Senior Program Officer

Background/IRC Summary:  

The International Rescue Committee (IRC) responds to the world’s worst humanitarian crises and helps people to survive and rebuild their lives. Founded in 1933 at the request of Albert Einstein, the IRC offers lifesaving care and life-changing assistance to refugees forced to flee from war or disaster. At work today in over 40 countries and 22 U.S. cities, we restore safety, dignity and hope to millions who are uprooted and struggling to endure. The IRC leads the way from harm to home.

IRC has been working in Pakistan for over 30 years, and manages and delivers large, complex programs to meet the needs in health, education, protection, environmental health and livelihoods for displaced, poor and disaster affected communities. IRC works in partnership with local government and non-governmental organizations and currently works in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab, Baluchistan and Sindh provinces.

Job Overview/Summary:

Under the supervision of Country Director, the Sr. Program Officer will provide high quality, core administrative support to the Country Director.  S/he serves as the primary point of contact for internal and external constituencies on all matters pertaining to the Office of the Country Director. S/he also serves as a liaison to the  senior management team; extend necessary support in compiling and collating various reports, presentations, communique (internal, external) that will involve research, info/data collection with consistency while coordinating with staff.

He/she will coordinate engagement with country team colleagues who are driving the Strategy of the organization forward. This role will have exposure to several different departments within the IRC, and staff at different levels. This is a challenging position that requires strong problem-solving skills, excellent interpersonal, analytical and coordination skills, a high level of personal initiative, and the ability to work well in a distributed, fast-paced environment. S/he must be able to work under pressure and possess the ability to maintain a realistic balance between multiple priorities and at times to handle a wide variety of activities and confidential matters with discretion.

Major Responsibilities:

Reporting and Coordination:

·         Lead, coordinate and proactively support development of content for country program reports, presentations, information/packages, and other communique (internal and external) with consistent quality as and when required. Successfully complete these critical aspects of deliverables with a hands-on approach within the agreed timeframe.

·         Lead compilation of Bi-Monthly Country Management Report.

·         Lead trip scheduling (logistical and administrative) of high delegation/senior level visits to the country program.

·         Perform variety of administrative tasks for the Country Director, including managing an active calendar of appointments; composing and preparing correspondence; arranging travel plans, itineraries, and agendas; and compiling documents for travel-related meetings.

·         Extend logistics, planning and coordination support in organizing Country Director’s international visits as well as support in meetings and workshop planning.

·         Communicate directly, and on behalf of the CD, with SMT members, staff, donors, and others, on matters related to CD's programmatic initiatives.

·         Research, prioritize, and follow up on incoming issues and concerns addressed to the CD, including those of a sensitive or confidential nature.

·         Take minutes of bi-weekly Senior Management Team meetings and any other meetings as requested.

Strategy coordination, socialization, and delivery:

·         Provide timely and consistent support to Country Director in development of IRC’s Strategy Action Plan (SAP).

·         Regularly track SAP progress by coordinating with SAP commitment owners and deliver strong quarterly SAP reports while complying with deadlines.

·         Work with in-house software development team to test and launch SAP online platform, and once launched track SAP progress and reporting using the platform.

·         Conduct orientation of SAP and its associated initiatives for new inductions.

·         Lead the process of organization’s SAP annual review, adjusting it in line with the context and capacity while coordinating with commitment owners driving the strategy forward.

·         Maintain a calendar of key Strategy related events throughout the year.

·         Remain flexible and respond to any tasks and assignment as deemed necessary by the supervisor that facilitate the CD’s ability to effectively lead the Country Program.

·         Participate in professional training and development activities, as needed or requested.

Key Working Relationships:

Position Reports to:  Country Director

Position directly supervises:  N/A

Coordinates with contacts: Sector and department heads, Senior Management Team, Partner and Peer organizations, Govt departments, Head Quarter and Regional Unit.

Job Requirements:

a)      Education:

·         Master degree in Social Sciences or relevant discipline.

b)      Work Experience:

·         At least 03 years of work experience in program support preferably with INGOs.

c)       Demonstrated Skills and Competencies:

·         Strong administration and planning and problem-solving skills.

·         Excellent writing and communication skills in English.

·         High level of comfort with MS Excel, Word and PowerPoint.

·         Ability to work independently, with proactive approach to work.

·         Ability to understand a large amount of information and summarize into key messages and vice-versa.

·         Highly organized with proven ability to handle multiple tasks and produce high quality deliverables as per deadlines in a fast-paced environment.

·         Ability to handle sensitive information with high level of confidentiality and discretion.

·         Very strong interpersonal skills and the ability to effectively communicate and build relationships with external stakeholders, including staff at various levels and across different departments and locations, including senior leaders.

·         Demonstrated strong decision-making capability

·         Forward looking thinker, who actively seeks opportunities and proposes solutions

Language Skills:  Have fluent spoken and written Urdu and English

Others:

·   Willingness to travel outside Islamabad to field sites under demanding conditions.

The IRC Core Values and Commitments.

·         The IRC and IRC workers must adhere to the values and principles outlined in IRC Way - Standards for Professional Conduct. These are Integrity, Service, Equality and Accountability. In accordance with these values, the IRC operates and enforces policies on Beneficiary Protection from Exploitation and Abuse, Child Safeguarding, Anti Workplace Harassment, Fiscal Integrity Anti-Retaliation and Combating Trafficking in Persons.

·         IRC is committed to ensuring that IRC staff is suitable to work with children and have the knowledge s/he needs to uphold and abide by the IRC’s Child Safeguarding Policy.

o   Level of interaction with children: Frequent direct contact with children

·         IRC ensures that its staff must actively practice the roles and responsibilities related to client responsiveness, accountability to people in affected communities and must have competencies to solicits and listens to feedback and other’s perspectives, responds to feedback with maturity and sensitivity and takes appropriate decisions and makes changes to behavior or actions in response to feedback.

·         IRC recognizes that gender equality is fundamental to the achievement of our organizational mission. As such, IRC is committed to the promotion of gender equality in all aspects of our operations and programs. Our organizational policies, procedures and actions demonstrate this commitment.

Women candidates and persons with disability are highly encouraged to apply.