Uganda: Program Manager - Uganda

Department: Program Position: Livelihood Program Manager Contract duration: 12 months Location: Gulu, Uganda Starting Date: Immediate

I. Background on ACTED

ACTED is an independent international, private, non-partisan and non-profit organization that operates according to principles of strict neutrality, political and religious impartiality, and non discrimination.

ACTED was created in 1993 to support populations affected by the conflict in Afghanistan. Based in Paris, France, ACTED now operates in 32 countries worldwide, with over 200 international and 4000 national staff. ACTED has a 110 million € budget for over 370 projects spanning 8 sectors of intervention; including emergency relief, food security, health promotion, economic development, education & training, microfinance, local governance & institutional support, and cultural promotion. For more information, please visit our website at www.acted.org.

II. Country Profile

Capital Office : Kampala National Staff : 108 International Staff : 7 Areas : 2 (Northern Uganda, Karamoja) On-going programmes : 9 Budget : 2.4 M €

ACTED has been active in Uganda since May 2007, both in the northern region and Karamoja. In the North, ACTED supports the early recovery process with a specific focus on the needs of returning populations displaced by years of conflict. It also expands access, retention, equity and quality of primary education. In Karamoja, the focus is enhanced food security and resilience to disasters, especially droughts, as well as improving the primary education sector. ACTED focuses its intervention on strengthening livelihoods through improved resource management, conflict mitigation and capacity building. In Northern Uganda, as internally displaced persons (IDPs) have returned home and gained access to land, ACTED is working with farmers on infrastructure and capacity development to rebuild agricultural livelihoods. In the Karamoja/Pokot area, ACTED responds to severe food insecurity caused by the drought in the Horn of Africa, providing support to agro-pastoral communities to increase their purchasing power and protect their assets, reducing vulnerability to natural disasters. As part of its integrated cross-border strategy between Uganda and Kenya, ACTED maintains its community-driven disaster risk reduction (DRR) focus and promotes conflict mitigation to ensure peaceful and sustainable access to shared resources. In 2013, ACTED maintains a strong focus on this approach and looks at extending it further along the border with Kenya. ACTED continues working with community-level structures and initiatives such as the APFS, the CDMCs or the DEWS to continue building the communities’ resilience to disasters.

III. Position Profile

For this RFA, the Program Manager has been identified as a Key Personnel position. The proposed Program Manager should have extensive relevant experience managing the mobilization and oversight of multi-faceted projects, including those in the infrastructure sector. The Program Manager should have demonstrated the ability to quickly and effectively assemble and manage a highly-skilled, interdisciplinary team; to effectively collaborate and coordinate with and lead a broad range of governmental and non-governmental actors and institutions across sectors in a developing-country setting; and to implement high-profile and politically sensitive programs.

The Program Manager will contribute to the development of his project, which is a constitutive part of the country strategy, and subsequently manage its implementation.

The PM will be responsible for managing partnerships and ensuring smooth implementation of work plan activities. The PM and senior management team will be responsible for monitoring, technical quality of program interventions, and accountability. This PM will collaborate closely with district officials and local authorities, as well as the donor.

More generally, the program manager is expected to contribute to the creation of a positive image and overall credibility of the organisation, notably through the application of ACTED’s mandate, ethics, values and stand-point with regard to other actors.

Collect information and tools employed for project implementation; Draft memos detailing lessons learned and best practices identified during the project; Share such memos with internal and external partners; Communicate such information to the Country Director or Area Coordinator, to Regional Support Offices and to HQ Reporting Department.

IV. Qualifications:

• Demonstrated expertise as a PM with a minimum of 5 years of experience managing large complex infrastructure programs preferably within an African context. • Experience working on USAID program; familiarity with USAID regulations. • Experience leading collaborative efforts with multiple stakeholders—i.e., between other USAID and NUDEIL recipients, INGOs, Local NGOs and GoU. • A successful track record in managing large teams effectively. • The ability to be collaborative across projects, flexible and creative; • Strong communications and interpersonal skills with evidence of ability to productively interact with a wide range and levels of organizations (government, private sector, NGOs).

IV. Conditions