ROLE PURPOSE

Plan International is an independent child rights and humanitarian organisation committed to children living a life free of poverty, violence and injustice.

We actively unite children, communities and other people who share our mission to make positive lasting changes in children’s and young people’s lives. We support children to gain the skills, knowledge and confidence they need to claim their rights to a fulfilling life, today and in the future. We place a specific focus on girls and women, who are most often left behind.

We have been building powerful partnerships for children for more than 85 years and are now active in over 80 countries.

We engage people and partners to:

• Empower children, young people, and communities to make vital changes that tackle the root causes of discrimination against girls, exclusion and vulnerability.
• Drive change in practice and policy at local, national, and global levels through our reach, experience and knowledge of the realities children face.
• Work with children and communities to prepare for and respond to crises and to overcome adversity.
• Support the safe and successful progression of children from birth to adulthood.

Plan International embarked on an ambitious and exciting strategic change initiative to make the organization more transparent, legitimate, and agile. Strengthening our organizational effectiveness from different perspectives is a priority for leadership in the region.

The Middle East, East and Southern Africa Region currently comprises 15 countries and a regional hub.  The Region also manages the Africa Union Liaison Office and a Shared Service Centre.  The Shared Service Centre provides transactional services to the Country, Regional and Global teams based in Nairobi and to some countries beyond.  This role sits in the Regional Hub Management Team of eight people, led by the Regional Director.

The purpose of this role is to maintain and improve organisational effectiveness and digital security in the MEESA Region and the MEESA Hub by:

• Providing strategic leadership to the Nairobi Shared Service Hub who provide timely, accurate and cost-effective services to existing and new clients within and beyond the MEESA region and to form the operational core of the Nairobi Global Hub; and bring strategic support and thought leadership for the emergence of shared services in the region.
• Improve and optimise operational effectiveness - oversight and coordination of the regional work to strengthen business processes and then to adopt the new systems to take them on-line. (YODA);()
• Bring strategic leadership to improve digital security and on-line functional capability in the MEESA Region; needs digital/it understanding
• Oversee the regional Supply Chain function to support countries to adopt and adhere to the supply chain manual.

 

Dimensions of the Role

• Shared services functionality
• Supply Chain management
• Digital security management
• Relevant people and talent management
• Strategic management of Y.O.D.A organization transformation project.

Accountabilities

1. Provide strategic leadership to the Nairobi Shared Service Hub the Nairobi Global Hub

• As line manager of the Shared Service Manager, drive consistent performance and provide strategic direction so that the Shared Service optimises the potential to save money and improve reliability of transactional processes in the MEESA Region, using in-house or out-sourced service providers.
• Implement the newly approved Agreement with the Kenyan Government to establish a suitably staffed Nairobi Hub that optimises the financial and operational benefits of the Agreement.
• As regional champion, work with other leaders and especially CDs to lead on shared services, bring thought leadership and support for shared services in region.

 

2. Anchor the organizational transformation project - Your Organization Data Analytics (Y.O.D.A); aimed to improve data integrity to measure our impact with increased accuracy.

• As overall lead for Y.O.D.A in the MEESA region, and as a matrix manager of the individual team members, ensure that the MEESA Y.O.D.A Team work as coordinated and well-planned support to countries implementing the Y.O.D.A programme in line with the Global Y.O.D.A priorities.
• Support the Global Y.O.D.A programme to learn from the activities in the MEESA Region and so improve the overall the design of Y.O.D.A.

 

3. As strategic lead for digital and IT in the region, introduce the strategic issues on digital security to the MEESA region and work with the DSRs to achieve the required levels of compliance on digital security across the region

• Oversight of IT hardware, bandwidth and use of IT programmes
• Oversight on digital security across the region
• Influence Global policies and procedures for IT and digital security

 

4. Work with the Regional Hub Management Team to drive operational effectiveness in the ways we deliver programmes and organization management in MEESA, so that the region is high performing in ensuring continuing high-level support from donors, partners, and other key stakeholders.

 

5. Strategic Transformation of operational excellence

• Contribute to the design and development of new strategic initiatives, and support business change activities across the region.

 

6. Capacity building and People Management

• Provide overall vision and direction to the Shared Services, regional Y.O.D.A and Supply Chain teams through effective coordination, planning, prioritization, coaching and supervision.
• Support staff to understand and comply with the organizational vision, mission, strategic direction and organization policies.
• Socialize and nurture Plan Values and Behaviours.
• Create an enabling working environment to foster excellent teamwork and high performing staff.
• Establish, communicate and monitor standards of performance and behaviours of the team through development of Individual Accountability Plans (IAP), and key performance indicators (KPI’s) that are agreed annually, and monitored and updated regularly.
• Support team members to gain the necessary skills through learning and development.
• Within the areas of responsibility, drive performance and change at pace to match the expectations of the organisation

 

7. Policies and standards

• Ensure that Plan International’s global policies for Safeguarding Children and Young People and Gender Equality and Inclusion are fully embedded in accordance with the principles and requirements of the policy including relevant Implementation Standards and Guidelines as applicable to their area of responsibility. This includes, but is not limited to, ensuring staff and associates are aware of and understand their responsibilities under these policies and Plan International’s Code of Conduct (CoC), their relevance to their area of work, and that concerns are reported and managed in accordance with the appropriate procedures.

Key relationships

• Regional Director
• Directors of Sub-Region
• Chief Information Officer
• Regional Hub Management team
• Country Directors
• Directors/Heads of Operations

Technical expertise, skills and knowledge

Leadership behaviours:

• Provides Strategic Leadership for the region, acting as a partner in the delivery of outcomes.
• Develops, motivates, coaches and manages finance teams in the region.
• Promotes high performance and continuous improvement by all staff.
• Promotes innovation and ongoing learning and development of all teams within the region.
• Communicates clearly and effectively.
• Gains, develops and retains credibility about their performance.
• Implements advanced strategies for gathering, reviewing, and analysing data requirements.

 

Skills specific to the post:

• Strong leadership and management skills
• Strategic problem solving
• Analytical skills
• Communication skills, appropriate to the audience, particularly Communicate operational effectiveness concepts and issues clearly to stakeholders.
• Ability to work in a multidisciplinary and multicultural environment
• Strong team-building and motivational skills
• Strong negotiating, facilitating and influencing skills
• Proficient in computer skills and use of relevant software and other applications (e.g.
• word processing, spreadsheets, database, internet).
• Possess the capabilities needed to deliver effective solutions to complex business challenges.
• The ability to conduct cost/benefit analysis
• Business case development
• Modelling techniques and methods
• Knowledge and experience of using any/all of the following would be an added value:
• SAP ERP systems
• Power BI
• Dynamics 365
• Experience of moving an organisation to a new ERP would be an added value

 

Preferred qualifications and experience

• Relevant business management qualification
• MBA or another relevant advanced degree preferable
• 8-10 years’ experience in a similar senior role
• Experience with NGO implementing projects related to operational effectiveness with success
• Experience in supporting a regional roll-out of an ERP platform would be an added benefit.