Job purpose:
The IFRC Asia Pacific Regional Office is seeking a consultant reviewer to lead the Internal Review of the COVID-19 Operations in India and Bangladesh. The COVID-19 operation is a unique response for the IFRC. The IFRC membership-wide approach (which included the IFRC Secretariat and our 192-member National Societies) reflects this operation's local and global nature.
The response is primarily a local response. National Societies (NSs) respond to the local needs of those affected by COVID-19 in their own countries, based on their National Society Response Plans, with IFRC support. Emergency operations are often the engine for local action: providing the resources via Emergency Appeals and Disaster Relief Emergency Fund (DREF) for National Societies to achieve large-scale activities in affected areas. As part of the IFRC's efforts to ensure the quality of operations and level of accountability to all stakeholders, an internal review of the planning, coordination and management systems of selected IFRC/NS COVID-19 operations in India and Bangladesh is proposed.
The internal review seeks to assess and identify challenges in the coordination and management systems of the IFRC COVID-19 operation in India and Bangladesh. The review will be carried out to review the effectiveness and efficiency of COVID-19 operations service delivery and quality programming based on the IFRC processes and procedures. The findings and recommendations from the internal review will contribute to the wider collection of lessons and best practices for wider COVID-19 operations in the Asia Pacific region.
The Terms of Reference is linked here.
Duties and responsibilities:
The internal review will be carried out by an evaluation team and led by the consultant team leader, who should have adequate understanding and familiarity with emergency operations, especially the COVID-19 Operation processes and procedures. The internal review team ultimately reports to the Commissioner, and will work with EMT, IFRC Asia Pacific Regional Office and the IFRC Country Cluster Delegation. in Delhi and IFRC Country Delegation in Dhaka, assessing and collecting information for the internal review and may coordinate with the National Societies for data collection processes.
The internal review team, led by the consultant as team leader, will carry out the internal review through a series of recommended approaches, including:
- Desk review of the country office COVID-19 risk register, secondary data (mission reports, debriefings, emergency plan of actions (EPoAs), DREF operations updates (OU), and supplementary documents (implementation plan, sitreps, logframes, 3W, audited financial reports, assessments and other relevant documents).
- Focus group discussions and key interviews.
- Direct observation - structured/unstructured.
The internal review team will be sensitive to the significant workload of National Society and IFRC operational staff, be as self-sufficient as possible.
Team Leader competencies and qualifications:
- Demonstrable experience in conducting reviews or evaluations of humanitarian programmes and experience in working on the review or evaluation of a disaster.
- Good knowledge of strategic and operational management of humanitarian operations and an ability to provide strategic recommendations to key stakeholders.
- Experience in Movement and external coordination mechanisms (REQUIRED).
- Strong analytical skills and ability to clearly synthesize and present findings, draw practical conclusions, make recommendations, and prepare well-written reports in a timely manner.
- Excellent writing and presentation skills in English.
- In addition to above-listed skills, the reviewer needs to have strong organizational and leadership skills, as well as a good understanding of the dynamics of cooperation between IFRC secretariat and the National Societies.
- Experience working in India and Bangladesh country context.
- Minimum 5 years experience in monitoring and evaluation of humanitarian operations.
How to apply
The evaluation is expected to last and is payable for 60 days (timeline can be adjusted). Please refer to the TOR attached for more information. To apply, please include the items below and send them to the email PMER APZO PMER.APZO@ifrc.org no later than 23 September 2022. Application materials should include:
- Curriculum Vitae (CV) of applicant(s)
- Cover letter responding to the criteria as set out in the requirements and clearly summarizing your experience as it pertains to this evaluation
- A financial proposal outlining daily consultancy fees and total cost of evaluation (in CHF)
- Details of three professional references
- A two-pager technical proposal with proposed evaluation methodology
- Two samples of previous written reports most similar to that described in this ToR, produced in English, and for which the consultancy team is sole or lead author
Application materials are non-returnable, and we thank you in advance for understanding that only short-listed candidates will be contacted for the next step in the application process and the selection panel does not have the capacity to respond to any requests for application feedback. Please take note that expressions of interest that do not cover these requirements will not be considered.