Spark Fund – Thailand Specialist At Global Fund for Children

How does it all work?

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.

GFC launched the Spark Fund, a youth-led fund that invests in youth-led and youth-focused groups tackling important issues such as inequality, climate change and mental health, in 2021. The Spark Fund places key funding decisions in the hands of young people representing their communities. Youth panelists design the grantmaking processes, select grantees and award funding. Spark Fund grantees have access to capacity development support and the opportunity to build connections with other amazing young leaders around the world. Coupled with flexible funding, this support enables them to experiment, collaborate and learn. In the first two years, Spark Fund panels funded 56 partners in 13 countries. We are now excited to be launching our first Spark Fund round in Southeast Asia.

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.

What will you be doing?

The Spark Fund – Thailand Specialist is responsible for the roll-out, facilitation and day to day running of the Spark Fund – a global youth-led participatory fund – in Southeast Asia (initially Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam) in collaboration with GFCs regional and global Programs Team. This role will work independently and with the core Spark Fund team and regional panels to co-design a participatory grantmaking process that channels funding to youth-led groups and organizations in Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam working to address climate change and promote climate resilience. This is a pooled fund with youth-participation as a core component in every step of its programming, learning and evaluation. You will report to the Senior Regional Director for Asia with a dotted line to the Regional Co-Director Europe and Eurasia/GFC Lead for the Global Spark Fund.

The Spark Fund Thailand Specialist will be responsible for:

Participatory Grantmaking:

• Identify and onboard a diverse group of youth panel members from Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam as co-creators of the Climate Justice Spark Fund
• Prioritize inclusion and access in all aspects of the trilingual participatory grantmaking process – including panel facilitation, the online platform for applicants and reviewers, and in person and online gatherings to name a few
• Coordinate participatory co-design process with panelists and develop external application materials
• Act as first point of contact for applicants and reviewers throughout the participatory grantmaking process
• Set up and run participatory processes on our Spark Fund decision making platform
• Manage and oversee grantmaking for the Southeast Asia Spark Fund in the grantmaking database Giving Data

Overall Project management:

• Manage and report on the day-to-day progress of the Southeast Asia Spark Fund within Global Fund for Children and to key external stakeholders
• Work in collaboration with the Spark Fund Specialist in Vietnam, the Learning and Evaluation team and the core Spark Fund team to support participatory evaluation and learning throughout the life cycle of the initiative
• Ensure that the grantmaking platform and other outreach materials are updated and accessible
• Represent GFC at external meetings and events

Partnerships management and Learning:

• Establish trust-based relationships with Spark Fund grantee partners and act as the GFC focal point for them
• Work closely with the GFC Learning and Evaluation team as well as external learning partners and communications leads to collect and highlight stories, learning and successes from grantees to demonstrate the impact of grantees and the initiative
• Work in collaboration with the grantee partners and peer networks to build and strengthen networks
• Conduct periodic site visits and regular check ins with Spark Fund grantees, both one on one and in a group
• Conduct capacity building activities and identify additional resources as needed to help partners address needs specific to the initiative

Global Spark Fund Support:

• Work with the Global Spark Fund team to process and document learning from the Spark Fund pilot round and Southeast Asia round, taking unstructured information and data and creating structured knowledge that can be disseminated and used as good practice
• Support global network building through helping to make global connections between Spark Fund grantee partners
• Share good practice and methodologies for youth participation across the GFC team
• Work with other regional teams and the Spark Fund global team to identify and capture good practice from other regions and build on this to develop new approaches in Southeast Asia

Are you the right person?

Essential

• Thai and English language written and spoken competency required
• Strong experience in engaging and working with youth groups and organizations
• Strong experience in project management with multiple external stakeholders
• Strong youth facilitation skills, both online and in face-to-face settings
• Experience of child and youth safeguarding in online and face-to-face settings
• Track record of independently delivering high quality work in a complex environment staying focused on deadlines and details as well as project delivery
• Experience of using a CRM, database or other tools to track projects, grants or similar
• Experience of collaborative working including with communities, organizations, and funders
• Strong verbal and written communication and interpersonal skills with the ability to interact and adapt information for people from a wide diversity of communities and cultures
• Good problem-solving skills
• Willingness to travel regularly within the region, including regular overnight stays
• Strong commitment to youth-led participatory programming and the Global Fund for Children’s mission, values and vision
• Comfortable using digital technology and learning new systems and processes
• Commitment to GFC’s values

Desirable

• Experience in grant making and/or managing CRM databases
• Experience in grant management including project learning, monitoring and evaluation
• Experience in managing large budgets and/or multi-donor budgets

Hours and Compensation:

This consultancy requires an average hourly commitment of 160 hours per month. The compensation rate for this consultancy will be based on the candidate’s qualifications, experience, and deliverables, and will range between $2,900-$3000 USD per month.