Regional Programme Officer at Hivos East Africa

Job context

Project planning, coordination and implementation:

• Support the practical planning and organisation of CMF meetings ensuring accurate and detailed record keeping of key project milestones.
• Take lead on the administrative aspects necessary for the development of costed work-plans complying with donor requirements. 
• Support the tracking of progress against CMF defined milestones and work-plans developed through accurate record keeping, documentation and dissemination of plans, updating quarterly progression of implementation plans, flagging areas of concern in good time and highlighting recommendations for necessary corrective action.
• Facilitate clear and consistent communications protocols within the project, maintaining open lines of communication.
• Facilitate the development of reports according to donor requirements and any additional requirements as stipulated by the CMF Steering Committee.

• Support all administrative processes relating to commissioned studies and consultancies.

Contract Management:

• Internal tracking of consolidated annual budgets, effecting budget monitoring systems, systems compliance and adherence to donor requirements.
• Working with the Programme Manager, ensure effective liaison with the donors on administrative matters concerning CMF and according to the key contractual requirements.
• Ensure documentation and filing systems facilitate accountability and audit requirements across the project and support the organisation of auditing and evaluation requirements related to the project.
• Compilation of high quality reports to the full satisfaction of CMF Steering Committee requirements and other stakeholders as necessary.
• In collaboration with Finance Manager, ensure timely, accurate and consolidated submission of claims to the donor against the contracted breakdown of costs and completion of agreed work plans.
• Ensure processing of  partner/sub-contracted payments against and according to Hivos  contractual obligations.
• Manage a database of all project beneficiaries with the responsibility of ensuring accuracy and data integrity of enrolled beneficiaries, whilst supporting partners in data management of the same

Financial management, budget and expenditure monitoring:

• Undertake grant monitoring and management of expenditure and budgets of CMF project.  These  include:  Preparation of monthly and quarterly financial and narrative  reports, 
• Analyse and make recommendations on the competence and adequacy of general financial feasibility of partner organizations, mode of operations including cost management efficiency.
• Provide support to the programme team on the analysis of partner budget proposals, and in the interpretation of financial returns from partners.
• Conduct financial and administrative reviews of prospective programme partners to determine adequacy of their accounting systems and internal controls, their financial status and their financial and institutional capability to implement activities.
• Support the partners to develop and maintain project financial reporting requirements and project audit in line with Hivos’ requirements.
• Monitor activity implementation and financial progress during the life of the project partnership to identify deficiencies, determine if earlier deficiencies have been corrected, and support partners to resolve any management systems difficulties revealed.

Governance and Partners' support:

• Provide quality checks on all financial/narrative reports submitted by partners to ensure they comply with donor requirements.
• Providing advice to the programme team on the analysis of partner proposals, budgets and reports.
• Reviewing and commenting on financial information submitted by partners against compliance with grant agreement letter requirements, good practices and/ or in fulfilment of conditions precedent to disbursement of project funds.
• Conduct partner visits to examine their financial records for accuracy and propriety of expenditures.
• Identify administrative capacity gaps and design appropriate capacity building programmes to address such gaps.
• Assist in resolving partners audit recommendations by solving financial and related problems and following up to ensure that audit recommendations are implemented.
• Based upon periodic reviews of specific activities, recommend changes to correct deficiencies or improve implementation and track implementation of these recommendations to completion.

Knowledge and Experience

• A Post Graduate Degree in Social Sciences.
• Track record in grant management and administration.
• Strong knowledge of key transparency and  accountability issues in Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa.
• Knowledge of key media development issues in Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa.
• Strong networks within the media fraternity (journalists, government, media development CSOs, commercial and community media houses).
• Understanding of project cycle.
• Excellent written and spoken communication skills.
• A self starter, ambitious and self-motivated person.
• Excellent analytical skills.
• Ability to make fair and objective decisions.
• Great organisational and planning skills.
• Ability to act on own initiative and to organise, plan and prioritise own workload to meet deadlines.

What we offer

Hivos offers a competitive package based on the candidate’s qualifications.