The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), a highly prestigious, reputable & world’s largest humanitarian organization, operating in more than 120 countries and territories, bringing life-saving assistance in emergencies, building pathways to peace, stability and prosperity for people recovering from conflict, disasters and the impact of climate change and supporting sustainable and resilient livelihoods for a world with zero hunger.
At WFP, people are at the heart of everything we do and the vision of the future WFP workforce is one of diverse, committed, skilled, and high performing teams, selected on merit, operating in a healthy and inclusive work environment, living WFP's values (Integrity, Collaboration, Commitment, Humanity, and Inclusion) and working with partners to save and change the lives of those WFP serves.
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WHY JOIN US?
- WFP is a 2020 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate
- WFP offers a highly inclusive, diverse and multicultural working environment
- WFP invests in the personal & professional development of its employees through a range of trainings, accreditation, coaching, mentorship and other programs as well as through internal mobility opportunities
- A career path in WFP provides an exciting opportunity to work across various country, regional and global offices around the world, and with passionate colleagues who work tirelessly to ensure that effective humanitarian assistance reaches millions of people across the globe
- We offer an attractive compensation package (please refer to the Terms and Conditions section)
ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT
The WFP South Sudan Country Office manages one of the largest and most complex operations globally, covering a wide programmatic portfolio ranging from relief food and cash transfers and the treatment and prevention of malnutrition, to school based programmes, social protection, resilience and smallholder market support, and capacity strengthening for national and local authorities and civil society. In January 2023, the South Sudan Country Office launched a new Country Strategic Plan for 2023 – 2035 aimed at assisting 7 million people with the objectives of saving lives through humanitarian responses and scaling up investments to enhance community resilience to conflict and climate related shocks. The strategy is in line with the humanitarian, development, peace nexus approach, with an overarching focus of contributing to local peace initiatives and “leaving no one behind”. Additionally, WFP facilitates access for all other humanitarian agencies through its humanitarian air services and logistics support capacity.
The Head of Programme function plays a critical role as part of the Senior Management Team, overseeing the design and implementation of a range of programme activities, managing a diverse team of approximately 200 employees across a range of technical functions, and supporting 15 field offices across the country. Applicants are expected to have a background in programme and policy, with extensive experience in operations of high visibility and complexity, under volatile security situations and/or politically sensitive environments with rapidly changing needs and high risks.
- Lead the design and implementation of the WFP Programme portfolio to respond to acute and chronic food and nutrition needs of South Sudan as determined by sector-wide needs assessments such as Humanitarian Needs Overview (HNO) and the Integrated Phase Classification for Food Security (IPC).
- Formulate WFP programmes in South Sudan in line with both organisational strategy and the practical realities of operating in the field, ensuring alignment between HQ and field operations enabling effective delivering of food assistance.
- Provide advice and support to the various technical units for the implementation of project activities in the field, and guide teams during problem-solving and decision-making.
- Provide solid technical and managerial leadership on a broad range of strategically important and complex policy and programme issues (including assessment and analysis, the choice of objectives, activities, transfer modalities and appropriate food products, the deployment and testing of innovative approaches and the development of strategies) to support government efforts to reduce hunger and malnutrition.
- Assist senior stakeholders of governments and other partners in identifying where food assistance can be usefully employed and provide support and technical expertise for the planning, formulation and implementation of food assistance programmes to strengthen government and community ownership and effectiveness of food security and nutrition programmes at global, national and sub-national levels.
- Identify, develop and nurture strategic and operational partnerships to identify opportunities for collaborative approaches and initiatives that improve assistance packages and support advocacy work.
- Enhance WFP's leadership status in different forums on subjects related to food security, nutrition, livelihoods, resilience, engagement in humanitarian, transition and development contexts and other related issues, through direct participation and/or through briefings, information products and other materials.
- Monitor and oversee operational research and evidence building on issues relevant to food assistance and to advocacy for WFP and to strengthen policy and programme formulation.
- Monitor and oversee preparation and dissemination of timely analytical and critical reports, publications, and a variety of information products or proposals for internal or external use to present a consistent picture to internal and external stakeholders and enable informed decision-making.
- Advocate for resources for a broad portfolio of WFP projects, including clearly articulating the need for food assistance and related programme opportunities, and follow up on the resource situation of projects including commodity and cash availability.
- Advice and support the development of functional training in areas of expertise to enhance the capacity of WFP staff and partner to design and deliver effective food assistance programmes.
- Lead, motivate and develop a large and complex team of professionals to enable high performance.
- Ensure the best use of assigned financial resources for achievement of set objectives.
- Other as required.
Education:
You have:
- Advanced university degree in International Affairs, Economics, Nutrition/Health, Agriculture, Environmental Science, Social Sciences, or other fields relevant to international development assistance, or first university degree with additional years of related work experience and/or training/courses.
Experience:
You have:
- Minimum 11 years of experience in strategic managerial roles;
- Experience in leading Programmes in a country/region;
- Experience leading multidisciplinary teams;
- Experience designing and managing operations;
- Experience shaping country-level operational strategies/partnerships.
Language:
You have:
- Fluency (level C) in the English language.
- Intermediate knowledge (level B) of a second official UN language: Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian, Spanish, and/or WFP’s working language, Portuguese.
You have broad knowledge in:
- Programme lifecycle and food assistance
- Operating various transfer modalities
- Knowledge of specialized areas (i.e. Nutrition, VAM, etc)
- Emergency Programming, Strategic Policy Engagement w/ Government.
