The Turkish Red Crescent Society (Türk Kızılay/TRC) was established in 1868 and is the largest humanitarian organisation in Turkey. As an auxiliary to the Government and with a wide reach in vulnerable communities, TRC has played a leading role in the refugee response since 2012, deploying staff and volunteers, organising dedicated structures to assist and protect people in need, and continuing to extend its humanitarian services to refugees and host communities in urban and rural areas by providing assistance across a range of programmes, along with supporting the needs of newly arrived refugees. Cash-based assistance is a core approach and existing competency; since 2016, TRC has been the main implementing partner for most major humanitarian partners delivering conditional and unconditional cash assistance through its Kızılaykart Cash-Based Assistance Programmes Platform (‘Kızılaykart Platform’), which was first established in 2011. The IFRC supports TRC in its response to the growing humanitarian needs in Turkey resulting from the Syrian and other concurrent crises. The operation focuses on developing community services and outreach programmes for displaced populations living in urban areas, and also aims to assist members of host communities as a way of building resilience and strengthening coping mechanisms. As of 2020, with funding from the European Union, the IFRC and TRC are partnering to implement the Emergency Social Safety Net (ESSN) – the largest humanitarian cash programme in the world, which assists over 1.7 million refugees living under temporary and international protection in Turkey to meet their basic needs via debit card-based monthly cash assistance, complemented by severe disability and quarterly family size-based top ups.
Job Purpose
Reporting to the IFRC’s Turkey Head of Country Office, the Manager – ESSN Learning, Capacity Support and External Engagement leads the Unit, including ongoing advancement of its strategy and areas of focus, and the roles, responsibilities and professional development of its personnel. A core responsibility is leading on facilitating and implementing the joint TRC-IFRC ESSN Learning Strategy, which includes:
▪ Overseeing third-party monitoring of the ESSN, and ensuring intersections with internal ESSN programmatic monitoring and learning;
▪ Coordinating technical cooperation and collaboration between TRC, IFRC and other humanitarian and development actors;
▪ Steering a dedicated ESSN Learning Hub, which seeks both to curate and house all relevant ESSN-related learning, and develop best practice, lessons learned and exchange of expertise amongst humanitarian actors locally and globally;
▪ Leading and coordinating impactful capacity support for and with TRC;
▪ Identifying and ensuring delivery on opportunities to capture and share learning on and from the ESSN programme and the IFRC and TRC’s partnership in its implementation – across the Movement, and externally with relevant stakeholders and actors at local, regional and global levels.
Job Duties and Responsibilities
Cross-cutting
- Provide leadership of the Unit and its work, including ongoing strategic and technical steering, oversight and advancement of its priorities and areas of focus, and ensure these continue to inform and intersect with IFRC-TRC programmatic priorities within their partnership as joint implementers of the ESSN
- Provide strategic advice and inputs on priority areas of focus, including to the programmatic framing of the ESSN within the contract with DG ECHO; and supporting on relevant components of the wider IFRC Turkey country strategic approach and operational plan
- Invest in developing and improving the IFRC’s partnership with TRC via the Unit’s areas of focus and ways of working, to collaboratively identify priorities and preferences, and add tangible value to both the programme and the partnership
- Actively maintain and develop ESSN donor engagement and relationships with regard to the Unit’s work, with a particular focus on the learning component, including via regular and transparent dialogue, exchange and sharing of information
- Maintain and develop active and appropriate working relationships with national and international public and private partners and stakeholders across Government, donors, humanitarian and development agencies, academia and the private sector, in close collaboration with the Head of Country Office, ESSN Operations Manager, and the Senior Advisors for Partnerships and External Engagement, and for Operations
- Support counterparts in TRC’s Kızılaykart Cash-Based Assistance Programmes Coordinatorship to identify and leverage opportunities for strategic positioning of the ESSN programme, the Kızılaykart Platform and the National Society, including setting up strategic partnerships at regional and global levels with competent and accountable key partners
- Represent the IFRC in all matters of partnership and external engagement which advances the ESSN Learning strategy, agenda and activities with counterparts in the Turkish Red Crescent, Government and external partners
- Engage with relevant Movement stakeholders and partners at global, regional and partner National Society levels in support of the ambition to exchange and share learning from the ESSN to the wider benefit of the Movement; represent the ESSN on the Cash and Social Protection Technical Working Group under the RCRC Cash Peer Working Group
- Provide strategic and technical advice as required on ESSN programmatic and/or thematic priority areas, including: the evolving transition strategy for the ESSN, specifically efforts to support access to livelihoods opportunities for relevant ESSN recipients; vulnerability analysis and enhanced targeting of assistance; and mainstreaming of protection within large-scale basic needs-oriented cash programmes
Staff management
- Manage and continue to build a dynamic and high-performing team
- Facilitate collaborative defining of roles and responsibilities, and support and invest in the professional development and capacity strengthening of the Unit’s personnel
- Ensure collaborative inputs to the Unit’s strategy, priorities and activities via a flat and equitable team structure
- Encourage creativity, and promote and support effective team working through transparent communication and regular team and bilateral/one-to-one meetings
- Provide leadership direction, and clear and collaboratively agreed goals and performance objectives to Unit staff
ESSN Learning
- Ensure coherence across all aspects of ESSN learning and maintain and develop overarching strategic thinking
- Lead on facilitating and implementing the joint TRC-IFRC ESSN Learning Strategy and its core components, including iterative evolution of the strategy and its activities over the life-cycle of the IFRC-TRC tenure of the ESSN, via coordination and collaboration with relevant IFRC and TRC stakeholders; ensure an inclusive and equitable approach
- Identify and ensure delivery on opportunities to capture and share learning on and from the ESSN programme and the IFRC and TRC’s partnership in its implementation – across the Movement, and externally with relevant stakeholders and actors
- Establish a dedicated ESSN Learning Hub, which both curates and house all relevant ESSN-related learning in one place, and contributes to further developing best practice
- Oversee the establishing and maintaining of the Learning Hub web-based/online platform
- Manage operational research and evidence building, including coordinating learning exchanges, partnerships, and the commissioning of targeted research to address programmatic priorities and strengthen the evidence base to inform ongoing implementation of the ESSN, along with ensuring documenting and publishing of relevant outputs, and supporting sector-wide dissemination, engagement and uptake based on these; manage consultancies commissioned in this regard
- Manage and act as organisational focal point for the external third-party monitoring of the ESSN, delivered in line with DG ECHO’s global guidance to partners delivering large-scale cash transfers, in particular the elements relating to Component C: Independent MEAL
- Manage the contract with the third-party monitoring group, including oversight, management and quality control of the project, ensuring compliance with and accountability to the project’s overarching principles, design, objectives, workplan and activities, along with successful and timely deliverables upon completion
- Coordinate with relevant stakeholders to the project, in particular DG ECHO, TRC, and the Ministry of Family, Labour and Social Services (MoFLSS) / Directorate General of Social Assistance (DG SA)
- Coordinate technical cooperation and collaboration with the World Bank, with a particular focus on designing and delivering an impact evaluation of the ESSN in phases III and beyond, and on vulnerability analysis and enhanced targeting of ESSN assistance
- Develop strategic partnerships and exchange with parallel learning alliances and initiatives on large-scale basic needs-oriented cash, in particular regionally with the Cash Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning Organisational Network (CAMEALEON) in Lebanon, and globally with the Cash Learning Partnership (CaLP)
Capacity support
- Oversee and ensure coordination of the IFRC’s commitment to impactful capacity support for and with TRC in context of the partnership on the ESSN, in line with a dedicated plan of action and using a range of modalities to meet identified priorities for support
- Identify ‘learning by doing’, mentoring and staff exchange opportunities, building on the international expertise of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement
- Collaborate with TRC counterparts to ensure intersections with and mutual support to the TRC Kızılaykart CVA Know-How Exchange Programme
- Manage and support the Rotational Delegates
- Coordinate support to TRC in investing in institutionalising and mainstreaming its cash capacity and core structure in order to establish sustainability beyond and outside the ESSN programme, including leveraging opportunities to further position the Kızılaykart Platform
How to apply:
Additional information on the vacancy and application instructions are available through this link
https://www.ifrc.org/en/who-we-are/working-with-us/current-vacancies/job-description/?id=69735