MERL Coordinator At Acción contra el Hambre España

The MERL Coordinator will be incharge of:

• Implement the structure, resources and tools of the MERL mission wide;
• Coordinate and Supervise activities planned under MERL;
• Design methodology for assessments, monitoring and evaluation of Action Against Hunger Sectors of intervention, providing sector guidance and capitalizing the lessons learnt;
• Liaise, coordinate assessment internally and with partner organization;
• Support the design of project monitoring tools streamlining resources;
• Support the mission in capitalizing on ongoing activities;
• Work on research and development studies that interest the mission.

for more information about our work in Syria please go to https://www.accioncontraelhambre.org/es/oriente-proximo/siria

Key activities

Objective 1: Lead the MERL Department and the MERL Strategy at Mission Level

• Define the MERL’s Department Strategic Objectives and Key Actions, along with an Action Plan for each year and update it based on achievements and evolving priorities of the mission
• Design, lead and manage processes to establish AAH Syria MERL systems in close coordination with, all departments, all stakeholders and with partners
• Ensure that the MERL systems are in compliance with Action Against Hunger’ global and regional policies, Minimum Standards, procedures, strategic initiatives, and donor’s reporting policies and guidelines
• Define/adapt and innovate for the assessment, monitoring and evaluation approaches and methods used by the MERL Department and AAH Syria mission
• Ensure the roles and responsibilities in terms of MERL activities are well defined across all departments and revised as needed with the other Coordinators
• Lead the generation of primary evidence by the MERL teams to support decision making in the mission, and communication / advocacy activities as per the priorities of the time
• Ensure that assessment and monitoring visits are meaningful and capture data sought and feed into management decisions
• With the support of Technical Coordinators, develop indicators to measure the impact of sectoral programs

Objective 2: Manage the MERL Department

• Validate admin, HR and log requests of MERL Officers (leaves, advances, TRF)
• Ensure the MERL Officer closely follow-up with other human resources recruited for MEAL activities (plan, budget, payment, etc.)
• Lead the recruitment of MERL staff (creation of JD, tests and interviews) and review the organigram based on evolving needs and changes in operations
• Lead staff using performance management (appraisals), identifying strengths and weaknesses within the team
• Oversee MERL activities through monthly and weekly plans prepared by the MERL Officers and ensure that the team closely coordinated and communicated the plan with Technical, Program and Logistics teams
• Coach and mentor the MERL Department’s staff, suggest tailored training opportunities to develop their career and hold regular meetings to discuss about their performance and motivation
• Closely coordinate and communicate MERL plans / activities / needs with other departments as needs be (HR, Logistics, Finance, Admin, etc.).

Objective 3: Strengthen the MERL Capacity of the mission and of AAH partners in Syria

• Provide strategic leadership to the Action Against Hunger technical and program team, and partners for all MERL related activities
• Provide trainings and follow-up refresher trainings on MERL sufficient to equip Action Against Hunger staff and partners to undertake effective assessment, monitoring, evaluation and learning at field level in all implementation areas; identify and fill training gaps
• Provide hands-on technical assistance to all staff in designing, monitoring, evaluating and reporting for projects
• Systematically review and provide feedbacks on reports / documents produced by MERL staff, disseminate and archive finalized documents in a harmonized format and centralized location (NHF) to facilitate learning
• Provide leadership, technical guidance and support to the MERL Department and other program / technical staff to develop more strategic approaches to improving M&E within their activities / projects
• In coordination with the HR department, ensure all new staff member received a MERL induction, delivered by the MERL Officer or by the MERL Coordinator depending on the relationship of the new-comers with MERL
• Facilitate or contribute to external M&E Technical Working Group meetings to exchange on challenges and best practices in Syria.

Objective 4: Coordinate and lead the MERL systems set-up and implementation for all projects / programs in Syria

• Contribute to project proposal and logic model development, using knowledge from AAH documented lessons learned and best practices
• Ensure the consistency of indicators across all grants as appropriate, ensuring they are coherent with AAH Key Indicators
• Develop indicators and M&E plans for all projects and design the MERL calendars with the heads of project based on the projects updated workplan
• Attend the projects’ kick off meeting and introduce the project’s M&E system
• Provide direct technical support to the program teams to complete the IBPR on a regular basis
• Design and develop the M&E tools (baseline, endline, surveys, questionnaires, observations grid, etc.) based on the project’s M&E systems
• In coordination with IM where appropriate, support the technical and program team to develop strong project tracking, record keeping and filing methodologies for all activities
• Compile and analyze M&E data and facilitate learning-to-action discussions with the program/technical teams, and partners
• In coordination with IM where appropriate, streamline the data/information flow and requirements
• Design and prepare appropriate reporting content for different audiences for key stakeholders and donors in coordination with Reporting Coordinator and DCD
• Collect and analyze lessons learned and best practices from previous and ongoing programs capturing the change from activities to ensure they validate the project’s theory of change
• Leverage lessons learned, best practices, program data, evaluations and other information to generate donor communication pieces, proposal annexes, success stories, case studies and other high-quality, results-based documentation.
• Provide input into budget management issues related to the MERL components of the projects

Objective 5: Oversee the Needs Assessment process

• Hand in hand with Senior MERL Officer, guide the MERL team’s identification of areas prone to exploratory assessments through surveillance of context (reading of HAT analysis, OCHA report, etc.) and priorities of the mission
• Ensure that the MERL team closely coordinate assessments’ visits with Program and Technical departments, along with reports and conclusions. If findings differ, ensure the teams reach an agreement through a joint analysis session, and triangulate their sources
• Provide technical support to the MERL Officer to design / review the assessment tools and methodology depending on the assessment type: multisector, sectoral, rapid, etc. and validate the final version before dissemination to the team
• When necessary, take the lead in designing assessment methods and tools or provide direct methodological support to the technical departments / coordinators
• Perform qualitative, quantitative and/or statistical analysis and aggregation of the gathered data/information for decision making
• Review the assessment reports, ensuring that the reports are made useful for decision making and add to the Advocacy agenda
• Store, organize and disseminate the assessments to the mission ensuring the format is relevant and appreciated by the varied audience (technical, program, operation, advocacy, etc.)
• Supervise the data entry of the assessment summary and key indicators in Kobo for analysis and visualization by the IM Department

Objective 6: Research and studies development with a focus on Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR)

• Strengthen a collective and systematic inquiry in which AAH Syria and community stakeholders engage as equal partners in the research process steps.
• Produce research studies reflecting the Syrian context needs and AAH priority themes under the guidance of AAH Syria CD and DCD Programs
• Organize internal and external Research workshops to present research findings as needed

Candidate description

• Post-graduate degree from a recognized university in a relevant discipline such as operations research, Development / Humanitarian Studies, quantitative analysis, monitoring and evaluation, statistics, etc.
• Extensive experience on project cycle management, research, data gathering and management, quantitative/qualitative analysis and English reporting.
• Experience on humanitarian needs assessments is a must.
• Gender / protection mainstreaming related experience.
• At least 3 years of experience within humanitarian organisations, in project cycle management and in M&E positions or tasks with management responsibilities.
• Demonstrable capacities in design and implementation of MEAL systems.
• Experience in quantitative and qualitative data collection approaches and tools.
• Capacity to facilitate work with community-level actors in planning, design, implementation of MEAL.
• Demonstrable track record in effective team membership and communications at a management level.
• Ability to conceptualize, perform and direct team research and writing of technical documents.
• Demonstrated MEAL field experience and competencies in collecting, manipulating, synthesizing, analyzing and presenting data to a variety to audiences.
• Demonstrated ability to transfer knowledge to diverse audiences through training, mentoring, and other formal and non-formal methods.
• Experience in developing and monitoring accountability systems.
• Excellent communication skills in English both oral and written.
• Able to work under Windows OS.
• Proficiency on the basic office tools (at least Word and Excel).
• Knowledge on databases and mobile data collection systems (ODK, Kobo).
• Knowledge of visualization tools (such as PowerBi).

Remuneration package

We offer immediate incorporation to a dynamic international network with the following remuneration package:

Formal work contract: 12 months contract

• Base: Damascus
• Annual Gross Salary: Starting 47**,000**€**
  • This packaged includes:
  • Expatriate insurance (health, live, repatriation, travel, etc.)
  • Break flights/trips to defined area: (break per diem: 215 EUR)
  • Yearly holiday return flight ticket
  • Accommodation and housing expenses (in shared guest house)
  • Travel costs to and from the mission.
  • 25 working days of paid leave per year.
  • Extra per month and per child (Under 18 years old): from 100€ to 225€ monthly (according to standard list of Action Against Hunger -Spain).
  • * Candidates may be contacted for other suitable positions within Action Against Hunger.
  • Due to the high-number of application receiAcción contra el Hambre Españaved, only potential applicants will be contacted.
  • Applications will be assessed and vacancy might be closed before the end of the announcement as per qualifications availability.
  • The organization is committed to the principles of non-discrimination and diversity and is particularly interested in receiving applications from a broad spectrum of qualified people.