Program Manager – East Africa Expansion

Location: Uganda

Industry: Nonprofit, Education & Government

Company: Leading Non-Profit Anti-Poverty Organization

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The Dispensers for Safe Water (DSW) program centers on an innovative low-cost drinking water treatment technology – the chlorine dispenser - that was developed through research collaboration between the organization, Harvard University, and the University of California - Berkeley. The chlorine dispenser has achieved high usage rates among communities and significantly reduces waterborne disease. This promising new technology has received strong interest from a number of partners, including several ministries of Kenya's government, major foundations, and leading water sector organizations. The project is currently transitioning from the proof-of-concept stage to large-scale implementation.

As part of the global scale-up efforts to launch programs beyond Kenya’s, the East Africa Manager will be responsible for leading the program’s expansion efforts in Uganda and Rwanda. DSW has ambitious growth plans over the next five years, and the Program Manager for East Africa Expansion will play a key role in building high-performing programs that will serve millions.Reporting to the Director of Global Programs, the PM position requires the entrepreneurial skills to take a program from pilot to scale. This includes building and managing relationships with governments and partners, executing pilot projects and developing plans to scale, building systems to ensure quality programming, and supervising field operations in these countries. While the initial focus will be on Uganda and Rwanda, the PM will apply these lessons to emergent and expanding programs across the region (Ethiopia and Tanzania), as well as globally.

Responsibilities:
Strategic Planning
• Contribute to strategic planning processes working with the Program Director – Global, for DSW expansion in East Africa – specifically Uganda and Rwanda. This includes identifying HR needs and growing the necessary team capacity in each country.
• Take overall responsibility for executing activities in line with program strategy.
• Adapt systems and best-practices and tools (both operational and for surveying) from Kenya and other DSW country programs to support program implementation in other East African countries.
Field Operations Management:
• Prepare work plans for the execution of field activities to take pilots through stages of expansion.
• Recruit, supervise, guide, support and develop field team for implementation and evaluation of dispensers program.
• Supervise field operations, including managing community outreach, site selection, communication and education activities, installations, chlorine supply chain and monitoring and evaluation.
• Create systems and develop resources for ensuring program-wide application of best-practices and sharing lessons learned with partners and other stakeholders.
• Conduct operational monitoring and analysis and apply lessons to improve operations and increase effectiveness and impact of programs.
• Liaise with relevant government ministries, stakeholders and partners to coordinate activities.
• Manage regular chlorine adoption surveys, contributing to analysis and report-writing of findings.
• Effectively coordinate with support functions offered by the organization’s Uganda country office and international headquarters.
• Provide occasional technical assistance to and liaise with other global programs outside of East Africa as necessary.
Partnership and Relationship Management:
• Maintain, build upon and seek out new relevant relationships with current partners in Uganda, Rwanda and Ethiopia. These partners are other international organizations, local organizations, government ministries, and local government administrative bodies.

Qualifications
Experience:
• Minimum of a bachelor's degree, master’s degree preferred, and a strong academic record
• A minimum of 2-3 years' experience in a role with management responsibilities in a high-performance professional environment
• Significant work experience in developing countries, including in Africa
• Comfortable in cross-cultural communications
Knowledge and Skills:
• Exceptional organizational skills with demonstrated ability to execute complex tasks
• Strong interpersonal skills and proven record to work efficiently and constructively in a team, that is geographically dispersed
• Proven leadership capacity to effectively manage staff remotely
• Strong critical thinking and judgment skills
• Intellectual flexibility and willingness to form and adjust opinions based on evidence
• Strong written English and communication skills a must; other language skills a plus, although not required (French, Kiswahili, Luganda, Kinyarwanda or Amharic)
• High degree of fluency with Microsoft Word and Excel
Personality and Attitude:
• Inspired by DSW’s mission of bringing safe water to millions of Africans, averting thousands of child deaths from waterborne disease
• Committed to evidence-based practice and policy in the development field
• Enthusiastic to develop personally and professionally as part of a growing global team
• Enjoys travel and working remotely and independently
• An entrepreneurial spirit – DSW is a dynamic program, with many opportunities for growth and leadership

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