Regional Business Development Advisor, Asia At ActionAid

The Role:

The Regional Business Development Advisor leads the development of Asia Regional fundraising plan and set day-to-day operational objectives to ensure the delivery of regional fundraising objectives and donor account management to an agreed target set for Asia Region.

This role supports, trains and advises AA countries in the Global South and Asia region in particular on growing institutional income, from pre-positioning through to proposal development and inception workshop delivery. The role will also provide global donor account management for a GS-owned donor (USAID, UN agencies or NORAD). The postholder will work closely with ActionAid countries and will build links with international and regional funding leads. Further, s/he will represent ActionAid Asia Region in funding fora, working groups and other meetings in support of global, regional and national level fundraising.

The BDAs work with Regional Heads/co-ordinators and the Business Development Lead to identify and tackle key priorities for support (through mobilising GS and affiliate capacities as well as through the use of Federation pooled funds).

Areas of Responsibilities

Strategic Impact and contribution

• Lead the development of Asia Regional fundraising plan and set day-to-day operational objectives to ensure the delivery of regional fundraising objectives and donor account management to an agreed target set for Asia Region .
• Support Business Development and Innovation Lead with strategy development and implementation, particularly aligning fundraising objectives to programme needs and bringing a country perspective to core business areas.
• Identify opportunities and undertakes specific follow-up actions in conjunction with ActionAid’s strategic global allies, Asia region country teams and in coordination with regional country support structures in order to strengthen donor relationships as the basis for resource mobilisation.
• Support countries to develop fundraising strategies and lead on staff capacity strengthening on all aspects of institutional fundraising.

Delivery of functional priorities

Funding diversification and donor development

• Research on possible funding sources and funding trends and evaluate their suitability for partnership with countries in Asia Region in terms of program, political and capacity fit
• Establish and maintain a Donor (comprising existing and potential donors) profile for ActionAid in Asia Region
• Initiate, build and strengthen relationships with all donors/ sponsors through a systematic cultivation plan designed to increase support of regional / cross countries funding opportunities in Asia
• Develop and implement a comprehensive communications plan in order to inform donors and sponsors as well as identified markets about the mission, vision, and values of ActionAid ( Country), its funding priorities, and gift opportunities
• Develop, update and share regional funding opportunities on regular basis to share with countries in Asia Region and with delegates of markets like Asia Hub and Gulf

Proposal development and management

• Identify funding opportunities, coordinate and support the development of proposals and concept notes for fundraising at Regional/ cross country level in Asia
• Review the proposals to ensure the alignment to ActionAid International guideline and requirement of the donor
• Review proposals’ and concept notes’ success rate and address reasons for failure at regional level
• Build, track and report on fundraising opportunity and proposal pipelines in Asia
• Facilitate and support fundraising network, linked to the federation wide fundraising community of practice to share funding information, exchange ideas and support capacity development in coordination with regional and global business development and institutional fundraising teams
• Contributes to practicing a team culture that values collaboration internally, cross functionally and in partnership with countries, external partners and networks.

System, Policies and Procedures and Product Management

• Promote country understanding and adoption of priority policies and systems such as cost recovery, the Contract Management System and related grant management best practices.
• Support the use by AA entities of relevant information systems and tools for sharing donor intelligence, policies and guidelines.
• In conjunction with the Grants Compliance and Assurance Lead, advise on changes to GS and country systems and policies needed to meet the requirements of the donor that this role account-manages.
• Contribute to development/adaptation/update of ActionAid’s funding management guidelines and processes, working closely with ActionAid countries, regional team, global and regional business development team, the humanitarian fundraising team and country transformation colleagues.

Issue Resolutions, Crisis/Risk Management

• Ensure good-quality capture of decision-making and agreements so that contract negotiations and grant management can proceed with minimum disruption.
• Manage intra-Federation risks and issues related to this role’s responsibility for account-managing a global GS donor, escalating when necessary.
• Use own judgement to manage competing demands and priorities for business development support, referring to line and matrix manager for guidance only in the most complex cases, and ensuring time is allocated according to agreed performance objectives and targets.

Communications, Influencing and Coordination

• Build relationships with key donors at the regional and/or subregional level (also global in the case of donors directly account-managed by this role) and coordinate strategic engagement at these levels by other GS and country staff.
• Support countries in donor relationship building and intelligence gathering at national level.
• Gathering and disseminate intelligence on funding opportunities, best practices and donor trends, helping countries understand their implications, and feeding back intelligence and analysis to GS stakeholders.
• Act as an internal advocate for country teams to increase focus and priority on raising funds locally, persuasively articulating institutional funding messages in regional forums and platforms.
• Collaborating with delegated market leads (such as Asia Hub and Gulf Market) to share country fundraising and strategic priorities, coordinate cultivation opportunities, maximise funding opportunities and increase brand awareness
• Ensures ActionAid is represented in agreed funding/programme fora and networks, proactively building relationships with institutional donors, peer INGOs/NGOs and networks, and disseminating key information and approaches to respective ActionAid teams and countries, in coordination with donor leads.
• Identifies and fosters potential external and internal partnerships, coalitions, consortiums and ActionAid country engagements that may result in joint programme funding opportunities.
• Works with countries, funding teams and market delegates (like Asia Hub and Gulf) to support that innovative ideas, good practice examples, knowledge sharing etc. are used to showcase for funding opportunities.
• Contribute (and if required organise) to internal, periodic fundraising events, webinars and meetings to share and strengthen the uptake for ActionAid’s fundraising initiatives
• Contributes to fundraising team development and the federation wide fundraising community of practice with fundraising expertise and experience

PERSON SPECIFICATIONS

Education and Qualifications

• University degree in a relevant subject area is essential, higher education degree is an advantage

Essential Experience

• At least three years’ experience of project cycle management, including project conceptualisation, project design, proposal development (technical and financial), monitoring and evaluation.
• Five or more years’ experience in institutional, and ideally trusts and foundations, fundraising role(s)
• Experience of developing institutional donor fundraising strategies and proposal
• Experience in external organisational representation.

Essential Knowledge

• Strong technical knowledge of donor funding proposals and use of logical models like logical framework analysis
• Sound knowledge of institutional and government donors and funding policies
• Broad knowledge of the development and social justice sectors with the ability to relate AAI’s theory of change and mission strategy objectives to donor priorities

Essential skills

• Focused and goal-driven, with the ability to triage competing priorities effectively and distinguish the important from the urgent, in order to stay on track with agreed goals and targets.
• Excellent stakeholder management and influencing skills.
• Ability to “manage up” effectively in a matrix management context through accountable, transparent and proactive communication and feedback.
• Good research and analytical skills with ability to bring different strands of information together and determine their relevance for the organization.
• Numeracy and good financial skills.
• Feminist leadership skills and attributes, including self-awareness, a positive growth mindset, ambitious drive for collective results, excellent teamwork skills, and strong commitment to dismantling bias and promoting equity and inclusion.

Language requirements

· Excellent command of the English language both verbal and written; preferably proficient in one other major language of the region that the role will support.