Iraq – MEAL Officer At COOPI – Cooperazione Internazionale

COOPI is looking for a MEAL Officer in Iraq

COOPI is active in Iraq since end of 2016, it is officially registered in Kurdish Region of Iraq since March 2017 and in Federal Iraq since September 2018. Since then, COOPI has implemented a series projects in the sector of Education in Emergency in Al Qayyarah (Mosul district) with funding from AICS (Italian Government) and private donors. In 2019, COOPI started intervening with WASH programming and emergency cash interventions in Salah ad Dihn governorate, one of the most affected by the crisis. In 2021 COOPI is bringin education, child protection, and livelihoods programming in the area, to provide a holistic response to the needs of the most vulnerable returnees and IDPs, especially those living in informal settlements.

WASH Program has been implemented continuously since 2019 with funds from OCHA and ECHO in consortium with international and national NGOs. At the same time COOPI has been implementing Education projects since 2018 through AICS and private funds and in 2021 start to carrying out out Livelihood activities with AICS funds and OCHA to provide a multi sector support to people in need in North and Central Iraq.

Role description

The MEAL Officer:

• plays a pivotal role in ensuring quality design and implementation of COOPI programs in Iraq, as well as high standards of accountability to donors and affected populations;
• works in close collaboration with the program managers to monitor and continuously improve the performance of our programs;
• contributes to the growth of COOPI’s portfolio in Iraq through the identification of needs and intervention opportunities.

To be successful in this role, the candidate will have to demonstrate superior planning, analysis and performance management skills and a high degree of flexibility and problem solving skills to cope with a rapidly evolving context. As the role entails close collaboration with a number of stakeholders the candidate is required to exert diplomacy, influencing and capacity.

Responsabilities

The specific tasks of the MEAL Officer are as follows:

Monitoring, evaluation and learning

• Support and contribute to the development and implementation of M&E systems, including M&E SOPs, guidance and tools, in compliance with COOPI global policies;
• Support the field staff in planning and executing M&E, including, data collection methodology and tools and data management, analysis and use;
• Support the monthly project reviews with by presenting M&E data and findings with a view to continuously improve program performance;
• Contribute to organisational learning through supporting specific analysis, lessons learned and reports;
• Provide technical support for quantitative and qualitative analysis for donor reports;
• Supervise and mentor field M&E staff;
• Conduct field support and monitoring missions to consortium targeted locations.

Accountability to affected populations

• Review and update COOPI’s AAP framework in Iraq;
• Support the integration of AAP mechanisms across all COOPI Iraq programs;
• Support program managers with the analysis of and response to feedback and escalate to senior management as appropriate.

Strategy and business development

• Proactively contribute to the identification of needs and funding opportunities;
• Lead initial assessments for upcoming opportunities;
• Participate in programme design and proposal discussions, including theory of change development, log frame design and budgeting for M&E;
• Review project proposals to ensure adherence to COOPI quality standards and participate in drafting log-frames, MEAL, and AAP sections of the proposal;
• Contribute to the design of M&E staffing structure and resourcing, including collaboration with programme staff to identify and plan for M&E needs;
• Contirbutes to the implementation and review of relevant aspects of COOPI Iraq’s country strategy.

Requirements

Education

• Degree in economics, political science, international development, social sciences, statistics or related field is required Advanced degree in Civil or Environmental Engineering or related field are preferred or equivalent work experience;

Experience/Hard skills

• At least 3 years’ experience in an international NGO preferably in an emergency or post-conflict setting;
• Experience managing M&E activities including collecting and reporting on gender-specific metrics;
• Experience designing and carrying out M&E studies, reviews and/or evaluations, qualitative and quantitative data collection tools;
• Experience using data collection and analysis tools (Kobo, SPSS, STATA, etc.);
• Experience in working with different Donors (ECHO, UN agencies etc.);
• Experience delivering M&E training and mentoring and developing staff required;
• Knowledge of Microsoft office package and advanced knowledge of Microsoft Excel;
• Strong analytical report writing skills and excellent communications skills in English;
• Knowledge of humanitarian principles, do no harm, and sphere standards;
• Understanding of data and information needs for program management and decision making;
• High level English language proficiency (speaking, reading, writing);

Soft Skills

• Target oriented and problem-solving aptitude, superior organization and planning skills, diplomacy and soft influencing capacity.
• Demonstrated teamwork skills and ability to work effectively with partners and stakeholders

We reserve the right to close the vacancy prior to the application closing date, once a sufficient number of applications have been received.