Mercy Corps is a leading global organization powered by the belief that a better world is possible.
In disaster, in hardship, in more than 40 countries around the world, we partner to put bold solutions into action — helping people triumph over adversity and build stronger communities from within.
Now, and for the future.

Program / Department Summary

Mercy Corps is seeking a Senior Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) Manager for the USAID-funded “Sahel Regional Resilience Activity” (SRRA). Funded and managed out of the USAID Sahel Regional Office, the program seeks to expand resilience in the Sahel by improving the ability of individuals, households, and communities to mitigate, adapt to, and recover from multi-faceted shocks and stresses. Implementation is planned for Burkina Faso, Chad, and Mauritania – with the possibility of additional countries – and is expected to include the management of multiple awards (i.e. “Associate Awards”) under a single mechanism, led by one “Leader Award.”

General Position Summary

The Senior MEL Manager will be a part of the SRRA “Leader Award” team, which oversees and supports Associate Awards in the region under this mechanism. The Senior MEL Manager will provide technical expertise, quality oversight, team management and leadership to generate and analyze data through a mixed-methods M&E system and present these data as evidence that stimulates the identification of adaptations that the Sahel RRA Leader Award can make to help it achieve its intended outcomes. The Senior MEL Manager will also lead the MEL team to support the CLA Manager and their team as they provide the technical assistance, guidance, and logistical support to Associate Awards’ use of CLA to adaptively improve and achieve their intended outcomes. The MEL Unit must also provide technical support to external implementation entities so they can measure the extent to which (a) they have achieved intended outcomes and b) CLA has improved their adaptive management. The Senior MEL Manager must lead SRRA to build and use a MEL system that integrates qualitative and quantitative monitoring (for performance measures and contextual variables) with learning-plan focused formative studies.

The Senior MEL Manager applies their successful experience and skills to build or strengthen systems for both performance and work plan monitoring, guiding or conducting quantitative and qualitative analysis, designing survey methodologies, and promoting evidence-based program management. They will apply their demonstrated experience leading MEL for a large, multi-year development or resilience awards to strengthen capacity of M&E and non-M&E staff; applying knowledge about theories of change, logic models, MEL plans, data quality assessments, data utilization for evidence-based reporting and learning purposes, and gender and youth integration into the M&E system; and in developing and operationalizing a comprehensive M&E plan. The Senior MEL Manager must have demonstrated experience networking and engaging with necessary stakeholders (internally and external to SRRA). They will manage staff, resources, consultants (as needed), and coordinate closely with partners to fulfill the MEL requirements of the program as well as promote evidence-based decision-making, adaptive management, and a culture of learning in line with the CLA approach.

Essential Job Responsibilities

M&E Management and Technical Leadership

● Design and revise strategic M&E documents, including the M&E Plan, theory of change, performance indicator reference sheets, logframe, data protection standard operating procedures, and sex and age disaggregation plans.

●Set up and oversee all principal M&E system components, including protocols and data flows for monitoring and evaluations, data and information management, M&E budgets, staffing, competency building and technology systems.

●Establish M&Estandard operating procedures, tools, and other mechanisms adapted to remote programming when needed in a country for maintaining MEL during insecurity and political risks.

● Design and oversee the implementation of participant-based surveys, including the scope of work, sampling strategies, questionnaires, analysis plans, statistical processing and analysis.

●Work closely with the Collaboration, Learning, and Adaptation (CLA) Managertopromote CLA through intentional and routine periodic learning initiatives sessions to share, discuss, and use monitoring data, document and disseminate/capitalize lessons learned and evaluation/assessments findings, support program management to conduct program improvements informed by data.

● Set up and cultivate the SRRA M&E working group between M&E staff in countries to integrate best practices, harmonize MEL strategies, and reinforce quality evidence generation and use.

● Serve as a senior leader on the SRRA Learning Council, synthesizing and sharing critical analysis, championing localization through MEL, and promote data-driven adaptive management.

● Co-design and manage the inclusion of qualitative data collection and analysis for both direct and supplemental measurements of program performance.

● Ensure that the Chief of Party and Deputy Chief of Party are alerted to any issues that prevent full implementation of the Activity in line with the Theory of Change.

● Ensure the Activity adheres to the USAID Policy & Guidance and the Mercy Corps M&E Policy and Record Management & Retention Policy.

Data and Information Management

● Support design of SRRA Associate Awards’ baseline, midline, and endline data collection, internal and external evaluations and data analyses.

● Design and oversee the set-up of an information management system, including processes and technology solutions for data collection, storage, processing, analysis, visualization, and reporting for all activity indicators and additional data needs for learning, adaptation, and reporting. Actively seek out opportunities for automatization and efficiency gains in information management.

● Design and implement data flows that align indicator definitions, tool matrices, databases and sampling frames to ensure traceable, timely, comprehensive, high-quality and demand-responsive data collection and processing in compliance with USAID and Mercy Corps requirements.

● Ensure data quality in all aspects of M&E, by conducting periodic data quality assessments (DQAs), and integrating corrections and remedies as necessary, to align with Mercy Corps’ and USAID data protection and M&E standards.

M&E Team Management and Internal Capacity Building

● Create and sustain a work environment of mutual respect, accountability and clearly communicated expectations where team members strive and are equipped with the resources to achieve excellence.

● Develop and oversee the implementation of a career development strategy for M&E and partner staff, that promotes M&E competencies and a culture of learning through systematic analysis and reflection of program data.

● Actively provide mentorship and training to program and M&E teams to improve their competencies in quantitative methods, qualitative methods, information management, critical thinking, data communication, problem solving, facilitation and data literacy.

● Train teams in appropriate methods for both qualitative and quantitative data collection methods, including surveys, focus group discussion and key informant interviews and lead qualitative data collection in participating communities as needed.

External Capacity Building

● Strengthen external implementing entities’ capacities in mixed-methods monitoring and evaluation, as well as how to present MEL system data as easily understandable, reliable, valid and compelling evidence for enhanced learning and program adaptation

Internal and External Coordination and Representation

● Represent Mercy Corps in M&E forums with the broader humanitarian and development community.

● Develop positive working relationships and coordinate/collaborate with partner organizations and international and national agencies active in the target areas.

● Conduct due diligence of partner M&E systems and processes, including data collection, processing, analysis and reporting, and organize periodic workshops and sharing sessions, ensuring that they are equipped with adequate resources and systems to contribute rigorous data to the overall program.

● Collaborate closely with the CLA Director, HQ- or region-based M&E and research teams and research team, lead and/or collaborate with external evaluators on the design and roll out of the program baseline and evaluations, while setting up effective systems for learning.

● Contribute to Mercy Corps’ country-wide Community Accountability and Reporting Mechanism (CARM) by assisting in the design of a program CARM Plan and supporting functioning of CARM channels.

Supervisory Responsibility

Activity M&E team. The number of direct reports will be between 4 and 6

Accountability

Reports Directly To: Deputy Chief of Party

Works Directly With: Activity team members, M&E, CLA and research teams, Technical Leads; staff across the Sahel Region; HQ and Regional Technical Resources and Quality team; Evidence & Learning team; partner organizations

Accountability to Participants and Stakeholders

Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our program participants, community partners, other stakeholders, and to international standards guiding international relief and development work. We are committed to actively engaging communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our projects.

Knowledge and Experience / Qualifications and Transferable Skills

● MA/S or BA/BS in a quantitative field (economics, agricultural/development economics, statistics, biostatistics, nutrition applied sociology, or other relevant field) with significant training in quantitative methods.

● At least seven years (10 years + if only BA/BS degree of relevant experience leading the M&E of multi-year development or resilience awards. The candidate must have experience leading an M&E team of a large, integrated program at least five of which must be based in country programs.

● Strong conceptual knowledge about theories of change, logic models, M&E plans, data quality assurance, mobile data collection, data utilization, and resilience, gender and youth integration into M&E.

● Demonstrated experience and expertise in developing and operationalizing a comprehensive Activity Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning Plan (AMELP).

● Strong quantitative background and demonstrated expertise in designing annual monitoring surveys including probabilistic sampling strategy and estimating sample size, developing appropriate weights, and analyzing quantitative data.

● Demonstrated expertise in designing qualitative studies and analyzing qualitative data, in-depth knowledge about qualitative sampling, and experienced in using interview and interactive tools to generate qualitative information and analysis.

● Demonstrated experience in participatory community governance, advocacy, capacity and leadership development, and/or management and use of grassroots level-generated data.

● Experienced in developing data quality assurance strategies, data management, and data visualization.

● Demonstrated expertise and experience in data utilization strategies and can creatively think about active data sharing techniques.

● Experience supporting partner organizations to ensure quality of their M&E systems.

● Excellent verbal and written communication skills in English and French.

● Experience working in the Sahel region is required.

● Excellent skills in software solutions and platforms for data collection, storage, processing, analysis and visualization, such as MS Office, CommCare, Stata, R, and Power BI.

Success Factors

A successful candidate will have a demonstrated ability to lead and communicate effectively with team members of varied work styles and cultures, follow procedures and meet deadlines with flexibility and creativity in planning and problem solving. They will have a proven ability to learn quickly, multi-task, prioritize, take initiative, be accountable for results, and understand the larger picture while remaining focused on the details. They will be comfortable working within a complex and sensitive setting and following laws and security protocols. The Senior MEL Manager will have a good handle on adaptive management, integration and coordination, stakeholder engagement, capacity strengthening, community-level governance and planning, facilitation, and conflict mitigation and conflict-sensitive approaches. The most successful Mercy Corps team members have a strong commitment to teamwork and accountability, thrive in evolving and changing environments and make effective written and verbal communication a priority in all situations.

Living Conditions / Environmental Conditions

The Senior M&E Manager is based in one of the Sahel countries, likely Senegal or Burkina Faso. The location is expected to be accompanied and secure. Housing is individual accommodation with freedom of movement beyond the house/office. There are international schools. Staff have relatively reliable access to services – medical, electricity, water, etc. This position requires approximately 30% travel by road or plane to field offices with varying levels of security. This position is not eligible for hardship and/or R&R benefits.

Mercy Corps Team members represent the agency both during and outside of work hours when deployed in a field posting or on a visit/TDY to a field posting. Team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner and respect local laws, customs and MC’s policies, procedures, and values at all times and in all in-country venues.

Ongoing Learning

In support of our belief that learning organizations are more effective, efficient and relevant to the communities we serve, we empower all team members to dedicate 5% of their time to learning activities that further their personal and/or professional growth and development.

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

Achieving our mission begins with how we build our team and work together. Through our commitment to enriching our organization with people of different origins, beliefs, backgrounds, and ways of thinking, we are better able to leverage the collective power of our teams and solve the world’s most complex challenges. We strive for a culture of trust and respect, where everyone contributes their perspectives and authentic selves, reaches their potential as individuals and teams, and collaborates to do the best work of their lives.

We recognize that diversity and inclusion is a journey, and we are committed to learning, listening and evolving to become more diverse, equitable and inclusive than we are today.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Mercy Corps is an equal opportunity employer that does not tolerate discrimination on any basis. We actively seek out diverse backgrounds, perspectives, and skills so that we can be collectively stronger and have sustained global impact.

We are committed to providing an environment of respect and psychological safety where equal employment opportunities are available to all. We do not engage in or tolerate discrimination on the basis of race, color, gender identity, gender expression, religion, age, sexual orientation, national or ethnic origin, disability (including HIV/AIDS status), marital status, military veteran status or any other protected group in the locations where we work.

Safeguarding & Ethics

Mercy Corps is committed to ensuring that all individuals we come into contact with through our work, whether team members, community members, program participants or others, are treated with respect and dignity. We are committed to the core principles regarding prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse laid out by the UN Secretary General and IASC. We will not tolerate child abuse, sexual exploitation, abuse, or harassment by or of our team members. As part of our commitment to a safe and inclusive work environment, team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner, respect local laws and customs, and to adhere to Mercy Corps Code of Conduct Policies and values at all times. Team members are required to complete mandatory Code of Conduct elearning courses upon hire and on an annual basis.