Roving Safeguarding Specialist - Ukraine Refugee Crisis Response at Plan International

Plan International is an independent development and humanitarian non-profit organisation that advances children’s rights and equality for girls. We support children’s rights from birth until they reach adulthood, and enable children to prepare for - and respond to - crises and adversity. We believe in the power and potential of every child, but know this is often suppressed by poverty, violence, exclusion and discrimination.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Roving Safeguarding Specialist - Ukraine Refugee Crisis Response

Location: Nigeria (Flexible)
Type of Role: Fixed Term
Reports to:  Accountability to Affected Populations Specialist
Functional Area: Humanitarian
Travel required: Up to 60% time sometimes at short notice
Effective Date: April 2022

Role Purpose  

• The conflict in Ukraine is resulting in a major humanitarian crisis with over 3 million people having fled to neighboring countries, and millions displaced within Ukraine.
• Plan International is responding to the crisis and working in partnership with civil society organisations in Poland, Romania, and Moldova to meet the key needs of those affected by the crisis as well as host communities.
• This position will play a key role in the support to country level activities and will provide technical support and guidance to Plan International teams and partners in Poland, Romania, and Moldova. A priority focus will be on supporting Plan International and its partners to DO NO
• HARM to children, program participants and affected community members that we serve. This will be done through supporting integration and mainstreaming of safeguarding and prevention of sexual harassment, exploitation and abuse (PSHEA) in our interventions, ensuring that our contact, interventions and operations do not harm or put those that we serve at risk of being harmed. Should harm occur, the position will support immediate effective survivor centered responses.

Dimensions of the Role

• The position will will lead in defining the Ukraine Hub agenda for protecting children, program participants and affected communities from harm that may be caused by their contact with our staff and associates, interventions and operations.

The role will develop Plan International’s approach to safeguarding and PSHEA in the response through:

• Support Plan International teams and our partners integrate and use the Core Humanitarian Standard across all aspects of our work.
• Providing technical and professional advice and support on Safeguarding and PSHEA best practice in the Hub interventions to ensure we do no harm to children and program participants that we serve
• Work with key stakeholders to develop and embed consistent and legally compliant safeguarding and PSHEA practices in programmes and processes across Plan International Ukraine Hub
• Proactively works with members from other functional areas in the Hub to develop and promote a culture committed to safeguarding and PSHEA
• Actively supports and promotes safeguarding interagency collaboration, engagement, communication and learning across the Ukraine Hub countries
• Provide support on safeguarding and PSHEA investigations as required.

Accountabilities
Developing Plan International’s Ukraine Hub’s Safeguarding & PSHEA Strategy:

• Support the Hub team in developing and implementing a humanitarian Safeguarding &PSHEA strategy for the response.
• Support in carrying out a Safeguarding &PSHEA risk assessment for the office and programs to inform senior leadership on strategic decision-making.
• Support the developing and implementing a safeguarding &PSHEA Work Plan, based upon the riskassessment.
• Ensure the Core Humanitarian Standard is the foundation of all response activities and ways of working.

Coordinate the Safeguarding &PSHEA implementation for the Ukraine Hub:

• Working with other functional teams ensuring that safeguarding and PSHEA is embedded throughout the program development and intervention cycle and the socialization of Plan Internationals Safe Programming and Influencing Tools 
• Providing safeguarding input to funding submissions as needed
• Implementing safeguarding &SHEA prevention, risk mitigation, and response measures during planning, policy and project development, and programming in the various technical areas of the office’s programs
• Train staff on safeguarding &PSHEA and the Code of Conduct (using the PSHEA Policy, Safeguarding Policy and Code of Conduct), emphasizing appropriate conduct for Plan International staff and associates, and how to submit and receive complaints under internal and inter-agency reporting systems
• As part of staff inductions, training and briefings, emphasize the Safeguarding Policy; PSHEA Policy and Code of Conduct that clearly prohibits safeguarding violations and SHEA, obliges reporting of such acts, enforces these clauses when breached, provides meaningful protection to those who report, and encourages safe reporting 
• Ensure that internal safeguarding &PSHEA measures are in place for recruitments that may happen for the Hub
• Support partners integrate safeguarding approaches into their work, including conducting initial trainings as needed for partners
• Support the development, translation, and access to Plan International safeguarding material for partners
• Working with AAP/CEA, establish and/or strengthen safe procedures for complaint and feedback mechanisms (CFMs), raise awareness of same to staff and associates
• Work with AAP/CEA, and other relevant actors to understand community preferences in reporting sensitive allegations such as SHEA
• Working with AAP/CEA, support the mapping of existing CFMs to identify where there are gaps in community access for reporting sensitive complaints 
• Based on CFM mapping and community preferences, support the strengthening of existing and/or establish new entry points to fill the gaps in reporting access so that there are safe, accessible, and contextually appropriate channels for any member of the community to report complaints, including those of SHEA
• Assist in a mapping exercise of available services and gaps for health, legal, psychosocial, protection and other support for safeguarding &PSHEA survivors, thus establishing clear pathways for referrals for survivor assistance, informed by good practice and community consultations
• Ensure prominence of safeguarding and PSHEA clauses in partnership contracts that clarify prevention, reporting and responding responsibilities

Community Engagement:

• As part of broader community engagement activities, working closely with AAP/CEA, support the Hub team in engaging communities on their preferred complaints and feedback mechanisms and classification of complaints (with SHEA as a serious complaint)
• Support the development of a collective communication strategy to raise awareness on key safeguarding &PSHEA messages, including the rights of affected populations, the fact that assistance and services are never conditioned on sexual favours, and how to submit sensitive complaints
• Assist the response team to consult and engage with all relevant stakeholders during the design of the CFMs in order to ensure support, high-level commitment, sustainability, and community trust and ownership in the complaints mechanisms
• Ensure that the implementation of safeguarding &PSHEA in the response is informed by community participation, contextually and culturally appropriate, and based on the community’s needs

Interagency Networks/Technical Clusters/Sectors Engagement:

• Engage with key Government ministries and departments.
• Support sector specialists and partners ensure safeguarding &PSHEA is addressed in cluster activities
• Proactive engagement and representation of Plan International in the PSHEA in-country interagency network/clusters, ensuring visibility of Plan Internationals work and that we are a positive addition to any PSEAH/ safeguarding activities in-country
• Develop a network with peer agencies safeguarding staff for experience sharing
• Support partners to engage with the safeguarding &PSHEA in-country networks
• Ensures that Plan International’s global policies for Safeguarding Children and Young Peopleand 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
Internal:

• Country Management Team members as required
• Programme technical leads.
• Ukraine Hub
• National Organisations
• Global Hub departments (including humanitarian, safeguarding)

External:

• Civil Society Organisations
• UN Agencies
• Institutional Donors
• Embassies

Technical Expertise, Skills and Knowledge
Essential:

• Experience of working in an international context on Safeguarding/Child Safeguarding, Prevention of Sexual Exploitation and Abuse, Protectionand Gender Based Violence, particularly in humanitarian settings
• Proven experience of using and promoting the Core Humanitarian Standard and related tools and guidelines.
• Good experience of embedding Safeguarding/PSEA or related practice into programmes – particularly humanitarian programmes - with experience developing risk management structures
• Significant experience of the humanitarian system and associated coordination mechanisms.
• Proven experience and ability to design and deliver training.
• Good interpersonal skills with the ability to communicate, negotiate and influence at all levels, considering cultural and language difficulties.
• Track record of strong facilitation, networking, and influencing skills in person and remotely.
• Skilled in risk identification and mitigation.
• Strong competencies on monitoring and evaluation of safeguarding and PSHEA mechanisms.
• High degree of organisational ability, working well to deadlines. Ability to work under pressure and willingness to work flexible hours in the event of emergencies.
• Passionateaboutsafeguarding and PSHEA
• Diplomatic, culturally and politically sensitive
• Experience of supporting complex safeguarding and SHEA investigations.
• Demonstrated experience of working with highly sensitive material in a confidential way; ability to show empathy for the challenges survivors face in reporting safeguarding concerns and the pressures

Desirable:

• Proficiency in Ukrainian, Polish, Romanian, or Moldovan languages.

Physical Environment:

• Based remotely, working in a virtual hub. Required to travel to operational locations on a regular basis, sometimes at short notice.

Application Closing Date
23rd April 2022.

Method of Application
Interested and qualified candidates should:
Click here to apply online

Click here for more information (MS Word)