Mercy Corps is powered by the belief that a better world is possible. To do this, we know our teams do their best work when they are diverse, and every team member feels that they belong. We welcome diverse backgrounds, perspectives, and skills so that we can be stronger and have long term impact.

The Program / Department / Team

Mercy Corps has been operating in Ethiopia since 2004. In partnership with civil society organizations, private sector, and the government, Mercy Corps Ethiopia has reached more than five million Ethiopians with interventions to save lives and build secure livelihoods. Our programs emphasize market-driven solutions, reinforce social bonds, and help communities build resilience to the impacts of climate change. Currently in six regional states – Afar, Gambella, Oromia, Somali, Amhara and South Nations, Nationalities and People’s Region (SNNPR) – Mercy Corps Ethiopia is driven by the mission to contribute the emergence of a peaceful, resilient, and prosperous Ethiopia which is inclusive of youth and women. Our strategic directions focus in promoting inclusive and dynamic markets; promoting peace and social cohesion through strengthening formal/informal governance structures and citizen engagement; improved natural resource governance; and integrated humanitarian response.

 Program / Department Summary

The peace building and social cohesion specialist is recruiting to work under PPIL /T4P:  Hilton Foundation funded project with 3m USD for the coming three years to strengthen social cohesion and improve livelihoods of host and refugee community members in Gog and Itang woredas.

Essential Job Responsibilities

• Work with the project coordinator and all peace actors at all levels on overall supervision and successful implementation of the social cohesion component of the project.
• Engage with local governments, host and refugee community members, on constructive activities to improve local governance and service delivery, as well as advance peace-building initiatives.
• Support an approach to incentivize local governments to become more efficient and accountable service providers.
• Facilitate activities with relevant national, regional and local governments, and various stakeholders including non-governmental organizations, the business sector, and academia, and other programs, as appropriate.
• Facilitate efforts to increase community participation in local peacebuilding and conflict prevention.
• Work with community members, including refugee and host-community committees, to draft plans and facilitate a dialogue between committees and development partners, government bodies, or businesses to obtain financial/in-kind support and create partnership agreements to accomplish project goals.
• Analyze key assumptions, capacity gaps, service delivery needs, and to develop a deeper understanding of the local socio-economy to ensure success of activities.
• Develop activities to support a stabilization-enabling environment, such as social reconciliation, or any other activity that fosters a willingness to engage in peace building.
• Facilitate the development of appropriate and innovative relationship structures and organizational capacity cognizant of traditional structures, values, and practices.
• Follow up day-to-day activities of social cohesion activities and capacity improvements of the program (both at the administrative level and in the field), including oversight of staff under this specific component.
• Travel regularly (as security situation allows) to the field to provide technical support and follow up at ground level
• Other duties as assigned

Strategy & Vision

• Recognize opportunities for innovative action and create an environment where alternative viewpoints are welcomed.

• Set direction by prioritizing and organizing actions & resources to achieve objectives and contribute to countrywide strategy development.

Program Management

• Ensure that program implementation is responsive to communities and partners and consistent with Mercy Corps’ relevant program guidelines, principles, values, quality standards and strategic plan.

• Ensure that beneficiaries are effectively targeted according to established vulnerability criteria.

• Develop program implementation strategies, including partnership frameworks, beneficiary targeting and distribution process as well as WASH, psychosocial and capacity building of partners.

• Integrate community approaches, gender sensitivity and capacity building into all activities as appropriate.

• Ensure program implementation is on time, target and budget, using effective M&E systems to reach desired impacts.

• Create and maintain systems ensuring effective and transparent use of financial resources for timely and informative reporting in line with donor and Mercy Corps policies and procedures.

• Fulfill Mercy Corps’ Program Management Minimum Standards based on the organization-wide guide.

• Ensure all interventions adhere to Mercy Corps’ Gender Policy, Do No Harm principles, and beneficiary accountability standards.

Finance & Compliance Management

• Ensure compliance with donor and Mercy Corps regulations related to emergency programming.

• Draft and/or review scope of work to hire and manage any technical consultants, including review for technical efficacy and contract budget. Influence & Representation

GEDSI (GENDER, EQUALITY, DIVERSITY AND SOCIAL INCLUSION)

• Understand and aware GDI related priorities of the country office and contribute for the

realization of priorities (continually work to understand and be aware of the gender diversity and inclusion priorities of the country office and contribute in the execution)

• Promote gender equal and inclusive workplace culture in a day-to-day interaction with a team member, partners and program participants.

Security

• Ensure compliance with security procedures and policies as determined by country leadership.

• Proactively ensure that team members operate in a secure environment and are aware of policies.

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.

Safeguarding & Ethics

·    Mercy Corps is committed to ensuring that all individuals we come into contact with through our work, whether team members, community members, program participants or others, are treated with respect and dignity. We are committed to the core principles regarding prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse laid out by the UN Secretary General and IASC and have signed on to the Interagency Misconduct Disclosure Scheme. We will not tolerate child abuse, sexual exploitation, abuse, or harassment by or of our team members. As part of our commitment to a safe and inclusive work environment, team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner, respect local laws and customs, and to adhere to Mercy Corps Code of Conduct Policies and values at all times. Team members are required to complete mandatory Code of Conduct elearning courses upon hire and on an annual basis.

Knowledge and Experience

•       Minimum of bachelor’s degree (MSC/MA preferred) in the areas: Sociology, social work law, and other related fields

o   Minimum of 4 years’ experience in peace building and social cohesion and/or NGOs working focused on MSD

•       Knowledge of and experience with social cohesion methodology and approaches.

•       Facilitation skills and experience in engaging local and national governments to support social cohesion.

•       Good understanding on the Markets4Poor approach and Markets development facilitation including coaching, relationship building, communicating, entrepreneurialism/business understanding and innovating.

•       Knowledge of participatory analyses, action and results processing.

•       Experience/exposures to the location/region he/she applied for.

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

•       Knowing one of the local languages

Success Factors

Define the specific behavior and attitudes critical to success in the position at time of hire and as it develops over time in paragraph form (soft skills).