Senior HR Coordinator (HR Lead) At International Rescue Committee

The International Rescue Committee (IRC) responds to the world’s worst humanitarian crises and helps people to survive and rebuild their lives. Founded in 1933 at the request of Albert Einstein, the IRC offers lifesaving care and life-changing assistance to refugees forced to flee from war and disaster. At work today in over 40 countries and 22 U.S. cities, we restore dignity and hope to millions who are uprooted and struggling to endure. The IRC leads the way from harm to home.

The IRC began working in Myanmar in May 2008 with emergency response and early recovery interventions for communities affected by Cyclone Nargis. Since then, the IRC has broadened its portfolio with health, protection, WASH, and shelters programs aiming to support displaced, crisis affected and vulnerable communities to survive, recover, and gain control of their futures. IRC’s current programming in Myanmar has a strong humanitarian focus and aims to reach people affected by the national crisis and escalating conflict that has spread across the country following the February 2021 coup, together with pre-existing caseloads of IDPs and marginalized and stateless communities. In addition to direct service provision, a critical component of IRC’s program strategy in Myanmar involves support to and through local partners, and IRC’s portfolio includes a range of local partners working across multiple sectors. The IRC currently works in Rakhine, Chin, Kachin, Northern Shan, Kayah and Kayin States and implements an annual portfolio of over $16 million

Job Overview/Summary

Under the supervision of the Country Director, the HR lead plays a strategic role in the provision of human resources required for the effective country program. This includes strategic initiatives, organizational culture, IRC ways, services, policies, and systems required for human resource development and management including talent acquisition, compensation & benefits, and HR reporting.

Major Responsibilities

Organizational Culture and strategic Leadership

• Contribute to the strategic leadership of The IRC in Myanmar as part of the Senior management team

• Support SMT (by leadership, strategic and operational) to create organizational culture as per IRC GEDI standards and IRC Way.

• Develop and implement mitigation plans to retain the right and motivated people with the skills to consolidate, solidify and celebrate

• Ensure best organizational culture and people management practices are in place, maintained, and updated as needed to meet and/or exceed IRC way and compliance standards

• Continually look for ways to develop and embed the IRC culture and vision at all functional levels

Human Resource Management

• Deliver a planned HR approach to attract, develop and retain the right talent with the right skills to achieve high-quality programmatic outcomes in line with Strategic Action Plans

• Determine workforce needs, identify human resources and competency gaps, and devise a development and workforce plan to facilitate nationalization of roles and staff retention.

• Actively participate in the proposal design and grants opening and review meetings, advise on organizational structure, position scoping, and other inputs critical to ensuring a strong HR foundation to support program quality.

• Actively implement and champion The IRC International’s diversity (GEDI) policy in the recruitment and employment of staff

• Contribute to emergency responses within the overall regional emergency response plan

• Ensure that HR systems (HRIS, LMS, Integra) are up-to-date and functioning

• Ensure comprehensive and inclusive onboarding of new staff and mid-term check-ins/refreshers for existing staff on organizational policies and compliances

Values, Culture and ways of working

• Ensure Values, mission and Culture are clearly defined and can be articulated by employees

Learning and Development

• Formulate and implement Consultative Integrated L&D Plan for each year addressing Program and Operations Teams L&D needs with options/solutions (within IRC and external environment); that includes employee engagement initiatives and gender engagement initiatives

• Actively practices and support mentoring, succession planning and management development within the scope of responsibility.

• Working with senior managers, to ensure that appropriate learning and development interventions are available and implemented, which develop the contribution of staff to the objectives of the country program.

• Ensure that the IRC staff have the required skills and abilities to provide capacity building and knowledge transfer to partner organizations

• Support and share key learning through different methods and help to create an environment for innovation

Rewards and Systems

• Participate in budget preparation and provide strategic compensation analysis to drive nationalization and ability to attract high-quality talent, define and review salary structure, coordinate annual compensation review process and compensation adjustments, consult with HQ compensation team to align with best practices.

• Manage national benefit plans, communicate updates, and conduct information campaigns for national and international staff.

• Oversee payroll and ensure collaboration with the Finance team on all payroll matters

• Provide support and advice on performance development plans and career advice

Performance Management

• Lead the performance management process with guidance from regional and HQ, create plan to manage annual and mid-year Performance Check-Ins, conduct trainings on goal-setting, utilize budgets to organize development activities and work one-on-one with managers and employees to create country wide development plans, support a culture of continuous feedback through HR initiatives and actions.

• Support line managers to fulfil their obligation in the performance management process in the whole country

Employee Relations Global Initiatives & Compliance

• Ensure IRC global initiatives/campaigns related to staff and systems (Integra, Safeguarding, Duty of Care etc.) are facilitated and implemented

• Address complaints, ensure compliant register, forward complaint to ECU as necessary, arrange/do the investigation and do other associated actions to settle the issue within short possible time with proper feedback to the reporter

• In collaboration with the CD and Ethics and Compliance coordinator, Support Investigation of ECU cases and provide report as per ECU requirements and guidelines

• Provide HR related audit feedback and take necessary corrective measures for future improvement to avoid such feedback in future

• Keep HR manual up to date, incorporate new policies and procedures as per the organization’s needs and keep the process smooth for staff operations

• Ensure adherence to Ops Scorecards, target achievement, on time reporting to SMT, Region and HQ whichever is necessary

• Advocate IRC values, in different forum, including internal and external and focus on how to improve ownership among the staff about IRC, listen to them, provide necessary guidance and support with regards to this

Staff Wellbeing

• Promote and monitor staff care and well-being, support healthy work-life balance practices

• Communicate and encourage active practice of the principles of the “IRC Way – Global Standards for Professional Conduct” throughout the country program

• Maintain healthy and empowering office environment that encourage open, honest and productive communication among IRC staff by delivering employee engagement and communication action plans

• Provide Health and Safety advice and proactively support risk assessments and risk management, including issues around staff health and welfare

Partner Capacity Building

• Support in identifying gaps in partners’ HR systems and support in building their capacities accordingly

• Support partnership team in partner assessment and vetting

This job description is not comprehensive and additional responsibilities in the remit of the role may be added according to the function.

Key Working Relationships

SMT, regional HR, field office coordinators, specialists on GEDI, DoC, ECU

Position Reports to:

Deputy Director Operations

Position directly supervises

HR Manager(s), specialists (comp & bens, compliance, talent acquisition), HR Officer(s), field office leads

Job Requirements

Education

• Master’s degree in human resources or postgraduate with specialization in human resources

Work Experience

• At least 10 years of work experience in leading key HR functions preferably in I/NNGOs, corporate sector or government overseeing human resource development and management, Recruitment, Compensation & Benefits, L&D and HR reporting.

• Understanding of Myanmar labor environment, relations, laws, and guidelines

• Extensive experience leading human development, duty of care initiatives, staff well-being and mental health

• Extensive experience leading PHSEA, safeguarding and GEDI mainstreaming in a fast-paced organization.

Demonstrated Skills and Competencies

• Excellent management, interpersonal and negotiation skills and a demonstrated ability to promote harmonious/cohesive teamwork, in a cross-cultural context

• Demonstrable ability to plan long-term, organize priorities and work under administrative and programmatic pressures with detail orientation and professional grace.

• Proven sense of professional discretion, integrity, and ability to manage complex HR situations diplomatically and to effective resolution

• Top-tier written and verbal communication skills

• Ability to demonstrate a supportive and consultative approach with direct reports and staff at senior and junior levels

• Strong skills in recruitment and compensation & benefits management.

• Very strong proficiency in MS Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint is required

• Previous experience of HRIS, payroll and reports

• Ability to plan, multi-task and manage time effectively

Language Skills

Fluent, professional level speaking, reading, and writing in English and Burmese

Works well in and promotes teamwork, flexible and able to handle pressure well

The IRC Core Values and Commitments

The IRC and IRC workers must adhere to the values and principles outlined in IRC Way – Standards for Professional Conduct. These are Integrity, Service, Equality and Accountability. In accordance with these values, the IRC operates and implements policies on Beneficiary Protection from Exploitation and Abuse, Child Safeguarding, Anti Workplace Harassment, Fiscal Integrity Anti-Retaliation and Combating Trafficking in Persons

IRC is committed to ensuring that IRC staff is suitable to work with children and have the knowledge they need to uphold and abide by the IRC’s Child Safeguarding Policy

Level of interaction with children: Frequent contact with children

IRC ensures that its staff must actively practice the roles and responsibilities related to client responsiveness, accountability to people in affected communities and must have proficiencies to solicits and listens to feedback and other’s perspectives, responds to feedback with maturity and sensitivity and takes appropriate decisions and makes changes to behavior or actions in response to feedback

IRC recognizes that gender equality is fundamental to the achievement of our organizational mission. As such, IRC is committed to the promotion of gender equality in all aspects of our operations and programs. Our organizational policies, procedures and actions demonstrate this dedication