Senior Compliance, Risk and Grant Officer

ABOUT FIRST CONSULT

First Consult is a leading economic development consulting firm implementing projects in Ethiopia. Founded in 2006, First Consult (FC) has grown to design and implement projects across the agriculture, manufacturing and service sectors. Our multidisciplinary teams combine a capacity to execute with clarity of the local context. We have delivered at-scale real impact in terms of jobs & wealth creation, business formation & growth, and investment attraction & mobilization.

ABOUT THE PROJECT/PROGRAM

First Consult (FC) is contracted to provide management and technical support services to MasterCard Foundation (MCF) under the BRIDGES programme to support the creation of close to 600,000 youth jobs (80% women) and 15,000 MSMEs, with 300,000 unemployed youth trained through supporting IP job creation initiative and market linkage between IPs and MSMEs. The BRIDGES Programme will address two fundamental, immediate and complementary challenges to unlock the potential for job creation within IPs and their surrounding ecosystem.

1. Making the industrial workforce markets work, which through the Enterprise Partners Programme, First Consult/DAI have successfully piloted in a few industrial parks and is now ripe for scale-up.
2. Making the IP business linkages (MSME) markets work to enhance domestic manufacturing value-added (MVA) for every given dollar of export. This will be done by substituting the currently- heavy import-dependent operations – itself a constraint on the factories – via local suppliers (MSMEs) in a number of ways.

The Government of Ethiopia recognizes the critical role played by Micro and Small Enterprises (MSEs) in creating job opportunities especially for young people and women, as well as for boosting national income and wealth that is important in igniting industrial transformation and private sector development. This is also well articulated in the Growth and Transformation Plan which prioritizes and identifies the development of micro and small businesses as catalyst for promoting industrial development.

POSITION SUMMARY

The Senior Compliance, Risk and Grant Officer will be responsible to ensure the overall compliance with all grants, federal, state, local and private, ensuring United Way is in compliance and meeting all deliverables, including monitoring of sub-recipients. This includes an understanding of all critical aspects of the grant cycle from pre-award to post-award; developing cost proposal packages for negotiations with subcontractors; cost negotiations with clients both as a prime contractor and as a subcontractor and any other submissions as required.

DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

• Responsible for compliance by various external partners of the company is properly adhered to as per the contract
• Oversee Financial, environmental, health and social risks related to partnering with private partners are identified, assessed, managed/mitigated and monitored accordingly.
• Supervise the compliance and grant team
• Oversee and supervise the due diligence and present a report to the leadership team.
• Identify risks such as environment and social, governance, and internal control and communicate with the leadership
• Lead the contract negotiation process and be the contact person for the company
• Lead the contract preparation process by consulting with the legal team (when needed)
• Oversee the procurement process of implementing partners and service providers
• Oversee in ensuring the documentation of internal memos and letters
• Oversee the intervention committee meetings
• Lead the concept note, intervention guides and other intervention documents review and approval
• Lead the cash forecast and budget utilization reporting process on an ongoing basis
• Update portfolio management documents and make analysis on a regular basis and present to the team
• Oversee payments for contract milestones
• Lead the vetting process and ensure the accuracy of the documentation.
• Oversee the update and review of the grant for each project are managed.
• Oversee to ensure funds management records are documented efficiently and accurately and confirm the information is always up to date.
• Lead partner monitoring in collaboration with the technical team and identify risks on the ground.
• Work in collaboration with a cross-cutting team to develop and implement the tool for assessing environmental and social risks.
• Develop compliance and risk manuals and procedures and update them as it is fit.
• Provide training on a continuous basis to the team on compliance, risk and grant management
• Oversee to ensure all hard and soft copy files are properly documented in the server.
• Perform any other duties as may be required by him/her immediate supervisor;

REPORTING

The Senior Compliance, Risk and Grant Officer reports to the Operation Lead and has a dotted line to the Team Lead.

•  Bachelor (BA) Degree (MA preferred) in Business, Finance, Project Management, Development Studies, or relevant Social Science from a recognized University/College
• Relevant experience of minimum 5 years for BA and 3 years for MA in Project Management in a donner funded project
• Good interpersonal skills and a good team player
• Strong command of English and Amharic
• Proven skills in proposal writing, project designing, and report writing
• Familiarity with major donor rules and regulations
• Excellent analytical and problem-solving capacities – ability to identify issues with contractual implications, ensure consistent donor reporting and support teams in providing appropriate analyses of activities.
• High adaptability – the ability to work with large range of actors including institutional donors and partners and to develop understanding of various contexts.
• High attention to detail in reviewing and inputting to reports, proposals and other documents.
• Advanced interpersonal skills and good pedagogy to support staffs in ensuring compliance with donor requirements
• Good proficiency in Microsoft Office – significant experience with Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.