Our vision, our mission and our work are all defined by one goal – ending extreme poverty, whatever it takes. We believe that no-one should have to live in fear that they won't have a home to sleep in or enough food to feed their children. For over 50 years we have been working with the world's poorest people towards this goal.

Today we are a team of over 4,400 highly skilled and dedicated professionals from 50 countries who share an exceptional depth and diversity of experience. We want committed, values driven staff to join our HQ team and are currently looking for a Country Director, be part of our Surge Team in our Emergency Directorate.

Concern offers in-house management and leadership courses and tailored organisation-wide learning opportunities both in-person and online. We are committed to providing our staff with the skills needed to excel in their jobs. All employees are required to undertake training in equality, diversity and inclusion; the Code of Conduct; and safeguarding, along with any other training required for the role.

Our culture is values driven and friendly. A global engagement survey conducted in 2022, responded to by 3,577 of our staff, showed that 89% of our staff would happily recommend Concern as a great place to work and 94% are proud to tell people that they work for Concern.

Members of Concern’s Surge Team will be deployed to various Concern country programmes for varying time periods ranging from six weeks up to six months. When not deployed, team members will work from home.

Contract details:

• 8 weeks annual leave increasing to 10 weeks after completion of first full year and R+R where applicable
• Up to 3 weeks home-based work
• All Surge Team members must be available to travel overseas within 24 hours of being requested to deploy
• Unaccompanied position

The job: You will be responsible for the development and effective management and oversight of Concern Worldwide country programmes in line with Concern’s organisational and country specific strategies, policies and procedures. This could be in a new country of operation where emergency assessments will be part of the role, or in an established country programme. You will represent Concern to the government, donors, and other appropriate bodies – including clusters and the HCT, agencies and the media.

You will fill appropriate staffing gaps in non-emergency programmes and existing chronic emergencies. This may require deployments in a specialist advisory as well as managerial capacity, both CD roles and in roles that could report to CD level - Programme Director, Systems Director, Area Coordinator, Programme Coordinator etc.

If you join us, this is what you will be doing:

Emergency Response

• Lead in undertaking emergency assessments.
• Lead in the design, delivery and management and oversight of emergency response programmes.

Programmes

• Manage country programmes in line with organisational policies and procedures, and with external standards such as the Red Cross/Red Crescent Code of Conduct, Sphere, and the CHS standard.
• Overall responsibility for strategic management of the programme, in particular preparing for and effectively responding to humanitarian situations. In some instances, leading a team to be deployed to a new emergency.
• On-going development and management of the funding strategy for the country programme.
• Maintaining an awareness of the current and potential future economic, political and social situation within the country and region.

Security and Representation

• Overall responsibility for security management: ensuring that the security situation is reviewed constantly, a Security Management Plan (SMP) is developed and updated as necessary, and that staff are aware of security procedures and comply with them.
• Representation of Concern nationally, maintaining coordination and networking relationships with the government, donors and other actors in the country, especially the clusters and the HCT.

Staff Management, Administration, Finance, Logistics

• Staff management and development, including in areas such as project design, proposal and report writing, monitoring and evaluation and other key areas. Provide general management support to direct reports.
• Ensuring that support systems (IT, Finance, HR/Administration, Logistics and Transport) are in place and functioning in accordance with good practice and organisational policy and procedures.
• Overseeing the finance function within the country programme with overall responsibility for budgeting, reporting and monitoring of all income and expenditure.
• Overseeing the HR function within the country programme and ensuring that policies and procedures reflect global policies.
• Ensuring all internal and external reports are sent to Regional Desk at HQ in a timely fashion and adhering to high standards of quality.

Communication

• Maintaining good, regular and open communication with the Regional Director and Desk Officer for the region.
• Contributing to organisational learning through liaison with other organisations and Concern fields and sharing lessons to be learned.
• Engaging with the media as required.
• Performing any other related duties as assigned by the Regional Director. 

Accountability 

• promote and ensure compliance with the Core Humanitarian Standard (CHS) commitments and quality criteria
• ensure that all staff are familiar with the principles underpinning accountability, safeguarding and Concern's Complaints and Response Mechanism (CRM) and ensure that information about Concern's commitments on accountability and safeguarding are disseminated among programme participants and communities
• ensure that the CRM is functional, effectively implemented and accessible in all programmes' locations, enabling safe reporting of both programmatic and sensitive complaints, including safeguarding concerns 
• ensure that complaints are welcomed, managed and responded to in a timely, fair and appropriate manner; ensure that sensitive complaints, including safeguarding concerns, are handled with utmost confidentiality and that the safety of the complainants and those affected is prioritised at all stages.

Skills you will bring:

Essential:

• Third level degree in a relevant discipline.
• 5 years’ experience working in a senior manager position within an international NGO.
• Proven experience of managing diverse and multi-sectoral programmes such as WASH, shelter, food aid, camp management, NFI distributions, cash transfers and early recovery, etc.
• Emergency assessment and response experience.
• Experience of security management in insecure contexts.
• Experience in management of financial resources and overseeing human resources, administration and logistics functions.
• Experience in building relations with donors and securing external donor funding.
• Excellent communication and presentation skills, including fluency in written and spoken English and a working command of French
• Willingness to travel frequently to rural field locations

This is a key leadership position; potential candidates are expected to demonstrate significant ability in the following areas:

• Leadership;
• Communicating and working with others;
• Delivering results;
• Planning and decision-making;
• Managing yourself;
• Creativity and innovation;
• Influence, advocacy and networking;
• Change management.

You will report to the Head of Emergency Operations overall and between deployments, and to Regional Director while on deployment in a CD capacity

The salary is from €75,834 to €86,667 (band 7) and this is a 2 year full time, fixed term contract 

We encourage all eligible candidates, irrespective of gender, ethnicity and origin, disability, political beliefs, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, or socio-economic status to apply to become a part of the organisation. Concern is against all forms of discrimination and unequal power relations, and is committed to promoting equality. 

If this role sounds right for you, please apply with your CV and cover letter. We will respond to every applicant. Please be aware we may offer positions before the closing date.

If you have any concerns about our recruitment process and need particular assistance - for example if you have a visual impairment or are neuro-divergent - please let us know and we will do our best to accommodate you. 

Important information:

Concern has an organisational Code of Conduct (CCoC) with three Associated Policies; the Programme Participant Protection Policy (P4), the Child Safeguarding Policy and the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Policy accessible here. These have been developed to ensure the maximum protection of programme participants from exploitation, and to clarify the responsibilities of Concern staff, consultants, visitors to the programme and partner organization, and the standards of behavior expected of them. In this context, staff have a responsibility to the organization to strive for, and maintain, the highest standards in the day-to-day conduct in their workplace in accordance with Concern’s core values and mission. Any candidate offered a job with Concern Worldwide will be expected to sign the Concern Staff Code of Conduct and Associated Policies as an appendix to their contract of employment. By signing the Concern Code of Conduct, candidates acknowledge that they have understood the content of both the Concern Code of Conduct and the Associated Policies and agree to conduct themselves in accordance with the provisions of these policies. Additionally, Concern is committed to the safeguarding and protection of vulnerable adults and children in our work. We will do everything possible to ensure that only those who are suitable to work or volunteer with vulnerable adults and children are recruited by us for such roles. Subsequently, working or volunteering with Concern is subject to a range of vetting checks, including criminal background checking. 

During this job application, you will provide Concern with your personal data. Concern takes its responsibilities towards this personal data very seriously and is committed to complying with all relevant data protection legislation. You have certain rights under data protection legislation. For more information on how to exercise those rights please visit www.concern.net/about/privacy