Financial Inclusion and Business Development Service Advisor (FIBDS)

• Build business development capacity for young women and men with private sector partners who can grow and extend access to goods and services in the crop, livestock and ecotourism market systems.
•  Support and provide BDS to young women and men on business plan preparation, access to finance and market linkage to their products and services.
• Identify existing private sector partners who can engage and benefit from BDS services.
• Understand the BDS and investors available in the market, their products and services and terms and conditions to support young women and men’s self-employment initiatives.
• Link and support young women and men producers and service providers with government, private actors, and financial service providers for their needs related to the intervention.

Financial access services functions

• Identify and understand how the financial sector works, its players, products and services and the barriers young women and men in pastoral and agro-pastoral communities face in accessing financial services.
• Develop proposals and technically manage multiple partnerships with Financial Service Providers (FSP) to increase access to formal financial products and services for targeted young women and men of pastoral and agro-pastoral communities.
• Coordinate the market assessment of the financial sector and all the players and understand all the financial products and services available in the market at Woreda, zonal, regional and national level.
•  Coordinate the market assessment of the financial sector to understand the bio-physical/geographic, social, cultural, gender, age and physical barriers to accessing financial services.
•  Provide up-to-date information to the project team on financial products, services and support linkages between informal and formal financial services.
• Manage partnerships and work closely with financial service providers to ensure their profiles are kept up-to-date, and their services are running as per the agreement they have signed with HRF.

•  Make sure that the market systems development approach is well understood and rooted in the project team.
•  Identify relevant market actors for the products and services of targeted young women and men in the project intervention area.
•  Identify and facilitate partnerships with all actors for skill development, professional and technical services provision at national, regional, and zonal levels and woreda, including government institutions, private sector actors, etc.
• Identify and facilitate partnerships with all actors, including government representatives, industry parks, and private sector actors, on market linkage services at the regional and zonal levels.
• Facilitate government – service providers’ capacity support functions along with the project coordinator and the team
•  Manage partnerships and work closely with the Market and institutional linkage actors to ensure their profiles are kept up to date, and their services are running as per the agreement they have signed with HRF.

Finance and Operations Functions

• Closely work with finance staff in budget development, spending, and forecasting
• Support timely procurement plan preparation and procurement processes when needed.
•  Ensures contractual agreements with financial service providers, market actors, and professional and technical service providers are appropriately managed and documented.

• Adhere to HRF Advocacy, communication and learning systems and strengthen the effort to document the impact of YES project activities.
• Plan and manage the financial inclusion, market and institution linkage content, and participants for the project’s annual learning event.
•   Review and report financial inclusion data on a monthly basis to the Chief of programs.
• Closely work with the Head office – Senior MEAL officer to continuously monitor, ensure implementation quality and support an accountability system.
•  Monitor and advise all partners so that all documentation is appropriately approved, closed out and filed.
•  Regularly visits to Kebeles to support young women and men in managing access to services (access to finance, access to market and professional and technical support).
• Undertake joint initiatives adaptively to identify what works well (and what does not) and scale successful initiatives through the partners.
• Support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our program participants, community partners, and other stakeholders.
• Support field team in facilitating government monitoring and evaluation missions at the Zonal level.
•  Ensure that reporting requirements and deadlines are satisfactorily met.

Gender and Inclusion Mainstreaming Functions

• Make sure that gender, inclusion and safeguarding issues are integrated into all financial inclusion and business development service-related project activities, contract documents, and partnership functions.
•  Make sure that all activities related to the post is gender sensitive both in participation and content.
• Enhance partners’ awareness of the gender and safeguarding policies of HRF and strictly follow its implementation.

Team Development Functions

• Develop strong and professional relationships across the project team and partners.
• Provide professional support and training to the field team and Head office staff regarding business development, financial and market access and partners’ capacity-building functions.
• Promote a culture of teamwork among staff and all stakeholders.

•  Perform tasks assigned by the Chiefs of Programs

•  Advanced degree (MA/MSC/MBA) from a recognised University in Economics, Agricultural Economics, Accounting, Business Management and related disciplines

• At least 12 years of previous related experience in private business agencies, NGOs, and commercial finance, preferably from the bank and micro-finance industries

•  Experience in implementing donor-funded projects such as Mastercard, USAID, EU, and others.
•  Proven experience in organizational development- cooperatives and enterprise development
•  Practical experience in Business development services, financial inclusion, market linkage
• Strong critical thinking and creative problem-solving skills with the ability to make sound judgments.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills with ability to write reports.
• Strong presentation, facilitation, training, mentoring, and coaching skills
• Excellent relationship management skills with the ability to influence and get buy-in from people of partners and to work with individuals in diverse geographical and cultural settings.
• Able to work independently and act on own initiative.
• Good English and Amharic language skills