCI areas of implementation to achieve mutually beneficial goals
• Engaging in SC Yemen strategy and coordination with Yemen CO SMT.
• Lead the annual review and planning process to ensure the continued relevance of the programme and partnership strategy in a dynamic environment

Oversight and Management of Programme Operations:

• Actively participate in designing, innovative and high-quality programmes to serve children 
• Participate in the programme proposal processes and ensure that all programmes progress, in accordance with grant agreements, are completed within time and on budget 
• Serve as overall budget holder for most programming in the South: manage and support budget holders for individual projects and grants
• Require managers to prepare timely and high-quality progress reports, programme reports, and donor reports in a manner to allow review and consolidation efficiently

Emergency Response Management:

• Ensure appropriate and timely responses at scale to all emergencies consistent with established benchmarks, plans, and organizational policies
• Ensure that all staff across departments and sub-office are familiar with, adhere to, and implement the procedures and processes detailed in the Rules and Principles for emergency response
• Strengthen the South Yemen office organizational readiness to respond to emergencies in line with global Save the Children International emergency goal and benchmarks
• Contribute to the review of contingency planning 
• Follow up with field teams to ensure contingency plan actions are undertaken, including:
• Working with DCD/DPO and logistics to ensure contingency supplies are in place
• Work with Field Teams to identify personnel for emergency response deployments
• Provide surge support for direct implementation in the event of an emergency.

Human Resources Management and Administration

• Lead on defining structures and systems capable of delivering the South Yemen programme
• Monitor the recruitment, training, and promotion of programmes staff to ensure core functions are filled, with a focus on nationalization of positions where feasible
• Manage the performance of direct reports using Save the Children performance management policies and procedures as well as through appropriate coaching, mentoring, training, and development
• Ensure that all staff understand and effectively delivering on their roles
• Proactively lead and support the development of national staff and their assignment to management positions of increasing responsibility as appropriate
• Manage the South Yemen management team; define expectations, provide leadership and technical support as needed, and evaluate direct reports regularly
• Manage the performance of all staff in the South Yemen programme through: 
• Effective use of the Performance Management System including the establishment of clear, measurable objectives, ongoing feedback, periodic reviews, and fair and unbiased evaluations;
• Incorporate staff development strategies and Performance Management Systems into the team building process.
• Coaching, mentoring, and other developmental opportunities
• Recognition and rewards for outstanding performance;
• Documentation of performance that is less than satisfactory, with appropriate performance improvements/ work plans 

Risk, Safety and Security Management:

• In collaboration with Security director  and Security manager, lead the process of articulating programmatic risks at the strategic and project levels and coordinate with support services to ensure a holistic approach to programmatic risk management
• Monitor programmatic risks in the contexts of a dynamic environment and ensure mitigation measures are applied and programmes adapted as and when necessary
• Lead on communicating risks and the impact on programmes to all relevant stakeholders
• Ensure that Security Risk Assessments for all program bases and activities in South Yemen are carried out.
• Develop, maintain, and manage triggers for escalation of security protocols, as well as de-escalation providing relevant information to decision-makers by Yemen CO SMT

Representation and Leadership:

• Lead on building and maintaining active and regular working relationships in-country with host authorities, donors, partner agencies and the UN
• Represent Save the Children in relevant key forums at both the global and national level
• Ensure effective engagement with authorities (MoPIC, MoE, etc) are managed well and timely addressed.
• Support in management of Sub Agreements and VISAs in the South in a timely manner, and ensuring these are processed with closed engagement with relevant authorities
• Support and establish a strong coordination mechanism of working groups, and other coordination meetings with technical team playing a central role with coordination tracker in place – capturing all coordination and engagements with stakeholders. 

QUALIFICATIONS:

• Bachelor’s degree in development or other social sciences or equivalent.
• Master’s degree is preferable.
• A minimum of 7 years’ management experience in an NGO environment, including significant field operations experience running both emergency and development programs
• Robust experience of NGO emergency programme cycle management, and with experience of working within a complex and matrix organisation structure
• ECHO, World Bank, USAID and SIDA funding programme management experience required
• Experience in international humanitarian systems, institutions and donors, and of procedures, accountability frameworks and best practices in emergency management
• Familiar with effective financial and budgetary control and managing grants from major institutional donors
• Solid project management skills related to organisational development projects and international, cross-functional teams with a proven history of delivering results
• Ability to analyse information, evaluate options and to think and plan strategically 
• An in-depth understanding of national and international children in crisis issues 
• Previous experience of managing and developing a team and the ability to lead, motivate and develop others 
• Excellent interpersonal, communication and presentation skills 
• Ability and willingness to change work practices and hours, and work with incoming teams in the event of major emergencies
• Commitment to and understanding of Save the Children’s aims, values and principles including rights-based approaches

Desirable:

• A very good understanding of at least 2 of the sectoral programmes and a working knowledge of the programme priorities of the response which include Education, Child Protection, Nutrition.