Senior Policy Manager at Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA)

Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) is a research and policy nonprofit that discovers and promotes effective solutions to global poverty problems. IPA brings together researchers and decision-makers to design, rigorously evaluate, and refine these solutions and their applications, ensuring that the evidence created is used to improve the lives of the world’s poor.

We are recruiting suitable candidates to fill the position below:

Job Title: Senior Policy Manager

Location: Abuja
Employment Type: Full-time
Reports to: Country Director, Nigeria

Position Summary

• The (Senior) Policy Manager will support the execution of IPA Nigeria’s evidence-based policy and practice impact and influence strategy, on women’s economic empowerment (WEE) and gender-related topics of priority.
• He/she will work closely with the global policy team, country office management, and research and policy staff in Nigeria to identify, cultivate, and support strategic policy and practice opportunities that show promise in improving outcomes for women and girls in Nigeria. 
• The strategic goals of the (Senior) Policy Manager will be to work with colleagues to equip partners to use evidence on WEE and gender in policy making and program design; pursue scale-up opportunities of promising programs in the sector; develop embedded evidence labs with government partners in the sector; build strategic partner relationships; and host/manage policy events.
• The (Senior) Policy Manager will write policy communications materials to inform policy making and program design in the WEE and gender space and will also work closely with the policy team to support the development of funding opportunities to resource strategic policy projects and initiatives across IPA.

Responsibilities
30%:

• Build expertise on global and local evidence in the WEE and gender space, and cultivate relationships with key local stakeholders in those spheres
• Work together with the global policy and communications team to lead and/or participate in strategic events in the WEE/gender space for policy purposes, including but not limited to summits, conferences, workshops, technical working groups, and round tables. Support gender-focused researchers and country management to participate in these events.
• Lead policy and stakeholder engagements with WEE and gender sector partners, including building relationships required to engage decision-makers around larger-scale evaluations of promising programs
• In collaboration with researchers and Nigeria's management team, represent IPA locally in policy conversations and at events.
• Support research management staff in executing the “Policy Impact Minimum Must Dos” and in identifying and stewarding high potential partner relationships in the sector, particularly with senior levels within government or large organizations.

40%:

• Lead IPA Nigeria in continuously identifying and prioritizing high impact policy opportunities on WEE and other gender topics for evidence to be used
• Manage IPA Nigeria’s relationship with key gender-sector policy partners
• Cultivate relationships with local decision-makers in the WEE and broader gender sector, particularly those with decision-making authority over evidence-to-impact opportunities.
• Launch high impact policy opportunities, including scale-up technical assistance, and either manage small-scale engagements personally with global support, or collaborate with global teams to raise funds to realize these opportunities.

30%:

• Support the Country Director in IPA Nigeria’s business development process.
• Proactively identify business development opportunities and cultivate relationships that lead to developing projects with key WEE and gender sector decision-makers
• Map influential NGO, PIs, and government stakeholders in all the gender sector for the Nigeria office
• Facilitate and participate in proposal development meetings with partners, Principal Investigators, Country Office staff, and the Regional Director.
• Write, edit, and format sections of grant proposals and adapt past proposals to apply to new donors.
• Expand and improve IPA Nigeria’s proposal development resources, information management, and stock language. 
• Together with the Country Director, act as lead steward to key partner relationships and support key research partner conversations in the sector

Qualifications
Required:

• Master’s degree in economics, development, international relations, public administration, gender, public policy or a closely related field is strongly preferred. Will accept additional experience in place of master’s. 
• 5+ years of relevant experience analyzing and communicating complex research results to various audiences, including at least 1 year of experience working closely with large NGOs or governments, preferably in the gender space and in a developing country context. 
• Knowledge of and demonstrated experience in the use of rigorous evidence for international development policy required. 
• Exceptional ability to understand academic research studies and analyze bodies of research
• Expertise in leading teams to draw policy lessons from these and communicating them to various audiences 
• Excellent written and oral communication skills, including clear, precise, non-technical written and presentation skills; requires a strong written “voice” and ability to write in various voices as needed as well as effective spoken communication and presentation style
• Experience with business development or fundraising
• Proven ability to multitask and successfully complete projects on tight deadlines with little supervision
• Willingness to work hard, be self-motivated, learn, be a team-player, and adapt quickly will be essential for doing well in this position.
• Experience supervising staff teams and managing multi-country projects 
• Strong ability to manage up and across.

Application Closing Date
21st March, 2025.