Background

The situation in Somalia remains fragile with continued political instability, climatic variability, and lack of basic social services. OCHA’s role is to coordinate effective and principled inter-agency humanitarian response and ensure that relief assistance reaches the people who need it in a timely manner.

In line with OCHA’s global mission, OCHA Somalia continues to:

• Advocate for access to basic services, especially water, sanitation, education and health for vulnerable communities, including the collection, analysis and dissemination of information to humanitarian partners, and negotiation of access;
• Support the government efforts and humanitarian organizations in relocation of internally displaced and return;
• Coordinate the implementation of humanitarian response in Somalia with UN agencies and programmes, national and international NGOs and local authorities/communities as appropriate, with focus on strengthening the cluster approach;
• Enhance a protective environment that respects the human rights of all, including IDPs, returnees and minority clans.

Under the direct supervision of the Head of Humanitarian Financing Unit/CHF Manager and oversight of the Head of Office of OCHA-Somalia, the incumbent will play a key role in ensuring the primary objectives of OCHA Somalia are met.

Duties and Responsibilities

Summary of Key Functions:

• Support the Management of the Common Humanitarian funds;
• Ensure  effective liaison with donors;
• Oversee the implementation of the accountability framework based on capacity Assessment;
• Manage internal communication with OCHA HQ and Field Offices as required.

Support the Management of the Common Humanitarian funds focusing on achievement of the following results:

• Under the supervision of the Senior HAO, support and advise the HC on the overall management of the Common Humanitarian Fund (CHF) vis-à-vis the humanitarian context (i.e. priorities and critical needs);
• Ensure the overall administration of the Fund and liaise as necessary with relevant OCHA HQ sections (i.e. OCHA Coordination and Response Division (CRD), OCHA Funding Coordination Section (FCS), OCHA Administrative Services Branch (ASB) or Multi-Partner Trust Fund (MPTF) Office);
• Support and implement standardized policy in line with HQ guidance and decisions;
• Manage and supervise Fund-related support staff;
• Manage fund allocation processes ensuring necessary coordination with relevant counterparts in line with the Terms of Reference and/or allocation guidelines (i.e. Review and/or Advisory Boards, cluster or sector leads; humanitarian organizations; and OCHA);
• Liaise with NGO, UN partners as well as clusters and OCHA field offices to follow-up on project progress and overall Fund progress;
• Ensure recipient organizations compliance with financial rules applicable to the Fund.

Ensure   effective liaison with donors focusing on achievement of the following results:

• Liaise with donors to keep them informed of humanitarian needs, response operations, and the funding status and funding requirements of the Consolidated Appeal and the CHF by contributing to donor briefings, preparing funding requests and reports;
• Coordinate, compile, review and comment on project submissions for CERF and recipient's inputs on the CERF Annual Report;
• Coordinate the proposal and reports submissions to donors on behalf of OCHA.

Oversee the implementation of the accountability framework based on    capacity Assessment focusing on achievement of the following results:

• Ensure compliance with monitoring and reporting systems in place for the Fund;
• Systematically provide information on project status to the HoO and the HC, donors, and relevant governing bodies of the Fund;
• Ensure timely overall project reporting, including acting as the lead for the pooled fund annual report exercise.

Manage internal communication with OCHA HQ and Field Offices as required focusing on achievement of the following results:

• In collaboration with other OCHA units and field offices, as well as with support from relevant OCHA HQ sections, document and disseminate results, best practices and results of the Fund across internal and broader audiences through information and communication products/pieces (i.e. bulletins, feature stories, photographs/videos, web-sites, etc.);
• Liaise with OCHA field offices and recipient organizations in order to disseminate full information on Fund activities.

Impact of Results

The key results of the post are support in the management of pooled funds (CHF and CERF), formulation of strategies for CHF allocations, ensuring smooth allocation processes, implementation of accountability framework and partnerships building.

Competencies

Functional Competencies:         

Advocacy/Advancing a Policy-Oriented Agenda:

• Identifies and communicates relevant information for a variety of audiences for advocating UN’s priorities;
• Maintains a functioning network of contacts with a variety of stakeholders to promote a better understanding of OCHA’s development agenda and to support advocacy efforts.

Building Strategic Partnerships:

• Maintains an established network of contacts for general information sharing and to remain up-to-date on partnership related issues;
• Analyzes and selects materials for strengthening strategic alliances with partners and stakeholders.

Innovation and Marketing New Approaches:

• Generates new ideas and proposes new, more effective ways of doing things;
• Documents and analyses innovative strategies/best practices/new approaches.

Resource Mobilization:

• Collects, researches and analyzes information on resource mobilization and utilization, drafts reports and documents and maintains information/databases on potential and actual donors and donor funded projects;
• Provides data and information needed for preparation of fund raising activities and resource mobilization documents ensuring needs of donors are met.

Promoting Organizational Learning and Knowledge Sharing:

• Generates new ideas and approaches, researches best practices and proposes new, more effective ways of doing things;
• Documents and analyses innovative strategies and new approaches.

Job Knowledge/Technical Expertise:

• Understands and applies fundamental concepts and principles of a professional discipline or technical specialty relating to the position;
• Possesses basic knowledge of organizational policies and procedures relating to the position and applies them consistently in work tasks;
• Strives to keep job knowledge up-to-date through self-directed study and other means of learning;
• Demonstrates good knowledge of information technology and applies it in work assignments;
• Demonstrates in-depth understanding and knowledge of the current.

Client Orientation:

• Researches potential solutions to internal and external client needs and reports back in a timely, succinct and appropriate fashion;
• Organizes and prioritizes work schedule to meet client needs and deadlines;
• Establishes, builds and sustains effective relationships within the work unit and with internal and external clients.

Core Competencies

• Demonstrating/safeguarding ethics and integrity;
• Demonstrate corporate knowledge and sound judgment;
• Self-development, initiative-taking;
• Acting as a team player and facilitating team work;
• Facilitating and encouraging open communication in the team, communicating effectively;
• Creating synergies through self-control;
• Managing conflict;
• Learning and sharing knowledge and encourage the learning of others. Promoting learning and knowledge management/sharing is the responsibility of each staff member;
• Informed and transparent decision making.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:         

• Advanced university degree (Master’s Degree or equivalent) in political or social science, international studies, public administration, international studies, economics, or any other related field.

Experience:

• Minimum of 2 years of progressively responsible professional experience in humanitarian affairs, emergency preparedness, crisis/emergency relief management, project management, budget management, or other related areas;
• Experience in the UN common system, humanitarian emergencies in the field, project management/supervision, monitoring and evaluation, and administration is desirable;
• Experience in drafting project documents and guidelines pertaining to humanitarian assistance are desirable;
• Experience in the usage of computers and office software packages (MS Word, Excel, etc) and experience in handling of web based management systems.

Language: 

• Fluency in oral and written English.