Technical Advisor II Gender – West Africa Region At Catholic Relief Services

Job Title: Technical Advisor II Gender

Reports to: Deputy Regional Director for Program Quality, West Africa Region

Department: West Africa Regional Office (WARO) – telecommuter

About CRS:

Catholic Relief Services is the official international humanitarian agency of the Catholic community in the United States. CRS works to save, protect, and transform lives in need in more than 100 countries, without regard to race, religion or nationality. CRS’ relief and development work is accomplished through programs of emergency response, HIV, health, agriculture, education, microfinance and peacebuilding.

Job Summary:

You will provide technical advice, guidance, and support to programs in 11 countries in the West Africa Region, including Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Senegal (Gambia, Guinea Bissau), and Sierra Leone. You will support implementation of CRS’ Global Gender Strategy, which renews CRS’ commitment to putting gender at the core of programming and ensuring equitable participation and benefit of women and men, girls, and boys for enhancing program quality.

Your responsibilities will range from supporting program design and implementation issues in line with Catholic Relief Services (CRS) program quality principles and standards, donor guidelines, and industry best practices to providing technical support to country teams to advance the delivery of high-quality programming to the poor and vulnerable. Your technical knowledge, advice and guidance will contribute to effective, adaptive and innovative programming in the region. All projects in the West Africa region have a gender component including, in particular, large integrated programs funded by donors such as USAID, USDA and various foundations.

You will possess strong expertise and experience in gender programming, knowledge of industr y standards and best practices, and strong capacity in technical writing (in English and French) for products such as proposals and technical studies. You will work closely with your counterpart Technical Advisors (TAs) in other sectors to ensure cross-sectoral integration of activities and to jointly advance WARO’s strategic priorities. You will also collaborate closely with members of the Agency gender team. Training CRS staff in gender will also be a focus of your role.

Roles and Key Responsibilities:

• Provide technical leadership and strategic assistance to WARO country programs in the design, implementation and monitoring of gender activities to ensure alignment with regional and Agency strategic priorities.
• Provide technical solutions to regional and CP teams, remotely and on-site, for strategic planning and ensure the application of Agency and industry best practices and standards.
• Facilitate learning for evidence-based gender programming across WARO. Contribute to knowledge management and learning through collecting and analyzing program data, evaluating strategic projects, assisting with measuring program impact, capturing and sharing lessons learned and best practices, and contributing to research and internal reports.
• Share guidance in the use of relevant agency policies and key conceptual frameworks in the development of regional programs and project proposals.
• Engage in project start-up, monitoring, analysis, course-corrections and evaluations to ensure high quality, impactful program implementation.
• Support funding acquisition by providing technical/design leadership, leveraging existing learning, identifying and cultivating strategic opportunities, and assisting country teams in the development of winning proposals.
• Advise on gender integration in assessment design, including creating and/or reviewing and revising sectors’ data collection tools. Develop gender-specific data collection tools as needed and relevant, including key informant interviews and focus group/ PRA guides Advise on gender sensitization/ training elements for enumerators and conduct data quality checks during data collection. – Guide analysis of results to ensure gender nuances are highlighted, and/or lead analysis of results for gender-related elements.
• Draft or bullet key gender assessment findings.
• Participate in the analysis of growth opportunities to ensure strategic alignment and capacity to implement excellent gender programming. Provide technical direction and content to project proposals, and assist in writing proposals, liaising with other technical advisors, as appropriate.
• Lead or participate in design workshops for large and/or complex proposals, as appropriate, including defining appropriate monitoring systems and indicators. Review both integrated and standalone health proposals to ensure application of agency and international standards and best practices.
• Contribute to regional and CP efforts to pre-position CRS for growth opportunities in all areas of programming. Lead or contribute to the development of the technical design for large and/or complex proposals, including defining appropriate monitoring systems and indicators. Advise project teams on integrating donor strategies, priorities and technical requirements into CRS’ approach.
• Contribute to capacity strengthening initiatives in gender programming for staff and partner through helping develop learning and training strategies and agendas/curriculums, conducting trainings and workshops, and mentoring and coaching to CP staff. Mentor staff from across the region working in gender and other technical areas, including facilitating community of practice exchanges; advising on staff development plans; participating in recruitment of country program gender staff; supporting onboarding; and identifying, organizing, and/or facilitating relevant trainings.
• Establish and maintain relationships with donors, peer organizations, research and other institutions. Participate in forums in the area of gender to collect and share best practices and promote CRS’ work.
• Liaise with CRS Regional Gender Technical Advisors from other regions and Technical Advisors in the Headquarters’ Program Impact & Quality Assurance (PIQA) department through virtual and in-person meetings to ensure high impact programming in WARO.
• Conduct technical visits to country programs to support effective implementation, monitoring, evaluation and documentation of ongoing project learning.
• Be familiar with and advise on integrating relevant donor strategies and policies with regard to gender.
• Contribute to the development and implementation of agency-wide strategies, standards, tools, and best practices in gender that effectively engage partners, donors and governments.

Catholic Relief Services carries out the commitment of the Bishops of the United States to assist the poor and vulnerable overseas. Our Catholic identity is at the heart of our mission and operations. We welcome as a part of our staff and as partners people of all faiths and secular traditions who share our values and our commitment to serving those in need.