About CRS

Catholic Relief Services is the official international humanitarian agency of the Catholic community in the United States. CRS works tosave, protect, and transformlives in need in more than 100 countries, without regard to race, religion or nationality. CRS’ relief and development work is accomplished through programs of emergency response, HIV, health, agriculture, education, microfinance and peacebuilding.

CRS has been working in Liberia since 1957 and is currently engaged in the School Feeding Activity III. The School Feeding Activity III (SFA III) will improve nutrition, and school enrollment and attendance for children and youth of different ages living within target communities, especially the most vulnerable and marginalized. This includes children and youth who are currently enrolled in formal or non-formal, pre-primary, primary, and secondary schools, as well as children and youth who are not currently enrolled in formal or non-formal education. Besides addressing the nutritional, enrolment and attendance needs of benefitting children and youth, the School Feeding Activity III (SFA III) will include a Home-Grown School Feeding (HGSF) component which will contribute towards Liberia’s efforts to address food insecurity and malnutrition. SFA III will also support the domestic production of safe, diverse, and nutritious food. The activity will likely also include a significant Conditional Cash Transfer component and potentially a WASH in schools’ activity.

Job Summary:

You will have an in-depth knowledge of working with farmers at community level to improve farming practices to ensure maximum crop yields; work with community farmers growing the staple crops to ensure maximum stocks and supplies of the raw materials to successively run the project. Your management skills and knowledge will ensure that the project delivers high-quality programming activities and continuously works towards improving the impact on the lives of the communities and beneficiaries we are serving in Liberia.

Job Responsibilities:

• Contribute to the development and implementation of agency-wide strategies, standards, tools, and best practices in agriculture, education and nutrition that will effectively engage community farmers and community leaders. Provide technical solutions to regional and country program teams, remotely and on-site, for strategic planning and how to best apply program design and implementation standards, best practices, partnership principles, tools, and M&E, ensuring high-quality implementation.

• Provide technical advice and solutions to community farmers on the growth, stocking and adequate supply of food stuff (home-grown component) for the sustainability of the SFA III project.

• Provide technical advice to the all project members in understanding agricultural policy and strategies, map key stakeholders and identify entry points to dialogue with local government, community farmers and small holder farmers.

• Reinforce the CPs capacity in effective stakeholder engagement and communication approaches as a foundation for effective collaboration and sustainable systems change

• Contribute to regional and country program efforts to pre-position CRS for growth opportunities in agriculture, education and nutrition programming. Lead or contribute to the development of the technical design for large and/or complex proposals, including defining and/or aligning appropriate monitoring systems to country level or global indicators.

• Manage and oversee technical, budget management, monitoring and reporting activities throughout relevant project cycles – start-up, implementation and close-out – to ensure efficient and effective implementation in line with CRS program quality principles and standards, donor requirements, and good practices.

• Ensure project team and partner staff use the appropriate systems and tools and integrate aspects of respect, gender, peace-building and integral human development throughout the project cycle.

• Provide technical leadership to the programming team in the development and implementation of strategies and best practices in nutrition; school feeding activities; that are aligned to the project requirements and effectively engage all stakeholders to ensure success.
• Lead the technical working groups on nutrition, health and wellness activities and champion learning with project staff and partner teams. Analyze and evaluate project performance data following MEAL policy. Proactively identify issues and concerns and use participatory processes to overcome implementation obstacles.
• Help identify, assess and strengthen partnerships, applying appropriate application of partnership concepts, tools and approaches to improve nutrition, and school enrollment and attendance for children and youth of different ages living within target communities.
• Coordinate, monitor and implement a Home-Grown School Feeding (HGSF) component which will contribute towards the GoL’s efforts to address food insecurity and malnutrition.
• Effectively manage team dynamics and supervise staff well-being. Provide coaching, strategically tailor individual development plans, contribute to the recruitment process of project staff, and complete performance management for direct reports.
• Coordinate the identification of staff capacity and technical assistance needs of partner organizations and capacity strengthening and required interventions to support quality project implementation.
• Coordinate and monitor financial, material and human resources relevant to project needs. Through planning and oversight ensure project resources are available and used efficiently. Conduct periodic budget reviews and follow-up with partners on timely submission of financial reports to facilitate proper tracking of resource use.
• Act as a contact person and represent the organization with donors, INGO working groups, local partners and relevant local government and community actors. Participate in relevant forums and knowledge networks to collect and share promising practices in the area of nutrition, health and WASH, promote CRS’ work in Liberia and contribute to the CRS learning agenda.

Typical Background, Experience & Requirements:

Education and Experience

• Master’s Degree Agriculture, Nutrition, Community Development, Behavior Change Science, Sociology, or relevant related degree with a focus on rural development and/or humanitarian assistance.
• Minimum of five years of relevant work experience in program management positions related to Nutrition and Food Security, preferably with an international NGO.
• Knowledge of capacity strengthening best practices
• Experience engaging with partner organizations.
• MEAL skills and experience preferred.
• Experience using MS Windows and MS Office packages (Excel, Word, PowerPoint), Web Conferencing Applications, information management systems.

Personal Skills

• Strong critical thinking and creative problem-solving skills with ability to make sound judgment.
• Strong relationship management skills and the ability to work effectively with culturally diverse groups.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills with ability to write technical reports
• Proactive, results-oriented, and service-oriented

Required/Desired Foreign Language

Strong written and verbal communication skills in English with ability to write technical reports.

Travel Required

Around 40% within the identified counties

Key Working Relationships:

Supervisory:

Internal: Country Manager; SFA III Project Manager, Field Staff.

External: Government of Liberia stakeholders, County Mayors, School Heads, Community Leaders,

Agency-wide Competencies (for all CRS Staff):

These are rooted in the mission, values, and guiding principles of CRS and used by each staff member to fulfill his or her responsibilities and achieve the desired results.

• Trusting Relationships
• Professional Growth
• Partnership
• Accountability

Disclaimer: This job description is not an exhaustive list of the skill, effort, duties, and responsibilities associated with the position.

How to apply:

Send your CV to: LR_HR@crs.org Or apply through the system below.

CRS’ talent acquisition procedures reflect our commitment to protecting children and vulnerable adults from abuse and exploitation.

Equal Opportunity Employer