Head of Asia
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Title
Head of Asia
Reports to
Joshua Castellino, Co-Executive Director
Salary
Hours: Initially appointment 0.8 of FTE, may rise to full time if additional funding is secured, Grade B. Salary dependant on location. UK equivalent is £41970 (outside London).
Location
Flexible within Asia. For this role MRG will consider candidates with the requisite expertise, located in Central Asia, Southeast Asia, East Asia or South Asia. The postholder should be able and willing to visit the MRG offices in the UK and Hungary.
Purpose of the post
The purpose of the job is to:
- oversee the work of a small team (5-10) of primarily remote consultants who support partners in a range of countries to deliver MRG’s projects in this region;
- lead the development and growth of MRG programmes in Asia, and,
- ensure the efficiency, effectiveness, quality, compliance, security and appropriateness of all activities run in the region including advocacy and outreach activities relevant to this work. The post will be expected to personally deliver aspects of programme implementation alongside supervising team members to do so.
Main duties and responsibilities
Core activities
- To lead the strategic development and growth of MRG’s projects and programmes in Asia.
- To design and support team members to design new programmes of work in conjunction with partners and allies, framing interventions while ensuring that they are high quality, high impact, well thought through, appropriate to the context, feasible, fundable and cost effective.
- To fundraise for programmes and support team members to do so, in close liaison with fundraising colleagues; initiate and attend meetings with donors in the region; track upcoming funding opportunities and trends in the region ensuring that MRG utilises these where appropriate; maintain positive relations and dialogue with donors; ensure that all work is conducted in compliance with donor requirements, and that teams provide high quality narrative and financial reports and updates to donors in line with their requirements.To support colleagues working on Asia programmes on programme design, fundraising, programme implementation, training, budget management, donor compliance, research, advocacy commissioning consultants, safe travel, security of all operations (including that of staff, participants and partner organisations), monitoring, evaluation and learning and all other work-related tasks.
- To ensure that all funded programmes are delivered to a high quality, on time and on or within budget, with the necessary monitoring, learning and evaluation in place. To support colleague to troubleshoot difficulties preventing smooth programme implementation and/or interfering with achievement of the results sought.
- To line manage a small team of approximately 5-10 colleagues (including some distance management).
- To lead on security measures in Asia where risks are relatively high; to advise staff, partners, participants, witnesses and human rights defenders on security, providing support and interventions where necessary and appropriate. To support team members to find ways to transfer funds to partners and grantees where restrictions in place affect normal processes.
- To represent MRG at events, presenting MRG’s accumulated expertise on minority and indigenous issues in Asia, acting as a spokesperson for the organisation.
- To ensure that Asia team members contribute to MRG’s media and social media presence (security permitting) and have in place effective outreach programmes to ensure that relevant targets are aware of our work and programmes.
- To liaise closely with partners, advocacy targets and other stakeholders in relation to MRG’s work (particularly where those contacts expect a senior contact or wish to provide feedback about a piece of work, decision, or behaviour of a staff member, partner or consultant).
- To liaise closely with specialised colleagues and ensure that Asia team perspectives are included e.g. in Leadership Team (periodically), in MRG’s web presence, in legal cases work, in UN work, etc.
- To plan work on a regular basis in consultation with Co-Executive Directors and Programme Co-ordinators and liaise with them in preparing work plans and delivery plans.
General
- Undertake such other tasks as may reasonably be requested by the Co-Executive Directors;
- The job holder will be required to maintain the pace of work which at times may be high, be expected to meet deadlines and manage several tasks at the same time.
- Respect and work towards full implementation of MRG’s Gender, Disability and Equal Opportunities Policies in all the work involved in this post.
- Ensure that all activities and scripts in the regional programme include and are sensitive to gender, age and disability issues and that MRG’s gender policy is implemented throughout all work involved in the regions.
Confidential information
Responsible for maintaining confidentiality as the job holder will be required to have a very high level of access to confidential information pertaining to MRG’s strategies, detailed financial information, personnel issues, and also access to sensitive external information which may impact on MRG’s activities.
Degree of supervision
The job holder will be line-managed by a Co-Executive Director and be expected to be able to proactively manage competing demands and adapt MRG’s organisation wide strategy and policies to interventions in the region.
Working conditions
Travel to and/or within the region will be required.
Although the primary purpose of this post is as described above, the post holder may be required to work partly or wholly on other areas of MRG’s work. This is to allow MRG to move staff away from work which is unfunded or underfunded or is no longer a priority for the organisation, to work on areas which have more funding, are growing or which are understaffed. This will normally involve the post holder carrying out tasks similar or identical to those listed in this job description but applied to different geographical areas, programmes or projects.
Person specification
A. Education and Knowledge
Essential
- Educated to degree level or 5 years’ work experience at a level similar to this post.
- Excellent knowledge of minority and indigenous issues in Asia, including recent economic, political and social developments gained through work experience, travel or study;
- Good knowledge of human, minority and indigenous rights standards and conventions, and international and regional mechanisms;
- Detailed knowledge of relevant networks of interested individuals and organisations;
Desirable
- Qualification in international law, international relations, development, social or political sciences or other relevant subjects;
B. Experience
Essential
- At least 5 years’ experience of work on minority or indigenous rights issues.
- A successful track record of designing new interventions that have attracted support and been successfully implemented.
- Three years’ experience of line management of at least 3 staff.
- Experience of handling complex security risks successfully.
- Experience of at least three out of advocacy, legal, training, organisational capacity building, grant making or research programmes.
- At least 3 years’ experience of designing, implementing and evaluating projects (at least some of this should be in Asia, and should involve multi-country, multi-strand projects of some complexity.)
Desirable
- Experience of advocacy at the UN;
- Leadership experience in managing teams.
C. Abilities and Skills
Essential
- Good knowledge of Word, Excel, database use, e-mail and the internet;
- Ability to manage several tasks simultaneously and to organise and prioritise own work;
- Ability to work on own initiative and stay calm under pressure;
- Ability to assess and absorb information quickly;
- Good judgement;
- Good letter writing and numeric skills;
- Ability to communicate effectively orally and in writing;
- Excellent written and spoken English#
- Ability to maintain confidentiality;
- Ability and willingness to travel for up to 8-10 weeks per year as required.
Desirable:
- Good working knowledge of at least one Asian language
D. Personal Qualities
Essential
- Commitment to the aims and objectives of MRG;
- Demonstrated interest in international affairs, human rights, and development issues;
- Ability to gain the confidence of members of minority and indigenous communities, donors and diplomats and work with a diverse group of people;
- Enthusiastic about working in a multi-cultural environment;
- Commitment to gender and equal opportunity policies.
