Job Responsibilities

• Strategic Planning and Leadership:
• Under the strategic guidance of the Director of Programs, participate in meetings with the donor to discuss the program progress and/or adaptation updates, and support in the decision-making on the emerging programmatic and operational issues.
• Coordinate with the IRC technical sector leads on the strategic direction and leadership for the program, including evidence-based adaptation of the technical sector interventions during the course of the program duration.
• Monitor and stay up to date on the emerging context-specific factors and risks impacting IRC planning and implementation, e.g., early warning data and actors mapping, and make recommendations to the technical sector leads and the Country Senior Management Team (SMT) as appropriate.
• Support the program implementation teams to ensure that all program sectors, and the interventions therein, have an inbuilt risk analysis and the mitigation mechanisms to adapt any changes in context.
• Ensure robust program-wide and sector-level preparedness capacity to respond to the potential future shocks and disasters, with adequate preparedness, risk reduction, and early or timely action.
• Leadership of program implementation
• Lead the project cycle management processes and provide leadership for the smooth implementation of the program, including kick-off meetings, regular technical review meetings and close-out meetings, engaging both internal and external stakeholders as appropriate.
• Ensure that project deliverables are met on time and within budget and ensure efficient budget management and conduct regular Project Budget versus Actuals Review Meetings. 
• Conduct regular project progress meetings and ensure the implementation is aligned with the planned timeline.
• As the Project Lead role has matrix staff management responsibility for all the IRC implementation staff, working closely with the technical sector leads, as per the IRC management in partnership (MIP) approach.
• Foster the intervention level integration both within and across the IRC technical sectors in the program, through the implementation team dynamics and intervention delivery by both IRC and local partners.
• Oversee and coordinate the development of intra- and inter-program work plans, monitoring and evaluation plans, spending plans, and communication materials like success stories, case studies, IEC, etc.
• Ensure collaboration and healthy and constructive working relationships of the program implementation teams with the communications and advocacy, partnerships, grants, and the monitoring, evaluation, accountability, and learning (MEAL) functions of IRC, including ensuring accountability to affected populations (AAP), gender, diversity & inclusion, protection mainstreaming, and advocacy.
• Ensure client feedback received through accountability channels are responded within the timeframe explained in the CRA SOP.
• Partnership Management
• Oversee the partnership management processes, in collaboration with the partnerships team and the technical sector leads, to ensure well-planned, timely, coordinated implementation through local partners.
• Actively promote meaningful partner engagement in program delivery and adaptation, as well as in the Project Cycle Meetings (PCM) processes.
• Liaise with finance and technical sector leads towards timely funds transfer to partners and proper tailored financial management support for partners.
• Liaise with the partnerships team to ensure the timely and effective partner monitoring, review, and reflection, on the mutually agreed tailored partner capacity strengthening plans.
• Ensure collaboration between IRC and partners in the timely identification and constructive resolution of issues.
• Grants Management
• Lead on compliance with the provisions of the donor agreement with IRC in areas such as the program implementation, reporting, financial management, and other risks, for both IRC and partners.
• Ensure program compliance with contractual narrative and financial reporting requirements of the donor.
• Oversee the spending and financial management practices of both IRC and local partner implementation teams, including chairing monthly budget plan versus spending analyses for IRC and partners.
• Foster program compliance to the donor, with guidance from the IRC Grants team; to the Government of Afghanistan, with guidance from the IRC Government liaison team; and to IRC, as per the IRC policies.
• Proactively conduct program review and monitoring activities to take stock of progress, identify and flag emerging issues, and ensure that they are addressed and the donor is kept abreast of any developments.
• Coordination and representation
• Ensure proactive and constructive linkages between the program implementation teams and IRC support function teams including HQ Contract Management Teams, Field Operations, Government Liaison, and Finance teams.
• Represent the program with the donor, sub-national and national level coordination platforms led National level actors, Technical Sector Working Groups, UN Agencies and government Authorities meetings when needed.
• Proactively contribute to the IRC in-country and international advocacy initiatives through sharing regular contextual analysis and evidence from the program implementation and developments in the sectors.
• Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability, and Learning (MEAL):
• Coordinate with the MEAL team to ensure an operational comprehensive MEAL plan for the program.
• Ensure that clients feedback is incorporated and informs project adaptation.
• Regularly review MEAL findings and ensure corrective measures for improvement.
• Ensure that the technical sector quality benchmarks are applied to monitor the quality of implementation.