Country Director

Major Responsibilities

Leadership and Representation

• Lead the country program by establishing and maintaining open and professional relations with colleagues, promoting a strong team spirit throughout the country program, and providing guidance, oversight and resources to enable staff to perform successfully.
• Develop and carry out strategies that result in strong representation with: government ministries at various levels; UN agencies; donors including PRM, ECHO, Germany, Canada, SIDA, ECHO, USAID, UN agencies and other international organizations; international and local NGOs; and coordination fora.
• Ensure that IRC remains a partner of choice for major international donors.
• Develop and maintain a high level of understanding of donor priorities and planned funding streams.
• Initiate and sustain strong, mutually beneficial and authentic partnerships with local organizations.
• Seek out and pursue opportunities to raise the profile of the work of IRC and its partners, as well as the lives and the needs of the people IRC seeks to serve.
• Play a leadership role in efforts to improve stakeholder coordination in Jordan.
• Lead country program collaboration with colleagues in IRC’s MENA Region to deliver regional programming and advocacy.
• Ensure leadership and management processes enable the IRC to effectively adapt to contextual changes and fully leverage opportunities to expand humanitarian access and assistance where relevant while steering the teams to develop a robust development programs in response to the evolving context.
• Work closely with regional leadership and leadership of the Syria and Lebanon country program to ensure agreement in how issues affecting all are addressed.
  

Strategic Direction, Program Quality and Growth

• Ensure the strategic vision and direction of the country program is aligned with IRC’s strategy to serve people with responsive, high-quality and accountable programming, and secure the resources necessary for realization.
• Ensure the strategy action plan is of quality, implemented and guides decision making.
• Ensure program quality through consistent use throughout the country program of: rigorous assessment, design, and proposal development and review processes; comprehensive monitoring & evaluation, accountability and learning systems; staff development investments; and partner organization capacity strengthening.
• Actively seek out and pursue opportunities to expand, in line with the IRC’s mission, humanitarian, resilience and development programming in Jordan, in terms of populations and areas served.
• Remain current on national and regional issues impacting the country program and partners, and develop responsive strategies to changing contexts.
• Ensure the SMT delivers the leadership, management structures, staffing skills and approaches, and operational systems required to ensure a coherent “one IRC” approach to achieve Jordan and regional objectives.
  

Safety and Security Management

• Take primary responsibility for overall management of safety and security for the country program.
• Oversee the management of all security issues, including appropriate response to emergency situations as they arise in close coordination with the Regional leadership.
• Maintain a culture of safety and security throughout the country program, including trainings and briefings that prepare all country program staff for security incident prevention and response.
• Keep security, evacuation and contingency plans current and accessible to country program staff.
• Maintain close coordination and communication with the Regional Safety and Security Director on safety and security concerns and evolving issues that could adversely affect IRC staff or operations.
  

Staff Management, Learning and Development

• Oversee the management, coaching and development of national and international staff to build a team of skilled, committed and motivated staff. Coach, train, supervise and mentor direct-report staff, including communicating clear expectations, setting quarterly performance objectives, providing regular and timely positive and constructive performance feedback, and providing documented semi-annual performance reviews.
• Provide a measurable development plan including on-the-job learning with the aim of strengthening technical capacity, exchanging knowledge within the team and providing guidance on career paths.
• As part of succession plan and nationalization goals, identify, train and develop capability and capacity of national staff to successfully transition role and responsibilities.
• Creating and nurturing an environment that supports learning, teamwork and high performance at all levels.
• Promote and monitor staff care and well-being. Model healthy work-life balance practices. Support appropriate interventions in response to identified staff care needs of both national and international staff.
• Offer leadership support for successful adherence by all staff to IRC’s country, regional and Global HR Operating Policies and Procedures.
• Work with regional HR staff to identify and implement recruitment and retention strategies.
  

Stewardship and Operational Management

• Drive operational excellence to achieve optimal efficiency and cost-effectiveness in all functions and operations of the country program.
• Oversee the development, deployment and utilization of financial and operational policies, procedures, and systems to deliver compliance with IRC and donor requirements.
• Ensure responsiveness and appropriate levels of in-person and remote support to all offices, especially in the areas of HR, finance and supply chain.
• Provide timely and effective management and oversight of the Jordan country program’s financial position.
• Maintain effective and coordinated budget monitoring processes for grant funds and discretionary funds.
• Seek opportunities to introduce efficiencies including through change management and eliminate redundancies in existing business processes.
  

Communications

• Model and encourage active practice of the principles of the “IRC Way – Global Standards for Professional Conduct” throughout the Jordan country program.
• Maintain a healthy and empowering office environment that encourages open, honest and productive communication among IRC staff and with partner organizations.
• Maintain open communications with regional management staff, regional technical advisors, and HQ departmental staff.
  

Key Working Relationships

Position reports to: Regional Vice President

Position directly supervises: A senior management team responsible for programs, operations, finance, People and Culture, and compliance, Security and MEAL.

Key Internal Contacts

• Country Program: All staff
• Region: Middle East and North Africa Regional Team
• HQ: Awards Management, Ethics & Compliance, Operations and Strategy, Finance, Global Philanthropy & Partnerships, Program Quality, Advocacy and Communications, and General Counsel
  

Key External Contacts

• Partner organizations
• Host country government officials
• Public and private donor agencies
• International and national NGOs
• UN agencies
• Foreign governments and their diplomatic missions in Jordan