Nepal Program Officer At Global Fund for Children

Join us in our mission to power the potential of young people

Global Fund for Children (GFC) works to build a world where all children and youth are safe, strong, and valued. To that end, we partner with innovative, locally-led organizations, helping them deepen their impact and build their capacity for social change. By pairing flexible funding with targeted capacity development services, we help our partners grow stronger and more responsive to challenges on the ground. Since 1997, we have invested more than $44 million in over 700 organizations. Our work advances the rights of children and youth across four focus areas: education, gender equity, youth empowerment, and freedom from violence and exploitation.

You will join a multinational team of caring and committed individuals who believe in investing in bold ideas to help grassroots organizations deepen their impact and advocate for children’s rights. We value courage, excellence, learning, partnership, and inclusion, as well as kindness and passion. Our partners’ visions for change inspire all we do. Feedback and learning inspire us to do better, and we strive to be youth-centered.

Overview of the role

We are looking for a Nepal-based Program Officer to join our growing Asia team and our Global Programs team. This is an exciting new role for GFC in Nepal and we are looking for a passionate and entrepreneurial individual with a commitment to supporting child and youth-centered grassroots organizations. This role will be a key part of our regional team, reporting to the Regional Co-Director for South Asia and working in close coordination with the Asia team.

The Asia team is at an exciting period of growth and we are looking for a participatory programs team member who can apply a learning-centered approach to facilitating knowledge among partners and colleagues while leading on engaging and supporting the capacity of child- and youth-led and centered organizations in Nepal. Serving as GFC’s main point of contact in Nepal, you will help to link funding opportunities for GFC with important issues to support, while building direct relationships with partners, peers and other stakeholders in the country.

Global Fund for Children prioritizes participatory and creative methodologies to ensure that child and youth participation and leadership is key to any work we undertake. Gender equity and participatory approaches underpin our current ways of working across the region and we are committed to putting learning from the current Addressing Root Causes initiative from Bangladesh and India into practice as we engage a new cohort of partners in Nepal that are committed to community-led change.

Essential experience and skills

The ideal applicant will be a values-driven, experienced network weaver and facilitator with an appreciation of participatory, community-led approaches. You will have a partner-led learning mindset with the ability to balance global priorities with emergent needs from partner organizations in Nepal and the ability to build and facilitate solid networks in the child and youth empowerment space.

You will ideally be available to start the role from October 2024. You will work closely with global GFC colleagues from across multiple teams. You will be based in Nepal with a strong, reliable internet connection that allows for virtual, global communication. You will be able to work flexibly across global time zones to enable engagement with GFC global colleagues.

Experience and Qualifications

• Strong understanding of children’s rights issues
• Experience working with community-based organisations
• Participatory and creative group facilitation experience in virtual and in-person environments
• Strong interpersonal and relationship building skills across diverse cultural and professional contexts
• Comfort with delivering work on scheduled timeframes, while holding the importance of nurturing relationships and fostering wellbeing
• Willingness to work across time zones and ability to adjust your schedule accordingly
• Strong commitment to GFC’s mission, values and vision
• Strong documentation skills with the ability to support partners strengthen their documentation practices
• A creative and solutions-oriented mindset
• Eagerness to learn and curiosity to explore community participation as a core design element
• Professional fluency in Nepali

Responsibilities

Partnership Development and Management

• In collaboration with the regional team, identify grassroots organizations in Nepal that align with GFC’s issue areas and priorities and that meet GFC’s funding criteria
• Develop relationships with grantee partners through calls and visits to foster strong communication and identify mutually agreed upon engagement plans
• Support community ownership process for partners in alignment with team members
• Support safeguarding values, practices and processes for partners in alignment with team members
• Have oversight of country-level budget and support the regional co-director with forecasting, use of funds and reporting
• Facilitate organizational capacity self-assessments and capacity development planning to support grassroots partners’ organizational development
• Handle the administrative process to disburse grant funds to partners
• Lead on the grants disbursement process in collaboration with the finance team
• Find opportunities for reflection and learning with partners to feed into GFCs learning and to share with funding partners
• Collaborate with programs team and global team on the articulation and implementation of overall programmatic strategies and practices
• Support regionally based colleagues with capacity development and grants management mentorship and guidance
• Work closely with regional team on facilitating design and learning methodologies for partner and community engagement
• Occasionally travel to visit partners across the country, and outside Nepal if required

Knowledge and Learning

• Contribute to the design and oversight of program learning and evaluation
• Work in collaboration with team and members of the staff to organize research, information, and results from proposals, reports, and surveys
• Explore and pursue avenues for knowledge gathering and sharing
• Share GFCs work, partners’ work and learning with internal and external audiences through blog posts, articles and speaking engagements

Compensation and Time

Rate – The renumeration range for this role is 1900 USD

Time – The time commitment is 20 days/ month