Financial Inclusion and Energy Access Advisor 25 views

About Mercy Corps

Mercy Corps has been operating in Ethiopia since 2004, working in rural, peri-urban and urban areas in Six regional states: Somali, Oromia, Afar, Southern Nations Nationalities and Peoples(SNNP), Amhara, Gambela and the capital city of Addis Ababa. We engage in both development and humanitarian work, and seek to integrate approaches, programs and geographies as much as possible. Our partners include government, academic institutions, development and private sector actors, civil societies and participating public. Mercy Corps has a growing portfolio of programs in Ethiopia that focus on food security; agriculture and livestock market systems development; maternal and child health and nutrition; youth economic productivity; resilience and humanitarian response. In Ethiopia, some of our donors include USAID, SIDA, EU, DFID, and WFP.

Mercy Corps Ethiopia invites motivated and qualified candidates to apply for the following vacant position.

Position Title: Financial Inclusion and Energy Access Advisor

 Location: Addis Ababa

Number of Positions: One

Mercy Corps and financial inclusion / energy

Globally, Mercy Corps is a leading practitioner of market systems development (MSD) approaches to poverty reduction, with particular expertise in implementing MSD programs in fragile and conflict-affected contexts. Our Ethiopia country program is implementing some of our most innovative and impactful MSD work. Two key sectors in which we apply MSD approaches are financial inclusion and energy. Financial inclusion is a cross-cutting intervention area in almost all of our programming, and Mercy Corps has been a pioneer in expanding financial services into pastoral lowland areas of Ethiopia, including supporting digital financial services. Mercy Corps is also increasingly focusing on improving energy access to alleviate poverty and support livelihood improvements.

General Position Summary

Mercy Corps is seeking to recruit an advisor for financial inclusion and energy access, to support integration of these approaches into Mercy Corps’ MSD programs across our Ethiopia country portfolio. The advisor will support implementation of high-quality financial inclusion and energy interventions (Program Quality), through capacity-building for teams, support in conducting market assessments and designing interventions and building relationships with key market actors from the private sector and government. The advisor will also participate in designing and writing new proposals for MSD programs that have financial inclusion or energy components (Proposal Development), and helping to ensure robust M&E and Learning for our programs, working with our Country MEL Manager (Learning and impact). The advisor will also play a lead role in representing Mercy Corps’ financial inclusion and energy work externally, through building relationships with key donors and participating in relevant coordination and learning events. The advisor will also be a member of the Mercy Corps country leadership team (CLT), helping to define and achieve our agency strategy.

Essential Job Responsibilities

Program quality

●       Support program teams to conduct high quality market system assessments in financial services and energy sectors, providing the foundation for program design

●       Support program teams to design interventions for MSD programs, using tools such as Results Chains and ‘Who Does, Who Pays?’ matrices

●       Support program teams to develop and implement work plans for MSD programs, maintaining a clear focus on facilitation principles

●       Work with program teams as they develop partnerships with private sector and government actors, and lead the process of developing partnerships with key ‘Lead Firm’ actors, such as large businesses and government

●       Provide capacity-building for Mercy Corps program teams, through formal training on MSD methodologies and informal mentoring and guidance

●       Support mainstreaming of gender and women’s economic empowerment into our financial inclusion and energy programming, and support implementation of this strategy

●       Support teams to manage MSD programs adaptively, through periodic reflection exercises and supporting use of M&E data

●       Support submission of high quality reports for financial inclusion and energy programming, to donors

Innovation and proposal development

●       Build relationships with key stakeholders in the financial inclusion and energy sectors, including regulatory bodies, banks, MFIs, digital platform providers, Mobile Network Operators and government bodies. Leverage these relationships to place Mercy Corps at the forefront of innovative approaches for financial inclusion and energy solutions.

●       Cultivate and nurture donor relationships and strategic partnerships that positively impact Mercy Corps ability to influence program strategies and proposal design, as well as strategic partnerships that result in stronger and impactful program development efforts.

●       Gather/analyze data and complete assessments to inform the design of new proposals

●       Participate in design workshops for large programs, and lead design workshops for smaller programs

●       Support writing/review of concept notes and proposals for MSD programs

●       Support development of realistic budgets for MSD programs

●       Keep up to date on relevant strategies being developed or applied by significant governmental, academic, and non-profit groups. Work with Mercy Corps to determine how the agency can best work with and/or influence such materials.

●       Work closely with field teams to influence their engagement and support of program pre-positioning, development and implementation.

learning and impact

●       Work with the Director of Programs and the Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) Manager to ensure that monitoring and evaluation is practical and reflects best practices

●       Contribute to agency-wide initiatives such as the research agenda around Thought Leadership priority topics.

●       Support new and ongoing programs with best practice advice and assistance on assessment, implementation, research, and evaluation needs.

●       Engage in implementation of projects that have significant financial services and energy component in building relationships with actors, documenting lessons learnt and best practices

●       Conduct assessments; write case studies, learning documents, short articles, and blogs; and develop internal and external disseminate plan for all products.

●       Nurture partnerships with universities, research institutions, and other organizations to produce case studies, assessments, and other learning documentation, as well as enhance program quality.

policy, advocacy, Representation

●       Represent Mercy Corps at academic events, conferences, media forums, and other events; contribute to thought leadership in financial inclusion and energy in Ethiopia, in particular in relation to resilience and MSD in crisis contexts

●       Identify and nurture strategic partnerships with other organizations and institutions.

●       Present concepts and ideas to donors, partners, and peer organizations that influence them to drive innovation and positive change.

team management

●       Build effective relationships with program teams implementing financial inclusion programming, based on mutual trust, collaboration, urgency and curiosity

●       Assist team members with information, tools and resources to improve performance & reach objectives.

●       Promote accountability, communicate expectations and provide constructive feedback informally and formally

●       Create and sustain a work environment of mutual respect where team members strive to achieve excellence.

●       Support hiring and orientation of team members with a focus on MSD

●       Play a program leadership role for financial inclusion or energy-specific programming.

Knowledge and Experience

●       Bachelor’s degree required. M.A, M.S., M.Sc., or equivalent in a field related to economics, international development, business management or subject with relevance for market systems development are preferred.

●       Participation in MSD training is strongly preferred, for example the two-week Springfield training in Glasgow/Bankok

●       5 to 7 years of practical experience working on market systems development programming in financial inclusion, that includes:

o   Undertaking market assessments and writing market assessment reports

o   Participating in the design of MSD programs and supporting proposal development

o   Providing training for team members on MSD theory and practice

o   Supporting development of robust results measurement systems, measuring impact on beneficiaries and system change

o   Demonstrating strong theoretical and applied knowledge of the field of expertise.

●       Practical field experience, typically over the course of 2 years, that includes:

o   A combination of successful temporary duration field assignments (under two weeks), longer-term field assignments (two or more weeks), and/or living in a field location for an extended period to work in a country or field office.

o   A number of emergency response assignments or other crisis response work that demonstrates the ability to successfully adapt support and assistance methodologies to real-world complexities.

●       Willingness and ability to travel frequently to Mercy Corps project sites and field locations, including traveling to insecure environments, is required.

●       Familiarity with major donors such as USAID, DFID, the EC and relevant foundations and corporations.

●       Fluency in Amharic and English is required.

Success Factors

The ideal candidate will have a strong curiosity for understanding and working effectively within the complex cultural, political, security and social environment of Ethiopia.  He/She will be an excellent communicator, multi-tasker, and able to work in ambiguous situations. He/She will be a tolerant and flexible individual able to work in difficult and stressful environments and follow procedures.  The successful candidate will be focused on team-building and capacity-building of national staff; be a strategic thinker, have strong skills in design monitoring and evaluation of development programs and maintain a sense of humor.