This Position is contingent

About Mercy Corps

Mercy Corps is an international Humanitarian organization operating Water and Sanitation, Economic Development, Livelihoods, Capacity Building, Emergency Response, Health and Nutrition, and similar sectors in the regions of SNNPR, Somali, Oromia, Addis Ababa and Dire Dawa. Mercy Corps works with communities, public and private sectors to implement appropriate relief, recovery and development interventions. Mercy Corps Ethiopia invites motivated and qualified candidates to apply for the following vacant position.

Position Title:  Monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL) Specialist

Duty Station:  Gambela, Ethiopia

Post Position: One

Program / Department Summary

Mercy Corps works in places of transition, where conflict, disaster, political upheaval, or economic collapse present opportunities to build more secure, productive, and just communities. Providing emergency relief in times of crisis, we move quickly to help communities recover and build resilience to future shocks, and promote sustainable change by supporting community-led and market-driven initiatives.

Globally, and in Ethiopia, Mercy Corps is a leading practitioner of market systems development (MSD) approaches to poverty reduction, with particular expertise in implementing MSD programs in fragile and conflict-affected contexts. This program will apply our market systems expertise to refugee and host community contexts in the Gambella region, with the objective of finding durable solutions to the protracted refugee situation. This program is part of a broader portfolio of markets and refugee programming for Mercy Corps in Ethiopia. The position is currently covered in the inception phase and will likely be extended.

General Position Summary

Mercy Corps seeks an experienced MEL Specialist with past experience of monitoring market systems development programs in refugee contexts.  The MEL Specialist will work under the direction of the Program / Area Manager and liaise closely with the Country MEL Manager. S/he will be responsible for all MEL aspects of the program. This will include working closely with assessment leaders and developing a detailed monitoring plan to ensure success in the next phase of the program. S/he will also play a lead role in representing Mercy Corps’ work externally, through participating in relevant coordination and learning events.

Essential Job Responsibilities

Program management

• Set-up the MEL system including all tools and data collection processes for program activities (Excel, Tola, Access, Concept Note Management System (CNMS), Institutional Performance Tracking System, etc.).
• Work closely with the program team members and local partners, to ensure effective monitoring, evaluation and reporting of program activities and results.
• Compile progress against indicators and report back to the team according to the monitoring plan.

• Build the capacity of all relevant team members to implement program-monitoring tools, accurately enter program data into relevant databases, and enable them to develop excellent reports and other documents.
• Collect, analyze and validate information and data on the performance indicators
• Build the capacity of MC team and our local partner organizations through ongoing training and support on: monitoring tools, entering program data into databases, the development of reports and other documents.
• Provide support for project reporting including Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly, Annual, Final and ad-hoc reports of the program.
• Coordinate reporting with local partners, specifically tracking deadlines, ensuring adherence to monitoring formats and requirements, ensuring reporting quality and accuracy, and periodic report writing, editing, and submission.

·         Coordinate and share information to ensure overall project targets and donor obligations are being achieved. Advise on suggested improvements, as required.

·         Develop a Learning Agenda for the program, and support successful execution of learning and impact studies.

• Work closely with the program team and partners ensuring we adhere to humanitarian principles, Mercy Corps’ gender policies, Do No Harm principles and beneficiary accountability standards.

·         Ensure program teams have community complaint and feedback mechanisms in place and that complaints and feedback being received are responded to within a timely manner.

FINANCE AND COMPLIANCE

• Ensure compliance with donor and Mercy Corps regulations.
• Draft and/or review scope of work to hire and manage any technical consultants, including review for technical efficacy and contract budget.

Organizational Learning 

·         As part of our commitment to organizational learning and in support of our understanding that learning organizations are more effective, efficient and relevant to the communities they serve, we expect all team members to commit 5% of their time to learning activities that benefit Mercy Corps as well as themselves.

Accountability to Beneficiaries

·         Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically
to our beneficiaries and to international standards guiding international relief and development work, while actively engaging beneficiary communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.

·         Team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner and respect local laws, customs and MC's policies, procedures, and values at all times and in all in-country venues

Knowledge and Experience

·         Bachelor’s Degree in social sciences, statistics, monitoring and evaluation, or related field is required or demonstrated equivalent work experience in the field.

·         At least 3 years work experience in implementing practical monitoring and evaluation, knowledge management or database management in pastoral and agro-pastoral systems of Ethiopia.

·         Demonstrated experience in monitoring routine data collection, data analysis and reporting against indicators at all levels.

·         Demonstrated experience in quantitative and qualitative survey implementation and support.

·         Demonstrated skill in training and M&E capacity development of field staff.

·         Proven experience in designing and implementing M&E activities and indicators, as well as analyzing the data collected.

·         Demonstrated skills in analyzing data, both qualitative and quantitative.

·         Experience working in Gambella, with strong contextual knowledge of relevant cultures and clans.

·         Willingness and ability to travel frequently to Mercy Corps project sites and field locations, including traveling to insecure environments, is required.

·         Experience effectively initiating and maintaining productive relationships with private, public, civil society and research sector partners.

·         Excellent computer skills, including all Microsoft applications (Word, Excel, Outlook & PowerPoint).

·         Excellent communicator in English with demonstrated excellent report writing and speaking skills, proficiency in Amharic and the local language(s) greatly advantageous.

·         Knowledge of Sphere standards and other training in humanitarian response preferred.

Success Factors

The successful candidate will possess excellent technical and leadership skills. He/she will undertake innovative approaches. The ideal candidate will have a strong curiosity for understanding and working effectively within the complex cultural, political, security and social environment of Ethiopia. S/he will be an excellent communicator, multitasker, and able to work in ambiguous situations. S/he will be a tolerant and flexible individual able to work in difficult and stressful environments and follow procedures. The successful candidate will be focused on capacity building of team-members, have strong skills in monitoring and evaluation of programs and maintain a sense of humor. S/he should have excellent communication, facilitation and networking skills with a wide range of private, partner and NGO-sector actors.