Programme Manager Society at British Council Nigeria

The British Council is the world's leading cultural relations organization and creates opportunities for people in the UK and worldwide to understand each other, to work together and learn from one another. We see this as crucial to building secure, more prosperous and sustainabl futures for us all. We build trust and understanding between different countries and cultures and develop strong international links that are of benefit to people in Britain and the rest of the world.

We are recruiting to fill the below position:

Job Title: Programme Manager Society

Location: Kano
Directorate or Region: SSA
Department/Country: Programmes/Nigeria
Reports to: Director Society
Job Category: Project Management
Start Date: 5th June 2015

Purpose of Job

• To act as the Senior Responsibility Officer for Programme delivery in Kano and therefore have associated representational, leadership and management responsibilities and accountabilities.
• To work with the Director Society and other members of the Education and Society team to lead implementation of the Northern Nigeria Girls School Enrolment Programme.

Context and Environment

• The British Council in Nigeria works in three strategic business areas; Arts, English, Education and Society.
• According to UNESCO around 58 million children of primary school age were not enrolled in school in 2012. The majority, 29.6 million, are in sub-Saharan Africa with 10.5 million of these in Nigeria.
• Across Nigeria, a number of factors on the demand and supply side including poor and insufficient infrastructure, opportunity costs of early employment and social barriers have been cited as reasons for large numbers of OOSCs. Research commissioned by British Council including the 2012 Gender Report and 2014 Gender Disparity in Basic Education Report indicate that across the north of Nigeria, social norms governing the position of women and girls in society have a deleterious effect on girl’s enrolment.
• The objectives of the project are to increase enrolment rates for girls across the North-Eastern and North-Western regions of Nigeria. The project will focus on challenging the social barriers to girl’s education building on interventions by government and international partners to address the supply side barriers.

The programme will work with an extensive range of partners, including donor agencies, civil society organizations, government agencies and contractors to organize and implement a range of projects, including:

• Community based advocacy and enrolment campaigns
• Media advocacy using radio and community performances
• Exchange programmes for key influencers, primarily traditional and religious leaders
• Research and development of innovative approaches to improving enrolment and educational outcomes for girls

The British Council creates international opportunities for the people of the UK and other countries and builds trust between them worldwide. In all that we do the British Council acknowledges our duty of care to ensure a healthy and safe place to work for our staff, customers and visitors. We aim to achieve this through compliance with the safety laws in each of the countries in which we operate. We aim, where practicable, to follow UK standards, guidance and codes of good practice where these offer enhanced standards of health and safety.

• The British Council recognises that we have a fundamental duty of care towards all children we engage with including a duty to protect them from abuse. We achieve this through compliance with UK child protection laws and relevant laws in each of the countries we operate as well as by adherence to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) 1989.
• Our Equal Opportunity Policy commits us to ensuring that there is no unjustified discrimination in the recruitment, retention, training and development of staff on the basis of age, disability, gender including HIV/AIDS status, marital status including civil partnerships, pregnancy and maternity, political opinion, race/ethnicity, religion and belief, socio-economic background, spent convictions, trade union activity or membership, work pattern and on the basis of having or not having dependants or any other irrelevant grounds.
• We guarantee an interview to candidates living with disability who meet the essential criteria.
• Candidates with special needs should please ask us for this information in alternative formats.
• All employees of the British Council must adhere to the Corporate Health & Safety, Equal Opportunity & Diversity and Child Protection policies and the Code of Conduct.

Accountabilities, Responsibilities and main Duties
Programme management and coordination:

• Work with Director Society to plan and implement an effective programme management plan to meet external and internal targets.
• Contribute to the development and management of programme governance structures including a Programme Board, Project Boards, External Advisory Group
• Lead project team on delivery of activity
• Contribute to the development of content within each project, including reviewing research, supporting external consultants and working with internal British Council resources.
• Working with the Director Society and Planning and Evaluation Manager to ensure appropriate monitoring and reporting of programme progress against agreed indicators and measures

Financial Management:

• Responsible for developing annual works plans and budgets for the programme
• Responsible for ensuring effective management of programme budgets including monthly reporting on budget performance
• Responsible for overseeing team procurement in line with established corporate standards

Risk Management:

• Responsible for maintaining and updating the project risk register at regular intervals as established in the programme management plan
• Participate in regular project risk review meetings with the programme management team
• Ensure dissemination of risk management standards to programme partners

Contract and account management
In compliance with corporate standards, processes and templates for contract and fund management:

• Support Director Society in developing contracts for all partnerships ensuring they capture all elements of the partnerships and outline clearly all partner responsibilities and benefits
• Draft agreements for all project contractors, consultants and suppliers
• Monitoring of contract database to ensure up to date records at all times
• As part of Country CRM framework, maintains and updates the CRM, recording contacts/ leads and outcomes of meetings , ensuring follow up action is carried out in a timely and efficient manner
• Monitor proper invoicing and payment schedule from donors
• Develop and manage relationship with key partners including public education bodies, civil society organisations and girls’ rights and education advocacy groups.

Equality, diversity and inclusion standards:

• Ensure that programme delivery, training events and activity are appropriately screened and reflect British Council EDI policy
• Lead on programme reporting for British Council Diversity Assessment Framework

Communications

• Work with British Council Nigeria Marketing and Communications team to develop and disseminate case studies, reports and impact stories for external and internal communication channels including digital and print media
• Work with Directors Programmes and Director Society and the External Advisory Groups to disseminate outcomes from Northern Nigeria Girls School Enrolment Programme in accordance with the project plan and identifying other means to maximise reach
• Work collaboratively with colleagues across the Programmes team to share intelligence and opportunity that creates added benefit to project partners and contacts

Team Leadership and management:

• Demonstrate effective leadership of wider Kano business delivery team and ensure that line management of staff is to British Council standards.
• Coach, Mentor and support team.
• Model appropriate leadership styles and British Council behaviours and ensure that staff work in alignment with the British Council Values at all times.

Key relationships:

• Country Director Nigeria, Director Programmes, Director Society, Nigeria Programme Management Team, Partnerships Manager, Nigeria Communications team, regional and global Education and Society team

Other Important Features or Requirements of the Job
Required candidate will also need to possess:

• Excellent organisational skills and attention to detail
• Ability to work effectively with tight deadlines
• Entrepreneurial spirit and ability to manage multiple priorities simultaneously
• Excellent presentation skills and interpersonal skills

Person Specification
Essential:

• We particularly welcome applications from people who hail from and live in Kano, Kebbi, Sokoto, Kastina, Zamfara, Borno, Yobe and Jigawa States and want to work in Kano.

Behaviours:

• Connecting With Others (most demanding)
• Shaping The Future (more demanding)
• Creating Shared Purpose essential
• Making It Happen  (more demanding)

Other behaviours needed for the job but not evaluated at interview

• Working together at more demanding level
• Being accountable at more demanding level

Skills and Knowledge Managing people

• Provides full line management to a team where all members are working in a similar area of expertise or business.
• Scope includes planning, setting objectives, role modelling an inclusive culture, recruitment, and development and performance management.

Managing Projects:

• Analyses requirements with the sponsor/stakeholders, defining the specification, planning, revising, implementing and evaluating on medium-to-large scale and/or high risk projects.
• Coordinates a diverse team with awareness of equality and diversity impact as part of the project specifications and handles changes in specification or plan to meet unexpected circumstances

Communication Skills:

• Displays good listening, writing and speaking skills, setting out logical arguments clearly and adapting language and form of communication to meet the needs of different people/audiences.

Planning and Organising:

• Organises own work over weeks and months, or plans ahead for others, taking account of priorities and the impact on other people.
• Develops and reviews the implementation of annual plans for a work group or function, taking account of business and customer requirements and reconciling competing demands.

Managing Finance and Resources:

• Monitors and controls an agreed budget within a defined area, producing reports and analyses and contributing to planning.
• Strong organisational and research skills
• Understanding of the education and social landscape in Northern Nigeria
• Strong networks in the education sector

Qualifications

• Bachelor's Degree
• Post-graduate degree in Education, Humanities or Social Sciences

Experience:

• Experience working on large scale education advocacy projects
• Experience of working with senior colleagues in partner / donor organisations
• Experience working in North-East/North-West Nigeria.

Application Closing Date
19th June 2015.

How to Apply
Interested and qualified candidates should:
Click here to apply online

Click here to download job details MS Word

Click here to download BC Core Skills (pdf)

Click here to download BC Behaviours (pdf)