National Project Officer - NOA (DC)

Introduction

1. ‎BACKGROUND
The project “Egypt Youth Employment (EYE): Jobs and Private Sector Development in ‎Rural Egypt (RAWABET)” is an International Labour Organization (ILO) project that is ‎funded by the Royal Government of Norway. The project comes within the overarching ‎framework of the “Egypt Youth Employment” programme, which works to promote and ‎facilitate tripartite partnerships towards supporting and scaling up of successful initiatives ‎to generate decent employment opportunities for youth in Egypt.‎

The EYE RAWABET project aims to contribute to economic development in rural Egypt by ‎promoting decent employment within large enterprises as well as in micro, small and ‎medium enterprises (MSMEs) along sectors and value chains of highest employability and ‎growth potentials. The project is implemented by the ILO Cairo Office, in partnership with ‎the Ministry of Investment and International Cooperation (MoIC), and in collaboration with ‎the Federation of Egyptian Industries (FEI), the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises ‎Development Agency (MSMEDA).‎

The project works to capitalize on the ILO’s expertise and long-standing experience in the ‎promotion of decent employment in the rural economy, and to build on and scale-up past ‎and ongoing rural-focused initiatives implemented in Egypt.‎

Towards realizing its objectives, the project devised a two-pronged strategy combining: 1) ‎direct technical support with 2) institutional capacity development. Direct technical support ‎takes place through carefully designed value-chain and MSMEs development ‎interventions. Institutional capacity and skills development, on the other hand, is being ‎delivered through capacity building activities based on ILO’s enterprise development and ‎entrepreneurship as well as other relevant training tools. In many ways, the institutional ‎and skills development activities are meant to enable and reinforce the value-chain and ‎MSMEs interventions.‎

Project Outcomes:‎

Outcome 1: Strengthened capacity of stakeholders to make informed decisions about ‎addressing opportunities and challenges for the promotion of decent jobs in specific ‎economic sub-sectors in rural Egypt.‎
Outcome 2: Decent work opportunities promoted along selected (sub) sector/value-‎chains in rural Egypt.‎
Outcome 3: Emerging MSMEs/small-scale producers supported/scaled up in rural ‎Egypt to contribute to local economic development (LED) and to promote decent ‎employment opportunities

‎2. REPORTING LINE:‎
The incumbent will perform her/ his duties under the overall guidance of the Director of DWT/CO-‎Cairo and the direct supervision of the project’s Chief Technical Advisor, while closely ‎coordinating with the project Project Programme Officers.  

Description of Duties

3. DESCRIPTION OF DUTIES:‎
The National Project Officer is expected to take over several roles that will support ‎the effective and timely implementation of the project’s activities, maintaining close ‎monitoring of the actual progress against what has been planned for, while ‎ensuring the proper allocation of resources, incorporate updates and amendments ‎to the project’s implementation plan, as necessary. The National Project Officer will ‎oversee the tasks performed by the administrative and financial staff, providing ‎support and guidance, as required.

‎4.‎ ROLE AND RESPONSIBILITIES:‎
Planning and management roles:‎
• Contributes to the development of the project’s implementation plan, and ‎accordingly, closely monitors the timely delivery of activities as planned, makes ‎updates to the plan as necessary.
• Maintains supervisory roles in relation to the tasks carried out by the project’s ‎administrative and finance staff, as required.
• Oversees and follows up with designated administrative and finance staff on the ‎rolling out of project’s training activities and the effective implementation of ‎capacity building interventions using relevant ILO tools.‎
• Attends to requests by the project and ILO Office staff, prepares correspondence ‎to address and answer queries pertaining to the project’s key administrative and ‎financial matters.

Procurement role:
• Contributes and support to the project’s procurement portfolio and contractual ‎arrangements of the project’s consultants, service providers and implementing ‎partners, including the management of the evaluation and reviewal process of ‎proposed contracts along the different stages and modalities of appraisal as ‎necessary, including at the regional or HQ levels, in addition to the identification ‎and selection of contractors, supervising and following up with administrative ‎and finance assistants on that matters.

Follow up and monitoring role:‎
• Maintains close follow-up with the project’s contractors, to ensure the timely ‎submission of deliverables as planned, in coordination with the monitoring and ‎evaluation officer, and with the support of the project’s administrative and ‎financial staff.

Budgetary and financial role:
• Supports the effective and efficient allocation of the project resources, prepares ‎budget estimates, processes budget revision, maintains the project’s ‎procurement plan and forecasts, and accordingly, monitor expenditures and ‎commitments, and proposes corrective actions, as necessary, to ensure the ‎optimal rates of delivery in line with the project’s workplan.

Other roles:‎
• Supports and coordinates the undertakings of the project’s internal and external ‎auditing, prepares necessary documents and reports to be reviewed by auditors
• Proposes improvements to work methods and processes with a view to ensuring ‎optimum efficiency and effectiveness. Liaises closely with other administrative ‎areas to ensure effective and smooth service design and delivery, recommending ‎improvements on interrelated processes
• Undertakes missions to project’s sites in target communities, to follow up on the ‎implementation of planned activities
• Participates in conferences, workshops, and training activities, representing the ‎project, in the absence of the Chief Technical Advisor
• Performs other duties as assigned by the supervisor

Required qualifications

Education

A first university degree in social sciences, business administration, development ‎studies, or related fields.

Experience

At least two years of experience in the implementation of technical cooperation project, ‎preferably in the field of youth employment. Good knowledge on skills development ‎and entrepreneurship is a considerable asset.

Languages

Excellent written and oral command of English and good knowledge of Arabic.

Competencies

A) Core Competencies:‎
•    Integrity and Transparency: Demonstrates honesty and openness.
•    Sensitivity to Diversity: Values diverse viewpoints - Fully considers all views and ‎opinions, including those that differ from his or her own.
•    Orientation to Learning & Knowledge Sharing: Builds expertise – Seeks ‎opportunities to build the depth and breadth of own expertise and knowledge - ‎Shares knowledge – Shares important or relevant knowledge and information
•    Client Orientation: Ensures programme/project activities are client/constituent ‎focused – Ensures programmes are client focused and all activities oriented ‎towards meeting client needs; encourages team members to proactively ‎consider, discuss and explore client needs.
•    Communication: Ensures understanding - Checks for understanding; presents ‎messages in different ways when required to ensure understanding.‎
•    Orientation to Change: Recognizes opportunities for change – Recognizes ‎opportunities for change and improvement; identifies where change is needed; ‎takes calculated risks.

.     Ability to work in a multicultural environment and to demonstrate gender-sensitive and non-discriminatory behaviours and attitudes

B. Technical Competencies:‎
•    Ability to draft quality reports.
•    Excellent analytical skills and knowledge of analytical tools, both quantitative ‎and qualitative.‎
•    Excellent knowledge of programming and budget development.‎Ability to work independently, quickly, precisely, and take initiative and responsibility;
.    Ability to work under pressure and to meet the deadline;
.    Proficient in Microsoft Word, Power Point, Excel, web-browsers and database applications, and  
.    Ability to deal with people with tact and diplomacy
•    Good knowledge about the role and activities of the UN.