Award Officer

Save the Children is seeking a qualified candidate to fulfil the following vacancy in its Ramallah Office:

Position: Award Officer

Position Ref.: SCI/ AO /2018

Deadline to apply:  June 18, 2018

The role:

The purpose of this post is to support the Country Office (CO) in the planning, securing and managing of both development and humanitarian awards. This role will work collaboratively with Members and other departments of the Country Office programme to ensure the development of quality proposals, and smooth management and donor compliant development and humanitarian programme awards, sub awards and contracts. The person will manage a discreet portfolio of awards. The Award Officer will be responsible for ensuring that the SCI programme adheres to all its award management obligations internally within Save the Children and externally with donors.

The post holder will work closely with Program Implementation/ Operations, PDQ and Finance on proposals, financial and narrative reporting, monitoring and analysis, and compliance processes

In the event of a major humanitarian emergency, the role holder will be expected to work outside the normal role profile and be able to vary working hours accordingly.

KEY AREAS OF ACCOUNTABILITY:

Developing self and others; working effectively with others

• Build relationships with other teams to support the resolution of issues and coordination of deliverables, (i.e. proposals reports, etc.)
• Support Awards Manager in delivery of capacity building to other teams in the CO and to partner organizations.
• Build relationships with Members, the Region and Centre and support the Awards Manager to escalate issues if required.

Communicating with impact, negotiation and coordination

• Engage with and coordinate across multiple stakeholder groups to support the development of high quality proposals.
• Support the development of high quality proposals through planning and coordination with PDQ, Finance, OPS and other teams.
• Coordinate and review donor reports including adequate planning with Budget Holders, Senior Programme Managers and Director of Operations to ensure deadlines are met.
• Communicate and coordinate with Member contacts to understand and record any changes related to donor compliance requirements and reporting dates.
• Organize and support facilitation of key awards meetings (kick off, award review, close out, etc.) with relevant budget holders, including a focus on donor requirements.
• Coordinate with auditors as necessary.

Compliance (systems, processes, donor)

• Understanding of SCI processes and key donor requirements, communication and adherence to them; support teams across CO to ensure all opportunities, proposals, donor agreements, partner agreements, contracts and amendments follow SCI processes.
• Understanding of the Awards Management System (AMS) and reporting functions, and ensure AMS is up to date to drive data quality.
• Accountable for driving AMS data completeness and quality for relevant awards.
• Ensure that all appropriate donor formats are available in-country and staff have a clear understanding of donor requirements/expectations throughout the award cycle.
• Responsible for communication of donor compliance requirements across the CO and partners.
• Ensure all partners and sub-award agreements undergo legal vetting, are input into and approved through AMS, and work with relevant staff to ensure relevant donor requirements are understood by implementing partners.
• Support close out process with relevant budget holders and work with Members to ensure awards are closed out on time.

Monitoring and Analysis

• Critical review of proposal budgets to identify budget lines for review or omitted costs.
• Work with OPS team, budget holders and Finance to coordinate the development of well costed budgets.
• Provide analysis through monitoring award processes, highlight financial issues to senior staff or Awards Manager and Budget Holders, and perform further analysis to resolve issues identified.
• Ensure regular award monitoring and facilitate regular meetings with key stakeholders to ensure individual award performance is being tracked effectively, and that risks and issues are being recognized and action taken.  
• Responsible for tracking and raising issues related to: amendment requests needed; contractual/donor compliance adherence; delays in deliverables that need to be communicated to Members (proposals, reports, close out); variances against phased budget; issues regarding audits and evaluations.

Portfolio Management and Strategy

• Support Awards Manager to perform portfolio level monitoring and analysis, and follow up and resolve issues identified.
• Produce management reports and escalate identified portfolio issues in a timely manner.
• Support Awards Manager on the regular award review processes on designated awards.
• Support development of donor strategies and scoping potential opportunities to support the CO fundraising strategy.

The Organisation:

We employ approximately 25,000 people across the globe and work on the ground in over 120 countries to help children affected by crises, or those that need better healthcare, education and child protection. We also campaign and advocate at the highest levels to realise the rights of children and to ensure their voices are heard.  

We are working towards three breakthroughs in how the world treats children by 2030:

• No child dies from preventable causes before their 5th birthday
• All children learn from a quality basic education and that,
• Violence against children is no longer tolerated

We know that great people make a great organization, and that our employees play a crucial role in helping us achieve our ambitions for children.  We value our people and offer a meaningful and rewarding career, along with a collaborative and inclusive workplace where ambition, creativity, and integrity are highly valued.

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Qualifications and experience

• University degree in Business, International Development, Finance/Accounting or in any other related field.
• Strong NGO experience with a good understanding of the grant management cycle.
• Ability to understand grant budgets and prepare financial reports.
• Highly developed interpersonal and English communication skills, including influencing, negotiation and coaching.
• At least three years of experience managing grants, contracts & sub agreements with knowledge of major funders’ guidelines (i.e USAID, ECHO, DFID, CIDA, SIDA etc.) relevant experience managing donor funded projects with International NGO’s particularly those addressing human/children’s rights and those applying partnership approaches.  
• Strong analytical skills and strategic planning abilities.
• Computer literacy and excellent documentation skills are a must.
• Excellent excel skills with the ability to draw out complex data from a variety of different sources.
• Ability to proactively identify issues and problem solving skills.
• Ability to establish and maintain conducive collegial relations and perform effectively as a member of a team.
• Highly developed cultural awareness and ability to work well in an international environment with people from diverse backgrounds and cultures.
• Excellent time management and planning capacity.
• Ability to manage a varied workload, to work effectively under pressure to organize and prioritize work to ensure departmental deadlines are met. Availability and willingness to work extra hours during times of humanitarian responses.

Applications should be submitted to the Apply Now Option on the website, please apply using a cover letter and up-to-date CV as a single document. Please make sure to mention the position ref. in the subject.  The selection committee will review all applications as they are received. All applicants must meet the minimum requirements described above, and those unable to meet these requirements will not be considered.

Please also include details of your current remuneration and salary expectations.

We need to keep children safe so our selection process, which includes rigorous background checks, reflects our commitment to the protection of children from abuse.