Integrated Protection Coordinator for Northeast Syria At International Rescue Committee

The International Rescue Committee (IRC) responds to the world’s worst humanitarian crises, helping to restore health, safety, education, economic wellbeing, and power to people devastated by conflict and disaster. Founded in 1933 at the call of Albert Einstein, the IRC is one of the world’s largest international humanitarian non-governmental organizations (INGO), at work in more than 40 countries and more than 25 U.S. cities helping people to survive, reclaim control of their future and strengthen their communities. A force for humanity, IRC employees delivers lasting impact by restoring safety, dignity and hope to millions. If you’re a solutions-driven, passionate change-maker, come join us in positively impacting the lives of millions of people world-wide for a better future.

Working in coordination with the humanitarian community, IRC currently addresses the needs of war-affected Syrians from several operational bases in the region. Our activities focus primarily on the supply of vital medications and medical equipment, non-food items, water and sanitation, education and child protection and form part of an over-arching humanitarian response in the region that seeks to assist refugees, IDPs and war-affected Syrians survive conflict and displacement.

In northeast Syria the IRC implements health, basic needs, livelihoods, and protection programming.

Job Overview/Summary

The Integrated Protection Coordinator leads the IRC’s efforts to meet conflict-affected people’s safety and protection needs, reducing risk and responding to cases of violence, coercion, and deprivation, as well as mainstreaming protection throughout the IRC and partners’ response in northeast Syria (NES). This includes Protection, GBV and CP case management, structured and non-structured psychosocial support, protection monitoring and information provision, legal awareness, protection mainstreaming and training, women’s empowerment activities, child protection committees, women committees, and other outreach activities.

Protection is a signature part of the IRC’s strategy over the next couple years. The Integrated Protection Coordinator will set and manage a clear direction, drive forward implementation and ensure robust and effective management and oversight to best meet the needs and aspirations of local communities and accountability to stakeholders.

Major Responsibilities:

• Provide strategic direction, leadership and overall technical and management support to protection and rule of law, women’s protection, and child protection programming in northeast Syria, ensuring it is needs-based, context-appropriate, responsive, coherent, collaborative, and operationally feasible and in line with the NES Strategic Action Plan outcomes for Safety.

• Lead a comprehensive assessment of opportunities for greater cross-sector integration within IRC’s program units, and develop/review the workplan for reaching integration goals, both with respect to programs implemented directly by IRC as well as those delivered in partnership; as required, support development of cross-sector SOPs, tools, training modules, etc.

• Promote joint work across the three teams (CP, WPE and PRoL) to enhance the quality of programming and a holistic approach to addressing the needs of family members.

• In collaboration with program, finance, HR and Supply Chain departments, ensure smooth management, implementation, integration and compliance of project work plans and budgets (budget forecasting, spending plans, procurement plans and expenditure), with best use of resources across activities and delivering on time, to scope and within budget.

• Ensure projects and activities are of high technical quality, meet humanitarian standards, mainstream protection, align with IRC’s Outcomes and Evidence Framework, and respond to community and monitoring feedback.

• Ensure that all internal and external reporting requirements are met, that reports are of a high quality and are submitted on time.

• Through direct liaison with the Supply Chain Coordinator, ensure timely procurement of supplies and materials in compliance with donor and IRC rules and regulations through timely planning, specifications development and collaborative relations with Supply Chain colleagues.

• Proactively identify, assess, monitor, and implement measures to reduce or control risks that may impact program delivery, quality, or compliance.

• Engage and maintain effective working relationships with stakeholders and coordination structures relevant to northeast Syria in Iraq and locally including NGO, UN, and technical and government actors.

• Ensure alignment and coherence with IRC country, regional and global strategy, local Health and Economic Wellbeing programs, and cross-border responses from other hubs.

• Liaise with Technical Unit advisors to ensure relevant support, tools and resources are being provided and integrated into programming.

• Proactively continue to grow the northeast Syria protection, women’s protection, and child protection portfolio through development of concept notes and proposals to existing and new donors, maintaining a coherent strategy across IRC’s areas of intervention in Syria.

• Lead assessments and context-appropriate research aimed at generating a strong evidence base for IRC protection programming, as well as informing IRC advocacy.

• Work closely with IRC’s advocacy and media teams, and the Violence Response and Prevention Technical Unit for the launch and dissemination of research reports and findings.

• Support the greater sharing and use of research and learning within IRC’s program sectors, including by contributing to program development and design, to ensure interventions are responsive to needs and informed by a sound understanding of the environment(s) in Syria.

• Identify, monitor, and report unmet needs. Explore the potential of the IRC to address those needs within the parameters of the Strategic Action Plan and sector priorities.

Staff Management and Development

• Coach, train, and mentor staff with the aim of strengthening their technical capacity, exchanging knowledge within the team and providing professional development guidance.

• Supervise and mentor direct-report staff, including communicating clear expectations, setting performance objectives, providing regular and timely performance feedback, and providing documented annual and mid-year performance reviews.

• Provide constructive feedback and counsel on appropriate career paths and professional development. Support the development of business development skills and responsibility among the integrated protection team, with a particular focus on national staff.

• Promote and monitor staff care and well-being; approve and manage all leave requests to ensure adequate coverage.

• Offer leadership support for successful adherence by staff to IRC’s Global HR Operating Policies and Procedures.

Key Working Relationships:

Position Reports to: Senior Integrated Protection Coordinator

Position directly supervises: Senior Women’s Protection and Empowerment Manager, Senior Child Protection Manager, Senior Protection and Rule of Law Manager

Other Internal and/or external contacts:

Internal: Program Implementation and Quality Director, Deputy Country Director – Programs, WPE, CP, PRoL Technical Advisors, Economic Recovery and Development Coordinator, Health Coordinator, MEAL Coordinator, Field Director, Supply Chain Coordinator, HR Director, Deputy Director of Finance.

External: Whole of Syria coordination structures including the NES Protection Working Group, technical working groups, INGOs

Job Requirements

Education: Bachelor’s Degree in humanitarian assistance, social work, human rights, international law, social science or related field. Advanced degree preferred.

Work Experience: 5 years’ experience implementing similar programming in an emergency or complex emergency context and demonstrable understanding of the relevance of international humanitarian law and human rights law to humanitarian action;

• Professional experience in program management including people management and budget management in the field of protection or human rights in conflict-affected areas.

Demonstrated Skills and Competencies:

• Demonstrable knowledge of and commitment to child protection, and women’s protection, empowerment and gender-based violence; Previous work on Protection Rule of Law, CP and GBV programming important.

• Ability to manage up and across and to influence others to mainstream protection across units;

• Strong team and people leadership, management, organizational and development skills;

• Strong program management skills with proven experience in the project cycle management;

• Strong budget management skills including budget development and accurate spending across multiple grants:

• Proven experience in developing concept notes, proposals, and reports across multiple donors;

• Strong written and oral communication skills, effective in representation and liaison with external parties;

• Works well in and promotes teamwork, comfortable in a multi-cultural environment, flexible and able to handle pressure effectively and productively;

Language Skills: Fluent in spoken and written English; Arabic and/or Kurdish a strong advantage.

Working Environment:

The position will be based in Hassakeh, in Northeast Syria with regular travel to program field sites in the areas of operation within Northeast Syria. The position will also include travel to Erbil, Kurdistan Region of Iraq, and other regional hubs for coordination as needed. Hassakeh is currently a medium security risk environment. Shared housing will be provided. Accommodation in the field sites is in shared housing or IRC approved hotels and the security risk is medium.

**Standard of Professional Conduct:**The IRC and the IRC workers must adhere to the values and principles outlined in the IRC Way – our Code of Conduct. These are Integrity, Service, Accountability, and Equality.

Commitment to Gender, Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion: The IRC is committed to creating a diverse, inclusive, respectful, and safe work environment where all persons are treated fairly, with dignity and respect. The IRC expressly prohibits and will not tolerate discrimination, harassment, retaliation, or bullying of the IRC persons in any work setting. We aim to increase the representation of women, people that are from country and communities we serve, and people who identify as races and ethnicities that are under-represented in global power structures.