About PETCO Ethiopia:

PETCO Ethiopia Recycling Community Organization (PETCO Ethiopia) is a non-for-profit Industry led producer responsibility organization incorporated in 2019. PETCO Ethiopia promotes a circular economy system to assure products and materials are kept in circulation through 

Circular designating, maintenance, reuse, refurbishment, remanufacture, recycling, and Composting.  PETCO Ethiopia seeks to minimize the environmental impact of post-consumer waste through accelerating the manufacturing sector shift from Linier  to a Circular Economy production system; supporting existing and creating green jobs for women, youth, and marginalized people; as well as promoting exercise of self-regulation for sustainable business in industries and institutions. PETCO Ethiopia operates throughout Ethiopia and has its head office in Addis Ababa. Moreover, PETCO Ethiopia is fostering access to finance, and capacity building, to foster enterprise development in Ethiopia across agro-processing & food, handcraft, textile and garment, solid waste, and leather sectors.

Program Background

PETCO Ethiopia is implementing 5-years of consortium project joint with Center of Accelerated Women Economic Empowerment (CAWEE) and Ethiopia Enterprise Development. The program is funded by the Mastercard Foundation contract to Enable Young Women and Men to Find Dignified and Fulfilling Work in Manufacturing in Ethiopia by capacitating existing SMEs. The program aims to: 

Build SME capacity to sustainably create new jobs and improve existing ones through offering tailored business capacity building and mentorship; enhancing access to markets and raw materials flow; and improving SMEs’ human resources capacity to create safe and inclusive working conditions for young women and men. 

Improve Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) offerings to better prepare women and youth to enter the workforce (facilitate school-to-work transition).

Facilitate a robust financial ecosystem to help SMEs access tailored financial services that allow them to grow and increase employment opportunities for young women in particular, and to invest in infrastructure that can improve young women and men's working conditions.

Strengthen the enablers (ecosystem) to foster private sector engagement, stakeholder coordination synergy, and policy development for sustainable and scalable job growth.

Duties and Responsibilities 

• The MEL specialist will provide strategic and technical support to Program in line with organizational policy and client expectations. S/he will closely works with consortium partners, program staff and partners the program deliverables, outputs and outcomes.  The MEL specialist will work in collaboration with MEL Lead to oversee the overall program MEAL system, monitoring, evaluation, learning, reporting, staff capacity building, coordinate capturing, compiling, and sharing learning across the consortium; and support the consortium team.

Specific responsibilities of MEL LEAD include, but are not limited to:

• In collaboration with the MEL Lead, lead the development, review, and implementation of the programs MEL strategy. Develop MEL tools such IPTT, PMP, and DIPs.

• Conduct timely project data collection, preparing quarterly, semi-annual, and annual project report.

• Supporting tech teams outcomes harvesting and identification of trends and lessons

• Conduct activities, Pause & Reflect sessions, extract lessons and learning from events such as workshops and forums, conduct studies, success stories etc.

• Lead the advancement of the learning agendas of the program.

• Contribute to knowledge and learning products in collaboration with communications team.

•  Support, coach, and mentor current the program MEL team.

• Refine and implement the project MEL activities, including developing and refining indicators; setting targets; monitoring project progress.

• Work to refine the project MEL system, tools, and strategies, including database(s); and providing monitoring data to inform the decisions on project performance and future direction to the project.

• Ensure that M&E activities are integrated into all program activities, and that data is collected and documented in an accurate and timely manner.

• Work closely with technical teams, and partners in setting annual targets for each project indicator, develop a monitoring and evaluation framework for different activities and monitor progress and achievements towards annual performance of indicator targets

• Develop and adapt the monitoring tools/trackers according to the different project interventions,

• Validate data collection tools and questionnaires, data collection procedures, and MEL policies and procedures to guide partners, and grantees. 

• Support project activities involving the collection and analysis of data for the execution of the Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) plan,

• Lead Project Data Quality Assessments and take Geo-references of partners/SMEs in coordination with other M&E team members.

• Provide data visualization and analysis for project communications materials for internal, client, and stakeholders.

• Consolidate and write periodic report: quarterly, biannual and annual. 

• Conduct filed monitoring, and delivery monitoring reports 

•  coordinate joint program evaluation with signatories, partners and donor.

• Coordinate baseline, midterm and end line, write synthesis report and organize validation workshop as well disseminate results.

• Ensure MEL system is gender-sensitive, and promote gender sensitive across the program.

• Ensure safeguarding principles and guidelines are embedded within the MEL system. 

• Develop ToR, liaison with partners, consultant and other potential actors. 

• Represent MEL Team in client coordination calls, and MEL focus call/workshops.

• Conduct any other MEL elated tasks as required.

  econWorking Relationships:

• This role will be closely working with the Senior Program director, sector Leads, finance, communication specialist, access to finance specialist, gender officer, and field coordination center. 

Reporting and Supervision:

• The Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) Specialist will report to the MEL Lead. S/he will be responsible to the implementation of the program’s MEL strategy. This includes tasks such as reviewing and updating the Activity MEL Plan, collaborating with the team to ensure MEL strategy and system are aligned with the program's results. Additionally, the MEL Specialis will collaborate with the annual target setting, update the Annual MEL Plan, learning, and focus on capacity building for implementing partners and other stakeholders regarding MEL activities.

Location: Addis Ababa 

Category: Program management

Report to: MEAL Lead 

Salary: Competitive salary and a range of additional benefits

Employment Term: Annual contract, renewable based on available fund

Closing Date: June 28, 2024

Job Requirements

Required skills and qualifications: 

• BA degree in a relevant discipline (Economics, development studies, Project Monitoring and Evaluation, statistics, or other related discipline).

• At least 3 years of demonstrated experience designing and implementing monitoring and evaluation, and learning activities.

• Previous experience implementing and managing a rigorous M&E system including developing and refining performance monitoring plans is required; experience in managing the DIS, and MIS is strongly preferred.

• Experience consortium programs/projects strongly preferred.

• Knowledge of data collection protocols and data quality assessment to ensure accurate data collection and verification; ability to identify data trends and communicate this information for strategic decision-making in program implementation.

• Previous experience working with SMEs in the manufacturing sector is preferred.

  Key Competencies Required: 

• Excellent skills in MS Excel, Word, PowerPoint; proficiency in MS, SPSS, STATA, Etc. 

• Excellent in digital data collection such as Kobo, SurveyCTO, etc.

• Proficient in data visualization tools such as Excel, PowerBI, etc.

• Excellent organizational, verbal, and written communication skills to manage project communications and disseminate project MEL information are required.

• Excellent command of monitoring, evaluation, and learning methodologies.

• A problem-solver, collaborator, self-starter, critical thinker, adaptive and flexible, as well as team-player. 

• English language fluency required and additional local language is an advantage. 

How to Apply

As part of your online application, please send your up-to-date CV (summarized in less than 3 pages) and one pager cover Letter in PDF file explaining your position, reference and your suitability against the essential criteria in the job profile to idemeke@petcoethiopia.org  before June 28, 2024 COB.

Instruction: Your PDF file name should indicate your name and position you are applying for and only short listed candidates will be contacted for next assessment steps.

PETCO Ethiopia will not cover any cost related to recruitment process charged by the applicant.

Qualified female candidates are highly encouraged to apply