Head of Programmes
3 month contract leading to permanent post

CanDo is on a mission to enable local humanitarians to provide life-saving healthcare in communities devastated by war.

Who are we?
CanDo is a small, dynamic start-up and registered charity building and mobilising a global movement because we believe passionately that we are all humanitarians. We are on a mission to enable local humanitarians to provide life-saving healthcare in communities devastated by war. Despite being  18 months old, we are already gaining traction and support for our innovative solution on a global platform.

Inadequate resourcing of local humanitarian organisations (LHOs) is preventing millions of people from receiving critical life-saving aid and is causing excessive suffering and unnecessary deaths around the globe.
We channel resources where they save more lives
We invest in local partners to grow their impact
We catalyse change towards a better humanitarian system
Our founder and CEO, Dr Rola Hallam, is regarded as a global thought leader. She is an advocate for the protection of civilians and the upholding of medical neutrality, the localisation of humanitarian aid and women’s rights.
Rola has spoken at prominent international conferences, events and on major media outlets, reaching over 9 million people. Over the past months she has met President Barack Obama and other statesmen, leaders of the tech industry such as Sundar Pichai, Google CEO, and leaders in the humanitarian aid and human rights sector. She has used these opportunities to push for collaboration on much needed change in the sector.

Rola has recently been appointed as a TED fellow, the first Syrian to receive this honour. Her talk highlighting the need to support local responders to save more lives was the TED talk of the day on the 15th May 2018.

In just over 18 months four of our partners have run seven successful campaigns, including building a children’s hospital in North Aleppo (and we have just raised sufficient funds to keep it open until summer 2019). We have reached 41,200 people in need by mobilising over 6,000 CanDoers and 40 NGOs. Four of the projects supported were delivered to besieged-communities in rural Damascus.

Our Vision: Everyone a humanitarian

Our Mission: Together, enabling local humanitarians to provide life-saving health services in communities devastated by war.

The Challenge

141 million people around the world are in need of humanitarian aid, 80% of those needs are driven by conflict.  Healthcare is one of the first victims of war, and the targeting of healthcare has become one of its weapons. 50% of people affected by complex emergencies are in the Middle East: in Syria alone 13.1 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance.

Both reliable data and our experience of working with local, on-the-ground groups, networks and organisations in war-torn Syria made us realise that while they deliver 75% of the humanitarian work, they receive less than 1% of the available funds. Yet they are the local heroes, taking action and creating projects that change communities and save lives, but with no way to tell their story and articulate their needs to a global audience.

At the same time there are millions of us around the world who see tragedy unfolding in war zones, who long to help alleviate the suffering but feel powerless to make a difference.

Our Solution
There is more to health than healthcare. We take a holistic approach, supporting medical but also nutrition, clean water, sanitation, hygiene, mental health and psychosocial support and protection projects. This gets the right aid, to the right person, at the right time, saving lives and alleviating suffering,

We invest in and resource vetted local responders to lead needs-based, cost-effective life-saving health interventions in war devastated communities. We believe local aid-workers are best situated to save lives. They are the first and ongoing responders, have access where others don’t, are accountable to their communities and knowledgeable of exactly what is needed, when and where.

CanDo mobilises a global community to invest in and resource local humanitarians to lead agile, effective, cost-efficient health interventions. Our platform pioneers people-to-people aid by connecting local humanitarians to the global citizens, philanthropists and strategic partners who will fund their health projects.

Our complementary, innovative co-created support programme builds local capacity, helping sustain the local response and maximize impact.

Our Mindset

We believe in working for change with Optimism, Courage, Connectedness, Pioneering and Openness. Our values shape our relationships with all our stakeholders – our partners, our donor community - and how we work as a team. We approach each other with open hearts and minds, we listen, we respond, we support and encourage.
The Team
We are a small but diverse team, spread across the UK, Europe and Middle East. You can find more about us on our website. Remote and home working is essential for us, but we have regular virtual meetings, an effective team messaging system to keep us all in touch and up to date, and regularly meet face to face as a small group or the full team. We love a good sense of humour and positivity, and a willingness to get involved and go the extra mile.

Our Programmes

We work with LHOs selected via a rigorous assessing and vetting process to build their capacity to launch and run successful campaigns on our crowdfunding platform therefore enabling them to deliver impactful, locally-led, tailor-made, data-driven health programmes. Our planning is multifaceted and involves co-creation, sector and region know-how, research and knowledge.

Our CanDo model was co-created alongside LHOs.  We adopt a human-centred approach and we plan projects with LHOs in order to design, develop and deliver tailor-made solutions which ensure they can deliver  impactful health services to war-affected communities.

We make regular visits to field locations and maintain good communications with LHOs working on the ground. Staying up-to-date with the contexts our partners are working in ensures that our projects are current, aligned with needs and impactful.

We use research and on-the-ground knowledge to support and strengthen our work, allowing us to understand industry standards, best practices and approaches, and provide evidence-based solutions.

Our local partners have limited access to practical and purposeful tools, resources and support to increase their aid response effectiveness. We have co-designed, with our partners, two programmes to support their organisations’ learning and development: CanDo Humanitarian Support Programme and CanDo Humanitarian Accelerator Programme.

About the Post

We are looking for an experienced and committed individual who can provide strategic and technical leadership to CanDo’s programmes and ensure delivery of our vision, mission and objectives. You should be excited by the prospect of building on and developing the pioneering work we have done over the last 18 months.

Main Duties and Responsibilities

Strategic leadership and management:
Coordinate and lead CanDo Programmes, ensuring delivery of CanDo’s vision, mission and objectives
Provide overall strategic and technical leadership in the design, development, planning, budgeting and implementation of the Programme Strategy.
Ensure the Programme Strategy aligns with CanDo’s Business Strategy
Ensure timely and accurate reporting to stakeholders.
Provide leadership and guidance and manage the programmes team to deliver the programme strategy, . 
Programme delivery:

Working closely with the programmes team:
Oversee the partner portfolio, with specific reference to the identification of suitable local humanitarian partners, and building and maintaining these relationships.
Represent CanDo externally with local humanitarian partners, leading on communication, coordination and support to partners.
Build and develop an approach to programme quality, knowledge production and dissemination.
Develop, implement and embed Monitoring, Evaluation and impact assessment tools and processes for our partners’ work and that of CanDo.
Oversee the development of of our partners’ fundraising campaigns and project implementation plans, to ensure their effective and timely implementation.
Work closely with the Finance Lead to ensure financial and programmatic accountability align
Liaise with and support partners in developing their campaigns.
Ensure the delivery of programmes with demonstrable impact and be accountable for overall programme quality and outcomes.
Continue to develop, implement and embed CanDo’s  support programmes, in order to ensure the sharing of knowledge and skills with and between local humanitarian partners.
Plan and deliver workshops, webinars and coaching sessions with local humanitarian
Operational:
Work with the CEO and team to ensure the smooth running of CanDo’s day-to-day operations, including supporting staff in achieving objectives and contributing to drafting funding applications
Participate fully in the annual budget process, lead the program budgeting process, and provide ongoing oversight and management of program budgets, .
Contribute to CanDo’s evolution as a humanitarian organisation by participating fully as a member of the team
Person Specification

Qualities
We are looking for someone who
Is self-motivated, able to manage themselves and deliver their work with light-touch direction
Cares about the quality of their work and the work of the team
Works to foster a collaborative team environment
Focusses on work that has a high impact for our partners, stakeholders and the team
Is proactive about their own professional development and keen to learn
Is an excellent communicator and maintains effective contact with stakeholders and the team
Is willing to roll up their sleeves and lend a hand, no matter how small or large the task
Is culturally and socially aware and able to appropriately navigate interactions with a range of individuals and organisations
Has strong teamwork skills and is comfortable in a highly collaborative team culture
Has the courage to admit mistakes, learn from them and move on
Experience and skills

Essential

Masters’ degree or equivalent
A minimum of 5 years experience of working in the humanitarian sector at a senior level
An excellent track record in programme design, planning and implementation
Experience in networking, partnership building and relationship management at a senior level
Experience of working with local humanitarian organisations
Excellent written and verbal communication skills in both English and Arabic.
A track record in building relationships with a wide range of stakeholders
Ability to work under pressure with excellent time management and organisation
Command of Microsoft Office packages and Google suite
Ability to work remotely
Ability to work effectively in a diverse team environment
Ability to travel internationally if required
Desirable

Experience of working remotely with partners in war affected areas
Understanding/experience of the Syria conflict
Details

This is  full-time post

Payment: commensurate with experience and location

Location: UK, Europe or Middle East

Application Deadline: 9.30 Monday 17 September 2018

Preferred Start Date: ASAP

Contract Length: 3 months, leading to permanent post dependant on performance

Interviews will be held the week following the closing date

How to Apply:

Please submit a CV which includes your full contact details, including address, and a detailed supporting statement which clearly addresses how you meet the points on the person specification and explains why you want to join our team.

Please email to hr@candoaction.org In the subject line use the format: Head of Programmes <Your Name> and include where/how you found out about this post.

Interviews will be conducted via Zoom video conferencing. It is free to register, we will ensure interviewees are set up to use it before their interview.

Please note we will not be able to consider applications which are CV only or from outside Europe and the Middle East

Job Email id: hr(at)candoaction.org