Monitoring & Evaluation Officer – UYA Project at Plan International

Position: Monitoring & Evaluation Officer – UYA Project

Plan International is a leading girls and children’s rights organization. Plan strives for a just world that advances children’s rights and equality for girls. We motivate our people and partners to:

• empower children, young people and communities to make vital changes that tackle the root causes of discrimination against girls, exclusion and vulnerability
• drive change in practice and policy at local, national and global levels through our reach, experience and knowledge of the realities children face
• work with children and communities to prepare for and respond to crises, and to overcome adversity
• support the safe and successful progression of children from birth to adulthood

Plan operates in 77 countries around the world. It brings its support to millions of children, their families and communities, mainly in Africa, Asia, Middle East, and South America. It implements projects in the Health, Water and Sanitation, Education, Child Protection, Sustainable Livelihood, and cross-cultural communication. Child sponsorship forms the basis of our work with children. Worth to mention, Plan International global ambition is to support 100 million girls learn, lead, decide and thrive!

 

As part of its commitment to support Plan International Federation reach 100 million girls so to Learn, Lead, Decide and Thrive, Plan International Liberia has developed a Country Strategy for the next five years (2019 to 2024) with specific focus on reaching 600,000 marginalized girls and children all over the country, with a strong commitment to work with partners at various levels to put an end to violence against girls and young women including Child Early Forced Marriage and Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) and other norms and practices that hinder their development and empowerment.

 

Plan International Liberia is committed to ensuring that Child Protection and Youth Safeguarding, Gender Transformative programming and Influencing are key and an integral part of all its work in the country. ‘

ROLE PURPOSE

Plan International is a rights based and girls focused organization that strive for a just world that advances children’s rights and equality for girls. We motivate our people and partners to: empower children, young people and communities to make vital changes that tackle the root causes of discrimination against girls, exclusion and vulnerability; drive change in practice and policy at local, national and global levels through our reach, experience and knowledge of the realities children especially girls face.

 

Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC), in partnership with Plan International (Plan) and Resonance Global (Resonance) form a uniquely qualified, complementary partnership to implement USAID’s Positive, Educated, Employed, and Resilient Youth Activity (PEER).  The goal of project is to increase the economic self-reliance and resiliency of Liberian youth in targeted areas. Five principles will guide our program: systems strengthening; private sector engagement; positive youth development; innovation; and inclusion. PEER will provide over 21,000 young people with the skills, experience, support and relationships to productively engage with their local economies. In the timeframe of the project, PEER will assist nearly 8,000 youth to transition to employment or start an enterprise. In order to reach scale and sustainability, the project will engage youth through all system’s actors, including market actors (employers and financial service providers), youth serving local organizations; and education actors (formal TVET, universities and community colleges). The project will build the capacity and bolster the resilience of local youth-serving organizations and youth themselves to adapt to diverse challenges and create flexible yet holistic approaches to ensuring a future. Plan International will provide Leadership for VSLA activities; technical assistance for gender and social inclusion strategies; training for Youth Health Volunteers and support for strategies to link youth to health services.

 

The M&E Officer under the technical supervision of the MERL Manager will lead all monitoring and evaluation functions of the project in his/her assigned location. This will include leading on in all data collections, analysis, and learning activities to help ensure accountability and efficiency. S/he will provide technical field support to project staff, partners and other beneficiaries as its relates to the project tracking. M&E Officer will work closely with Program teams to assess field conditions, support capacity building initiatives, and facilitate the collection of quality data under the supervision of the MERL Manager. S/he may be assigned to focus on supporting one or more specific projects activities as BE assigned by the MErl Manager.

Dimensions of the Role

S/he will work closely with the project and team, the M&E Officer will support the reviewing and preparing of monthly, quarterly and final narrative and financial donors’ reports.

Additionally, s/he will replace or work with other members of the team, as need be, in supporting the general works of the MERL at Plan International Liberia writing and set up, follow up of program indicators, implementation of processes, data collection and reporting in line with the MERL System, approach and practices as agreed with the donor and the project MERL Framework. The M&E Officer will implement these specific roles and responsibilities:

 

• Support all MERL initiatives for assigned grant(s)/project(s) including monitoring data quality, tracking the progress of activities, and contributing to staff capacity building initiatives as necessary.
• Support MERL Manager creating a framework and procedures for the monitoring and evaluation of project activities.
• Support the MERL Manager in defining and implementing the key project performance
• indicators (KPI) as well as monitoring them throughout the duration of the projects.
• Assist in proposing strategies to increase data use and demand amongst project staff and partners.
• Assist project staff, partners and donor in clarifying project information and all M&E data
• Ensure the effective implementation of instruments and mechanisms for monitoring and evaluation of the
• Support project team on ways to properly document, organize and capture
• Project progress.
• Draft tools and their revisions as well as data collection procedures under the supervision of the MERL Manager (eg. logical framework, project performance tracking, indicators, data flow chart, etc.
• Suggest ways to facilitate data collection and the flow of data amongst project team.
• Perform regular field visits to ensure the quality of data collected by Programs and to verify the accuracy of reported data.
• Support the MERL Manager to ensure that donor, partner, and Senior Management data
• queries are addressed in an accurate and timely manner.
• Support in the implementation of quarterly data quality assessment
• Perform all other functions relating to Plan International as may be assigned by the supervisor.

Accountabilities

The M&E Officer is the first line staff who can be trusted to produce quality monitoring and evaluation information relating to the project specific and other roles and responsibilities that maybe assign. It is expected that the staff will execute these functions by relating to others in the team, supervisors, senior management and donors. It is expected that the M&E Officer will exercise maximum trust and honesty in conducting the affairs of this project and other others assign. H/she will also represent Plan International.

General Responsibilities

• Developing monitoring and evaluation plan for the project;
• Developing a Monitoring and Evaluation plan for county activities
• Monitoring and Evaluation of financial and programmatic goals outlined in the proposal;

Development of monitoring and evaluation plan

• Ensure the effective implementation of instruments and mechanisms for monitoring and evaluation of the project;
• Ensure work plans, implementation and monitoring plans are agreed with the MERL Manager;
• Ensure the technical preparation of project monitoring activities

Development of a Monitoring and Evaluation Plan for county activities

• Advise the project team in regard to the good performance of data, quality control of data and reports;
• Train project staff in the usage of MERL tools for tracking, and establish mechanisms for monitoring/evaluation and use of the monitoring system;
• Coordinate management procedures and monitoring training and other project activities;

Dealing with Problems

• Execution of alternatives based on the Risk Management Grant Plan;
• Collect information on specific actions Management Plan to overcome the emergency.

• Ensures that Plan International’s global policies for Safeguarding Children and Young People and Gender Equality and Inclusion are fully embedded in accordance with the principles and requirements of the policy including relevant Implementation Standards and Guidelines as applicable to their area of responsibility. This includes, but is not limited to, ensuring staff and associates are aware of and understand their responsibilities under these policies and Plan International’s Code of Conduct (CoC), their relevance to their area of work, and that concerns are reported and managed in accordance with the appropriate procedures.

 

Key relationships

Internal	Level of Contact
Country Management Team	High
MERL System	High
External	Level of contact
Children	Medium
Partners, donors and government agencies	High
Consulting Firms	Medium

 

Technical expertise, skills and knowledge

• Good level of proficiency in Windows Excel and quantitative analysis
• Ability to design M&E tools, surveys, and evaluations
• Demonstrated ability to train and build capacity of others
• Strong interpersonal skills
• Fluent in oral and written English
• Experience in a non-governmental organization or in the United Nations (desirable).

 

Essential

• University degree in Social Sciences, Health, or related field;
• Minimum [3] years of experience in monitoring and evaluation

 

Knowledge

• Knowledge of M&E system, approach and practices including indicator tracking
• Participated in designing and implementation of studies
• Proven experience working with partners.

 

Skills

• Initiative and forecasting;
• Ability to work in team and ensure proper supervision;
• Capacity planning and organization;
• Capacity for analysis, presenting information

 

Attitude/Behaviours

• Ability to resolve conflicts;
• Be flexible and adaptable to changing including changing of assignments and duty station
• Empathy with gender and sexual diversity;
• Interest and commitment to working with children;
• No discrimination.

 

Plan International’s Values in Practice

We are open and accountable

• Promotes a culture of openness and transparency, including with sponsors and donors.
• Holds self and others accountable to achieve the highest standards of integrity.
• Consistent and fair in the treatment of people.
• Open about mistakes and keen to learn from them.
• Accountable for ensuring we are a safe organisation for all children, girls & young people

We strive for lasting impact

• Articulates a clear purpose for staff and sets high expectations.
• Creates a climate of continuous improvement, open to challenge and new ideas.
• Focuses resources to drive change and maximise long-term impact, responsive to changed priorities or crises.
• Evidence-based and evaluates effectiveness.

We work well together

• Seeks constructive outcomes, listens to others, willing to compromise when appropriate.
• Builds constructive relationships across Plan International to support our shared goals.
• Develops trusting and ‘win-win’ relationships with funders, partners and communities.
• Engages and works well with others outside the organization to build a better world for girls and all children

 We are inclusive and empowering

•       We empower our staff to give their best and develop their potential
• We respect all people, appreciate differences and challenge equality in our programs and our workplace
• We support children, girls and young people to increase their confidence and to change their own lives.

 

Physical Environment

Post holder will be based in the field office with frequent visit to the project’s communities.

 

Travel requirements:

The position entails 60% travelling to the communities to support effective data collection.

 

Location:                 Country Office, Monrovia

Grade:                      C1

Department:            Program Department

Reports to:              MER&L Manager 

Closing Date:          15 August 2022

 

Early application is encouraged as we will review applications throughout the advertising period and reserve the right to close the advert early. A range of pre-employment checks will be undertaken in conformity with Plan International’s Safeguarding Children and Young People policy. Plan follows an equal opportunity policy and actively encourages diversity welcoming applications from all especially women and people living with disability. As an international child centred community development organisation, Plan International is fully committed to promoting the realisation of children’s rights including their right to protection from violence and abuse. That means we have particular responsibilities to children that we come into contact with.

 

Plan International believes that in a world where children face so many threats of harm, it is our duty to ensure that we, as an organisation, do everything we can to keep children safe. We must not contribute in any way to harming or placing children at risk. Equality, diversity and inclusion is at the very heart of everything that Plan International stands for. Our organisation is based on a culture of inclusivity and we strive to create a workplace environment that ensures every team, in every office, in every country, is rich in diverse people, thoughts, and ideas. We will provide equality of opportunity and will not tolerate discrimination on any grounds. We foster an organisational culture that embraces and exemplifies our commitment to gender equality, girls’ rights and inclusion while supporting staff to adopt good practice, positive attitudes and principles of gender equality and inclusion.