Initiatives and Challenges Program Assistant at Skills Outside School Foundation

The Skills Outside School Foundation is the leading African education, employability and entrepreneurship organization with a vision for a productive human capital driving transformational socio-economic development globally through our core pillars- interventions, data and advocacy over the last 8 years.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Initiatives and Challenges Program Assistant

Location: Abuja (FCT)
Employment Type: Full-time

Job Description

• The Initiatives and Challenges Program Assistant manages the innovative process of the organization.
• (S)He will be tasked with identifying innovative potentialities and bringing them to fruition in order to best benefit the overall goals of the organization.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Brainstorms with the creative team to discover alternative solutions and approaches to old problems.
• Plans effective new ideas and innovative strategies for product development, marketing, branding, or business opportunities.
• Recognizes promising ideas and introduces them into the organization's plans and discards ideas that are ineffective, costly, or beyond the organization's mission or abilities to develop.
• Strategizes with the team to transform general ideas into workable solutions.
• Analyzes existing practices to isolate areas ripe for improvement or enhancement.
• Encourages creative thinking in the team and nurtures innovative thinking across all areas of the organization.
• Follows target audience responses to new ideas, tracks and analyzes the success of new products or services, and responds to the target audience's questions.
• Monitors research and development of other organizations to spot trends in innovation and supplement research findings in the organization's industry.
• Allocates resources to maintain the organization's existing agenda while accounting for new projects.
• Tests the progress of innovation and adjusts the pace or direction of new projects in accordance.
• Keeps all new projects in line with the company's mission and maintains consistency with the organization's message and brand.

Requirements
Education and Experience:

• Bachelor's Degree is preferred but not required.
• Background in marketing, research, and development, product development, or strategy is recommended.
• Proven experience in the industry or working in a leadership role in a similar industry.
• Portfolio of past work.
• Minimum of 2 years' experience.

Required Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities:

• Must possess an inquisitive and creative mind.
• Must be independent and self-directed but able to work and lead a team of creative individuals.
• Superior research and analytical skills to track and predict trends.
• Must be able to work creatively within a budget and use innovation to find ways of more managing resources.
• Strong business knowledge, understanding of a variety of business practices, and familiarity with the company's industry.
• Must be able to collaborate with executives, creative teams, research and development, and project management teams.
• Must have excellent interpersonal skills and the ability to persuasively sell ideas.
• Must be willing to take calculated risks and manage expectations.

Job Benefits
At SOSF, we value diversity and inclusion – in backgrounds, and experiences and also encourage a gender Friendly work Environment. We offer:

• Paid Time off (PTO) which includes;
• Sick (sick leave based on the duration of sickness after a verified Doctor’s report)
• Exam (A Maximum of 1-week paid examination leave annually)
• Annual (25 days for full-time staff and 20 days for contract staff)
• Maternity (3 months for confirmed female staff)
• Paternity leave (5 working days for male employees)
• Group continuous Learning and Development: As part of our commitment to organizational learning and in support of our understanding that learning organizations are more effective, efficient, and relevant to the communities they serve, we expect all team members to commit 5% of their time to learning activities that benefit Skills outside foundation as well as themselves. The team has a learning and development WhatsApp group where all posts are shared.
• External Engagement policy: SOSF Encourages people to have other external engagements outside SOSF which support the vision and mission of the organization as well as their interests.
• A flexible working structure that entails a 90% Remote and 10% Physical work structure.
• SOSF has an excellent career growth pathway for its staff through its 2-promotion cycle in a year.

Application Closing Date
10th February, 2023.