About Porticus 
Porticus is a philanthropic organization that aims to create a just and sustainable future where human dignity flourishes. Our work aims to strengthen the resilience of communities so that all people have ownership over their future and natural resources are used in a sustainable way. Our work is realized through strong networks of partners including local and global NGOs, communities, people with lived experience, policy makers and co-funders. With colleagues based in 14 offices around the world, we want to provide solutions to today’s social and environmental problems that benefit generations to come in four areas: the natural environment, society, education and faith.

Role Description

Porticus is seeking a Senior Programme Manager to support and monitor the development and management of strategic programmes within the Building Future Generations Sector (BFG). Specific priority will lie under the Children in Displacement Challenge, building off previous BFG Portfolios, including an Education in Displacement Portfolio.

Regional and international travel will be required for this position (up to 30% of the working time).

Building Future Generations Sector Strategy 

Vision: A world where whole child development is a force for inclusion for children in
extreme adversity, enabling them to develop to their full potential and succeed in life.

Social Change Goal: Children in extreme adversity build resilience and socio-emotional skills as a key enabler for them to learn and develop to their full potential.

Porticus is fully committed to supporting the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 4 – ‘Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all’ – by 2030. Our contribution to this has focused on supporting systems to integrate the principle and vision of Whole Child Development.

We see resilience/ socio-emotional learning (SEL)/psycho-social support (PSS) as a critical building block, especially for children in extreme adversity who are often dealing with trauma and toxic stress, to enable engagement in meaningful learning and unlock opportunities for children to engage in the full breadth of education to fulfil their potential. We want to focus on efforts that will support the integration of resilience/SEL/PSS to be prioritized, assessed and delivered within systems. This focus will cut across our two new challenges: Children on the Margins and Children in Displacement over the next 4 to 5-years.

In this role specific priority will lie under the Children in Displacement challenge.

Children in Displacement Challenge

The extreme adversity associated with displacement often causes lifelong, cumulative and intergenerational negative outcomes for children, their families and society. SEL helps all children prepare for life in the 21st Century, but for children who are displaced it also has a critical role in their psycho-social recovery and wellbeing. Porticus’s Children in Displacement Challenge’s ambition is to see system actors integrate strong evidence-base on SEL into policies and classrooms to support academic learning and child development.

Porticus Africa – Children in Displacement Challenge

Porticus has been working in Africa for over four decades. From its base in Nairobi, Porticus’ main efforts focus on Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Zimbabwe and South Africa. Our Building Future Generations Sector programming covers Kenya and Uganda.

Kenya is one of our target countries in the Global South where we aim to deliver compelling examples of systems integration at scale to inspire others. Kakuma refugee camp has been a focus for Porticus work on displacement since 2017. Our investments have produced flagship models for both SEL enabled accelerated learning and disability inclusion. Now, the Kenyan government are developing a “Shirika Plan” as a comprehensive and sustainable approach to address the refugee situation in Kenya and integrating refugee learner in the national education system. We see this as an opportunity to elevate and scale our existing work.

As part of the Children in Displacement Challenge Team, key responsibilities include: 

1.    Leadership 
•    Contribute to thought leadership, on issues related to education and child development, specifically children who are displaced in the region and globally to influence and push the field towards higher impact and systemic change. 
•    Work closely with other regional Programme Managers in the Africa region and in the Children in Displacement Challenge team to implement well-coordinated global programmes, promote innovative and equitable grant-making practices and encourage learning.

2.    Exploration in Africa 
•    Identify opportunities for strategy-aligned projects and programmes and manage regional exploration grants in Africa and where possible contribute to aligned sectors with clear attention to the learning cycle within which these ideas are developing. 
•    Contribute to interregional engagement and collaboration by actively supporting Porticus as a Learning organization, by sharing knowledge, experiences across the matrix and sectors. 

3.    Contextualisation 
•    In collaboration with the Porticus Africa Regional Director, enable sense making when it comes to strategic decisions related to a challenge, programme challenge-related work or the sector. 
•    Internally and externally represent the region, demonstrating knowledge of the region and context within which we work and identify possibilities for sectoral/cross thematic work, in shaping discourse within the ecosystem. 
•    Continuously analyse and monitor developments in the field to identify emerging trends, needs, gaps and opportunities in the region and/or challenge related topics. 

4.    Programme Design and implementation under the Children in Displacement Challenge
•    Lead on the management and implementation of the Kenya programmatic work in collaboration and consultation with equivalent post holders in other regions and with the Challenge Lead. 
•    Contribute to increased evidence and learning about what-works in practice in raising the quality and effectiveness of our work by supporting programmatic research and analysis, programmatic evaluations and share results and learnings internally and externally.
•    Identify opportunities for innovative, data driven, contextualised programmatic strategies that contribute to field building, (pushing the thematic discourse further), nurturing networks (outside of grants, with funders, thought leaders, practitioners and other system stakeholders), creating platforms and drawing in lessons and learnings (beyond reporting). 
•    Identify and develop partnerships and programmes that aim for systemic and lasting changes in alignment with challenge strategies and lead the implementation of these programmes, including but not limited to: 
o    Applying meaningful participation approach to the extent possible in all stages of the programme grant making from co-developing applications with partners to accompanying the implementing and closing.
o    Convening programme partners and other key stakeholders.
o    Applying sophisticated safeguarding and GESI lenses to programme development and management.

5.    Storytelling 
•    Contribute to the knowledge base of Porticus by regularly sharing insights and knowledge coming out of the programmatic work internally and externally. 
•    Engage in relevant fora and champion the work of partners.
•    Provide inputs to meetings with the BFG Investment Committee as required. 
•    Prepare communication material in collaboration with communication colleagues. 

6.    Building and Maintaining Relationships 
•    Develop, strengthen and maintain strategic partnerships, in close cooperation with the Porticus Africa Regional Director and Challenge Lead. 
•    Build and manage trust-based strategic partnerships and engage in strategic dialogue on emerging and critical issues with diverse networks in Africa and globally. 
•    Understands the role and value of partners as contributing to the overall strategic intent. 
•    As part of the Challenge team, contribute through regular meetings, to the organisation’s annual reflection learning cycles with input, discussion and apply learning for course-correction and future programming.
•    Contribute and integrate non-financial contribution to partners such as capacity building on fundraising and identifying co-funders in grant management.
 

Experience 
The successful candidate should possess many of the following professional and personal abilities, attributes, and experiences:
1.    Minimum of a Master’s degree in a relevant discipline.
2.    At least 10 years of programme professional experience within philanthropy or international development sectors at the international or regional level.  
3.    Strong and relevant networks and contacts within the education sector in Africa with an emphasis on Kenya and Uganda. 
4.    Experience of and commitment to, working with and through partners and contributing to partnership strategies.
5.    A broad background with comprehensive understanding of programme design, development and implementation as well as systems change, networking and community change.
6.    Experience with strategy, monitoring, evaluation and learning (SMEL) and working with other technical advisors and research teams to establish effective monitoring systems in relation to programme activities.

Competencies and Skills 
1.    Commitment to living the Porticus’ culture and to transparency and open exchange, generating trust among colleagues and reinforcing Porticus culture and values (modesty, empathy, endurance and trust) in external engagements.
2.    Commitment to addressing power dynamics in philanthropic partnerships. 
3.    Strong in building and maintaining networks. 
4.    Adaptability to changing contexts. 
5.    Strong analytical and project management skills, able to break down and solve complex problems and present these to internal and external stakeholders. 
6.    Ability to accurately assess situations and find appropriate solutions to generate impact. 
7.    Ability to multi-task and set priorities and be an effective collaborator in a complex internal and external environment, including the ability to work with efficiency and tact in a matrixed environment.
8.    Strong skills with Microsoft Office applications, including a proven track record to convey information using supporting tables, graphs, and other visual representations; Experience in the use of database and analytics solutions such as Salesforce and Power BI is an added advantage.
9.    Ability to work and interact with people from diverse, professional, social and cultural backgrounds.
10.    Demonstrated excellent professional communication skills and fluency in written and oral English.

• We will screen all applications on an ongoing basis.
• Applications without a cover letter will not be taken into consideration.
• We reserve the right to unpublish the vacancy
• An (online) assessment may be part of the recruitment process.
• Reference checks are part of the final hiring procedure.

Equal Opportunity And Anti-Discrimination

Porticus does not discriminate against anyone. We expect every stakeholder to show respect for all people. We stand for equal opportunities and are committed to recruiting and retaining a diverse team in an equitable and inclusive environment. We strongly encourage applications from people with lived experience, as well as from candidates coming from any minority or underrepresented groups.

Safeguarding

Porticus recognizes a fundamental duty of care towards all children and other vulnerable Individuals with whom we engage. We uphold to protect children and other vulnerable individuals from abuse, neglect and exploitation and we require the same of all our internal and external stakeholders.