The Ugandan Jobline

Job Title: District Liaise Officer

Organisation: Lively Minds

Duty Station:  Based in Jinja, Uganda with frequent travel

Reports to: Programme Manager

Compensation: Band 5b, 21,229,992.00 UGX gross per annum ( 1,769,166 UGX gross per month), rising to 23,352,991.20 UGX gross per annum after 1 year subject to performance. Then, any subsequent pay progression is based on performance.

 

Benefits: Benefits include basic, medical insurance for the employee only and provident fund.  We offer all staff access to internal learning opportunities. We are unable to offer any financial support for relocation. However, new staff may be permitted to stay on a short-term basis in shared office accommodation if there is a room available in the office. These rooms will be allocated on a first-come-first-serve basis.

 

About US:

Lively Minds is an award-winning NGO, working to get pre-schoolers in rural Ghana & Uganda school-ready. Since 2008, we have developed an innovative, behaviour-change programme that empowers marginalized, poorly-educated mothers to run educational ‘Play Schemes’ for pre-schoolers and to provide better home-based care, using local resources. The Lively Minds programme aims to improve school-readiness of rural kindergarten children, by training parents to provide practical, cost-free learning and developmental activities in the kindergarten and at home.

 

About US:

Our mission is to get preschool children in rural Africa to thrive.  At present, over 250 million children worldwide fail to receive the education and care they need in their early years which means they are less likely to do well in school, find gainful employment, and are at greater risk of early marriage, early parenthood and even criminality. Current approaches to solving this crisis are not proving effective or scalable in low- and middle-income countries.  That’s where Lively Minds comes in. We have developed an award-winning Early Childhood Development programme that has been proven through randomised control trials to improve cognitive and socio-emotional skills and reduce malnutrition for pre-schoolers in hard-to-reach communities, so they have a greater chance of succeeding in school and in life. The programme provides marginalised Mothers with a parenting course that empowers them to run educational Play Schemes for pre-schoolers and to provide better home-based care, using cheap local resources. In addition, we started a radio programme for parents during COVID and this has now become a permanent fixture.  The programme is delivered through government partners, is cheap and highly scalable. It genuinely has the potential to play a transformative role in ending the global ECD crisis.

 

We are extremely proud that the Government of Ghana have now adopted the programme and we have a ground-breaking partnership with them to support them to institutionalise it, fund it and scale it to 60 education districts, reaching over 4000 communities and 1 million children. In addition, an award-winning international research team are conducting a further randomised control trial to help us understand its impacts at scale.

 

In Uganda Lively Minds operates in Mayuge district. The Programme is implemented across all the 12 rural sub counties of Mayuge in partnership with the Mayuge District Local Government. It is referred to as the Mayuge District Lively Minds Programme. The programme reaches to 408 villages and 0ver 48,000 children.

 

We’re a lively ambitious organisation, determined to have a major positive impact on the world. We work hard at a fast pace, in a challenging environment. We expect everyone to give their best to achieve the best possible results. Our work is demanding but provides plenty of opportunity for innovation, responsibility, growth, collaboration, creativity and fun. We want all staff to be happy and fulfilled and to feel appreciated and valued in their work. To find out more about our programme, look at the videos about our programme https://www.livelyminds.org/videos

 

Job Summary:  The District Liaise Officers are part of a busy District Implementation team, responsible for embedding and sustaining the programme. Each District Liaise Officer is responsible for providing training, technical support and capacity building to the sub counties.

 

The District Liaise Officer has a high level of responsibility within each subcounty. He/she manages the programmes’ relationship with several different District stakeholders and represents Lively Minds. The officer will work closely with Mayuge District local government and  Sub county stakeholders to help problem-solve any issues and risks, including quality and compliance issues such as absence and lateness.

The Officer will also produce reports as well as analyse financial reports submitted by the sub counties. The Liaise Officer will work directly with the Lively Minds Coordinators- subcounty staff members, to support them to quickly resolve issues and escalate to the subcounty chief  and Programme Manager where necessary.

 

Key Duties and Responsibilities:

Responsible for the success of the “embed” phase

• Develop comprehensive monthly coaching plans for subcounty team members that are tailored to individual and team needs, aligning them with programme objectives and standards.
• Foster a culture of continous learning and development within subcounty teams and Support capacity building through training, coaching and mentoring others.
• Oversee the adherence of Subcounty teams to activity standards ,identify and report on activity compliance by the Subcounty, identifying issues,  proactively engage in problem-solving and escalating those that need to be escalated to the Programme Manager.
• Support Sub counties to meet quarterly strategies and and provide weekly updates and to supervisors on progress and challenges.
• Build Subcounty capacity and ownership during ongoing activities through training and field/online/mobile coaching/mentorship sessions.
• Supervise the quality of ongoing activities delivered by,subcounty including monthly meetings, “Top-up” workshops, Parenting workshops, target period meetings, monitoring, termly reporting, radio programme etc.
• Provide in person and phone coaching at the start and end of every on ongoing activity to ensure that all activites meet required standards and clickmedics reports submitted as required by subcounty team member.
• Review and validate clickmedix reports submitted by subcounty, Colloborate with subcounty teams to identifying challenges, solutions and coaching needs for  subcounty members to solve challenges with programme delivery and reporting.
• Complete clickmedix reports for all ongoing activities and share activity reports with time and date stamped pictorial evidence. Ensure accurate detailed documentation of project activities.
• Supervise the disbursement of funds by subcounty teams and ensure compliance to Lively Minds policies, analysing data and financial reports/accountability, identifying risks, problem-solving, take proactive measures to address them and escalate to higher authorities where appropriate.
• Submit to finance office timely accountabilities of funds advanced to you and those advanced to the sub-
• Share lessons learned with wider stakeholders and contribute to continuous improvement programmes for areas such as Subcounty support packages.

Quality assurance, reporting and compliance

• Monitor ongoing quality of Play Schemes, Parenting Workshops and Radio Programme, identifying risks and bright spots and proactively problem-solving.
• Provide timely and accurate reports of Play Schemes, Parenting Workshops and Radio Programme quality.
• Assess budget requests and analyse financial expenditures for the sub counties.
• Provide weekly written reports about the activities delivered or supervised during the week.
• Support LMCs to develop termly Sub county development plans and ensure timely reviews of the plans are done and reported.
• Develop coaching plans for subcounty teams, conduct coaching for the teams and submit coaching reports on click medix and written coaching reports to the Programme Manager.
• Conduct debreifs with the sub county teams at the end of every monthly meeting and Top Up attended and also at every Parenting workshop and Play scheme supervised.
• Conduct monthly review of LMC termly packs and Parish Leader Packs to ensure they are up to date.
• Document and submit to the Programme Manager at least 4 significant change stories from VHTs, SC teams, children and mothers every month.
• You may be assigned any other responsibility in agreement with your line manager, in contribution to Lively Minds’ work and in recognition of your experience and skills. It is therefore expected for staff to be flexible and willing to contribute to the work of the wider team.

Qualifications, Skills and Experience:

Essential experience and skills

• Minimum qualification: Degree in early childhood or a relevant subject eg Education, Social Sciences, Community Health etc.
• 3- 5 years of relevant work experience.
• Good financial acumen with monitoring and reporting on finances/budgets.
• Ability to coach and deliver training to government officials and others.
• Understanding of Monitoring and Evaluation practices with strong data analysis abilities.
• Analytical with strong problem-solving abilities and the ability to make decisions in a timely and robust manner.
• Excellent planning and organisational skills.
• Very good communication, negotiation and influencing skills with good basic report writing skills.
• Comfortable with frequent travel and overnight stays.
• Technically literate – Good understanding of MS Word, PowerPoint and Excel. Able to adapt to and learn new tech systems easily.
• Fluency in Lusoga is essential – both speaking, reading and writing.

 

Desirable experience and skills

• Experience working with local government and community stakeholders especially Village Health Teams.
• Experience working for an NGO.

 

To succeed in this role, you must be:

• Proactive, energetic and highly motivated.
• Analytical with a keen eye for detail.
• Confident in training, coaching and motivating others to solve problems.
• Able to manage a diverse group of stakeholders, including senior government stakeholders such as Subcounty Chiefs.
• Able to monitor and analyse budgets.
• Technically proficient and able to learn to use new tools quickly.

 

You will be expected to perform against the Lively Minds’ Competencies.

 

How to Apply:

 

If this sounds like you, please send your completed application form to  jobs@livelyminds.org  by 11:59 pm EAT on 17th September 2023.

 

Note:

• Lively Minds operates a strict Child & Vulnerable Adult Protection Policy, and we, therefore, check the suitability of successful candidates through background checks consisting of references and police checks.
• Lively Minds is fully committed to equity, diversity, and inclusion. We want this to be reflected in the diversity of the people who work for us, and we welcome applications from people from all backgrounds and identities.
• Applications submitted after the deadline will not be considered. Also, CVs and cover letters will not be considered unless stated as a requirement.
• Due to resource constraints, we apologise, but we will only respond to shortlisted candidates.

 

Deadline: 17^th September 2023 by 11:59pm EAT

 

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