Asia Foundation Local Governance Program Manager

Asia Foundation

Local Governance Program Manager

The Asia Foundation, an international non-governmental organization, is seeking candidates for a Local Governance Program manager to support an extensive three-year ‘Support for Local Governance, Elections and Civil Society Program: Timor Leste’. The program manager shall be part of a team that will implement activities towards enhancing the capacity of newly-elected Suco Councils to strengthen citizen participation in village and municipal governance. The position involves the design and implementation of intensive training activities, village-level data gathering and analysis and inter-action with local officials and civil society groups to improve local governance and dispensation of mandated functions.

Supervisor: Senior Local Governance Advisor

Major responsibilities of this position include:

• Assisting in the selection of project sites, including coordination with concerned public and private institutions and agencies and the generation and processing of information for purposes of site-prioritization.
• Assisting in the design and implementation of orientation activities for suco councils including the generation of relevant documents, literature and other data/information needed to design appropriate orientation modules, plan and implement the orientation program and coordinate and monitor all related orientation activities.
• Assisting in the design and implementation of a Suco Governance Performance Scale, (SGPS) to be used for monitoring purposes.
• Communicating the program’s purpose and objectives to concerned local and national officials.
• Providing technical assistance to partner local governments, civil society organizations and national government institutions in areas relevant to the achievement of program objectives, including but not limited to, the organization and strengthening of suco associations, networking with other civil society groups and organizations.
• Assisting in the design and application/facilitation of suco participatory planning and implementation workshops.
• Providing follow-on technical assistance to partner sucos to implement the priority activities identified in their respective plans.
• Preparing Scopes of Work and/or Terms of Reference to guide (local) external technical assistance providers implement outsourced tasks related to the achievement of project objectives.
• Organizing national awards for best performing local governments, especially sucos.
• Organizing national events such as conferences, workshops, forums and dialogues, to be participated in by both civil society representatives and public officials, designed to present and discuss issues relating to local governance as well as best practices.
• Representing the Foundation in meetings.
• Preparing reports on program activities.

Qualifications and Experience required:

• Deep knowledge of Timor Leste local governments, especially the Sucos and Aldeias, specifically their structure, tradition, mandated functions, functional relationship with districts/municipalities, performance, strengths and weaknesses.

• Familiarity with the functions, organizational structure, officials of the Ministry of State Administration and Territorial Management (MSTAM).

• Familiarity with the functions and organizational structure of the Timor Leste national government, including the Parliament.

• Familiarity with sources of data and information on Timor Leste municipalities and sucos.

• At least five years of experience in local planning and budgeting in Timor Leste.

• At least five years experience in the design and implementation of training programs.

• Extensive program and grant management experience.

• Familiarity with the Timor Leste NGO/CSO community.

• Ability to work cooperatively with government and non-governmental organizations.

• Excellent verbal and written communication skills (including English), culturally sensitive interpersonal skills, strong organizational abilities and computer literacy.

• A university degree in a relevant subject.

• Excellent analytical and presentational skills.

If you are interested in applying for this position, please send your resume or CV to
ftilman@asiafound.org as soon as possible, as we would like to begin interviews this week. Only short listed candidates will be contacted.