About CRS: “Catholic Relief Services carries out the commitment of the Bishops of the United States to assist the poor and vulnerable overseas. Our Catholic identity is at the heart of our mission and operations. We welcome as a part of our staff and as partner’s people of all faiths and secular traditions who share our values and our commitment to serving those in need.”

In Ethiopia, CRS has a long and rich history of providing emergency relief and development assistance to the people of Ethiopia since 1958. At present, CRS/Ethiopia implements multiple projects through different partner organizations. CRS/Ethiopia has a highly diverse portfolio currently focusing on community-based food and livelihood security through activities in agriculture, health, peacebuilding, WASH, emergency relief, and savings and lending. CRS is active in nearly all regions of Ethiopia: Tigray, Amhara, Oromia, Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples' Region (SNNPR), Somali, Benishangul Gumuz, Afar, and Dire Dawa Regions.

CRS strictly adheres to its Policy on Protection of Children and Vulnerable Adults among its staff, consultants, volunteers, and affiliates. CRS is an equal opportunity, affirmative action employer: women, minorities, and people with disabilities are encouraged to apply.

As part of the CRS family, you will join the more than 5000 strong and vibrant individuals working globally to accomplish the mission of CRS. CRS/Ethiopia invites you, the qualified candidate, to apply for the following position;

Job Summary:

The job holder will manage financial services for the poor programming in the Country Program (CP) for Feed the Future Ethiopia Livelihoods for Resilience – Oromia (LRO), designing and implementing interventions advancing Catholic Relief Services’ (CRS) work in serving the poor and vulnerable. Your management skills and knowledge will ensure that the CP delivers high-quality programming and continuously works towards improving the impact of its programming.

Job Responsibilities:

•  Manage and implement all activities throughout relevant project cycles - project design, start-up, implementation, and close-out - to ensure efficient and effective implementation in line with CRS program quality principles and standards, donor requirements, and good practices. Ensure the project team and partner staff uses the appropriate systems and tools.

• Effectively manage talent and supervise. Manage team dynamics and staff well-being. Provide coaching, strategically tailor individual development plans, contribute to the recruitment process of project staff, and complete performance management for direct reports.

• Champion learning with project staff and partner teams. Analyze and evaluate project performance data following the MEAL policy. Proactively identify issues and concerns and use participatory processes to overcome implementation obstacles.

• Act as a key resource person in project design and proposal development in the respective programming areas, gap-filling and taking on growth responsibilities, as needed.

• Effectively manage talent and supervise. Manage team dynamics and staff well-being. Provide coaching, strategically tailor individual development plans, contribute to the recruitment process of project staff, and complete performance management for direct reports.

• Coordinate the identification of staff capacity and technical assistance needs of partner organizations and capacity strengthening and required interventions to support quality project implementation.

• Help identify, assess and strengthen partnerships relevant to Feed the Future Ethiopia Livelihoods for Resilience – Oromia (LRO) applying the appropriate application of partnership concepts, tools, and approaches.

• Coordinate and monitor financial and material resources relevant to project needs. Through planning and oversight ensure efficient use of project resources

Scope

1. Supervise the LRO Access to Finance Officer
2. Work with informal (Saving and Internal Lending Communities-SILC) and financial service providers (MFIs, SACCO Unions and RuSACCOs to improve the design and delivery of their products and services (credit, savings, insurance) to reach larger numbers of the poor, both for on-farm and off-farm activities
3. Develop strategies to address the problem of household over-indebtedness, terms and conditions of financial service providers (FSPs) to suit the needs of the poor
4. Work to expand existing FSPs reach to new geographical areas and design alternative financing (value-chain financing) considering existing value-chain financing actors (multi-purpose cooperatives, agro-dealers, etc.)
5. Monitor and provide technical assistance for smooth implementation of the loan guarantee fund and conditional capacity-building support to FSPs
6. Provide technical assistance to program and partner staff in the implementation of Savings and Internal Lending Communities and Private Service Providers (PSP) methodologies.
7. Technically lead assessments related to assessing to finance that may be conducted by LRO or/and jointly with others