Country Protection Coordinator At Danish Refugee Council

Danish Refugee Council/Danish Demining Group (DRC/DDG) is one of the world’s leading humanitarian NGOs, working in more than 40 countries to provide adequate assistance with a rights-based approach to refugees, asylum seekers, internally displaced persons, returnees and migrants. DRC/DDG is currently looking for a highly qualified Spanish and English-speaking Protection Coordinator.

The onset of large mixed migration flows into Colombia due to the crisis in Venezuela requires a major integrated humanitarian response to meet the urgent needs of refugees, asylum seekers, migrants, Colombian returnees, and host communities. Based on the conclusions of several emergency needs assessments, DRC set up an emergency response in the Caribbean coastal areas of Colombia (Riohacha and Barranquilla), in Bogotá and Medellin. DRC´s integrated humanitarian response will be based primarily on protection activities, with components of Shelter, WASH, multi-purpose cash assistance, NFIs, and livelihood interventions.

GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE POSITION:

The primary objective of the Protection Coordinator is to ensure the full and effective country-wide implementation of all DRC protection activities (refugees, migrants, returnees and IDPs), as well as the responsibility for developing context-sensitive strategies and the implementation of the protection components of DRC’s projects country-wide. The Protection Coordinator also provides technical protection expertise on program development in all relevant projects ensures compliance to DRC programme procedures and guidelines within Colombia. The position will be based in Bogotá, Colombia, with extensive travel to DRC field offices and meetings with partners and donors as necessary.

RESPONSIBILITIES:

Protection project management and implementation:

• Ensure quality of the protection interventions including protection monitoring, IPA, legal aid, community-based protection, case management, and prevention and GBV response, and the coherence between all projects, ongoing and proposed, according to overall DRC country strategy.
• Supervise the implementation of the protection monitoring at country level and develop high quality analytical protection monitoring reports based on protection monitoring data and field reports.
• Lead the development of and supervise a national legal aid and advocacy network with key legal aid actors to promote strategic litigation and joint advocacy initiatives.
• Lead the development of DRC´s advocacy strategy and ensure advocacy initiatives are based on evidence.
• Develop project-related operational tools and standard operating procedures for all country protection activities and lead capacity building initiatives for DRC protection staff.
• Lead process of mainstreaming protection to all DRC activities in country.
• Provide inputs for donor proposals and reports.

Program development and strategy:

• Represent DRC via active participation in protection sector at national and regional level.
• Oversee knowledge sharing across teams ensuring that monitoring and evaluation results are understood and used to improve protection programs.
• Drive the development and growth of the protection programs within the DRC program objectives and feed into country-wide strategy development.
• Ensure close cooperation with donors, government counterparts and coordination mechanisms on-site and in synergy with other DRC´s programming.
• Provide technical guidance, support and training for all protection staff.
• Develop and/or review all protection indicators.
• Ensure that SOPs for all protection activities align with DRC country strategy and sector best practices.
• Conduct regular field missions to all field offices to provide technical and operational guidance, support and supervision of the implementation of the protection activities in the field.
• Conduct monthly technical meetings with senior protection field staff for each protection activity (Legal aid,monitoring, CBP, case management and GBV) to ensure coherence with SOPs and the protection strategy.
• Develop protection mainstreaming plan for all DRC projects and provide technical advice and training as needed

Accountability and reporting:

• Develop and monitor relevant accountability initiatives within the protection program as well as strengthen the effort to document the impact of activities.
• Ensure compliance with internal and external reporting requirements.

People Management and technical support:

• Technically supervise protection and GBV managers in the field.
• Lead the recruitment of all protection managers, GBV managers and technical protection staff such as protection/legal aid specialists, including coaching and capacity development.
• Conduct monthly protection meetings with the protection managers to share best practices between the field offices to ensure the highest quality of the protection response.
• Provide technical supervision to the protection mainstreaming officer for the Cash Consortium (CUA – NRC-DRC and ACH) and the overall protection mainstreaming strategy.

EXPERIENCE AND SKILLS:

• Minimum 3-5 years of relevant experience in similar positions in humanitarian organizations.
• Experience in writing project proposals and budgets for humanitarian donors.
• Experience of terrain and work with urban, and/or rural, and/or indigenous communities.
• Experience in humanitarian coordination and the development of humanitarian strategies.
• Experience in producing high-quality technical material (training material, protection tools, proposals, strategic documents etc.).
• Excellent knowledge of written and spoken English and Spanish.
• Skills and experience in training, capacity-building, budget management and donor reporting / accountability / compliance.

EDUCATIONAL LEVEL:

• Master’s degree in human rights, political science, refugee law or other relevant fields.

DRC CORE COMPETENCIES:

• Striving for excellence: You focus on reaching results while ensuring an efficient process.
• Collaboration: You involve relevant parties and encourage feedback.
• Taking the initiative: You take ownership and initiative while aiming for innovation.
• Communication: You listen and speak effectively and honestly.
• Demonstrating integrity: You act in line with DRC’s vision and values.

What we offer:

• This position is open to national or expat contracts.
• Commencement: As soon as possible
• Salary: F1
• Duty Station: Bogota, Colombia with frequent travel to field locations.
• This position offers a great opportunity to become part of one of the leading global NGOs, focusing on refugees and displaced people, in a fast-growing environment in Colombia.