Country Director

The Country Director (CD) for Somalia and Somaliland is a senior position tasked with leading Consilient’s Somalia-based research team, including in-office international and national research staff and field-based enumerators and researchers. The CD plays a critical role in managing Consilient’s largest research portfolio, and in linking the Somalia-based research team with other functional and geographic teams at Consilient. The CD reports directly to Consilient’s Managing Director (Chief Executive Officer). This is a full-time position based in our Hargeisa, Somaliland office. The position may involve occasional travel to project locations.

The CD’s scope of responsibilities is broadly divided into the following areas, among others:

1. Oversight of Research Delivery

The CD will be responsible for overseeing the delivery and the quality assurance of all research projects in Somalia and Somaliland through the following tasks:

• Exercising supervision over Consilient’s Research Managers and Officers and conducting regularly check-ins to ensure all project tasks are on schedule;
• Managing project assignments to Managers, Officers, and national research staff, bearing in mind each project’s unique timelines and needs, as well as the strengths, availability, workload, and research interests of the CD’s direct reports;
• Approving all project workplans and budgets, ensuring that all projects are completed within the allocated budget caps and timelines;
• Providing feedback on research designs and draft deliverables, and providing final approvals on research deliverables prior to submission to clients;
• Managing the office projects cash flow to ensure that all project teams are adequately resourced for fieldwork.

2. Direct Project Management

As a senior member of the research team, the CD will periodically be called upon to directly manage some of Consilient’s most methodologically and/or logistically complex research projects. This is typically done in close collaboration with one of Consilient’s Officers and Fieldwork Managers. In this capacity, the CD will be responsible for:

• Liaising with clients to operationalize broad research objectives into concrete methodologies and workplans;
• Designing context-appropriate data collection instruments, in collaboration with clients and Consilient’s national staff;
• Creating project fieldwork plans and budgets;
• Designing and/or leading the training of data collectors and other field staff;
• Overseeing field-based data collection and real-time data quality control through high-frequency checks;
• Leading or advising on the drafting of final reports and deliverables;
• Participating in the presentation of results or other dissemination events with the client and/or donor.

3. Capacity Building and Recruitment

The CD will play a critical role in the coaching of current staff and in recruiting new staff. The CD will be responsible for:

• Conducting regular performance reviews to appraise direct reports’ performance over the course of multiple projects;
• Identifying growth and capacity building opportunities for direct reports, bearing in mind their professional interests and strengths;
• Liaising with Human Resources and the rest of Senior Management on staff contractual matters;
• Collaborating with the broader research management team to identify areas for continued training and to design appropriate training materials, where relevant;
• Leading efforts to identify, screen, and invite job applicants to participate in Consilient’s recruiting drives;
• Leading the initial onboarding of incoming research staff, in collaboration with Consilient’s Operations team.

4. Liaison with Other Units Within Consilient

Consilient’s work is made successful through the close coordination between its various functional and geographic teams. The CD will therefore act as an important liaison to help ensure that all components of Consilient’s work operate cohesively. This will be done through the following responsibilities, among others:

• Participating in weekly coordination calls with all unit heads and the Managing Director to promote alignment in the various workstreams. Follow up ad hoc meetings should also be anticipated;
• Coordinating closely with the Finance and Operations teams on the timely payments of project funds, use of Consilient equipment for data collection, and other research tasks;
• Working with Consilient’s research leads in the Sudan and “emerging markets” portfolios to ensure all projects are appropriately staffed and backstopped;[1]
• Collaborating with the Business Development team to identify and capture additional opportunities. This will typically involve providing inputs into technical and financial proposals, including on the methodological design, proposed budget and team structure, and timelines.

Position Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in relevant field with prior social science research experience (Master’s strongly preferred);
• A minimum of 6 to 7 years of work experience in international development, humanitarian assistance, monitoring and evaluation, policy analysis, social science research, or some combination thereof;
• Strong familiarity and experience with both quantitative (including descriptive and inferential statistics) and qualitative research methods;
• Extensive experience in research project management, including research methodology design, data analysis, primary data collection, presentation of findings, and research budget management;
• Advanced competency in Stata, R, or a comparable language/software for data quality control, cleaning, and analysis. Applicants must be familiar with standards and protocols for reproducible data analysis;
• Excellent writing skills adaptable to a wide range of audiences, including technical research teams, policymakers, and program implementers, among others;
• Demonstrated history of successfully leading, managing, and coaching diverse, multi-cultural teams;
• Experience coordinating with external stakeholders and client communications;
• Eagerness to engage in research across a multitude of sectorial areas;
• Ability to multitask and work independently with minimal supervision;
• Ability to produce high-quality deliverables under pressure and tight deadlines;
• Fluency in formal written and spoken English;
• Experience living and working in a developing country and/or humanitarian context strongly preferred. Experience working and living in Somaliland/Somalia or the Horn of Africa region in particular will be considered an asset;
• Experience working with major humanitarian or development organizations and/or bilateral and multilateral donors will be considered an asset.

Accommodation, Living Arrangements, and Travel

• Successful candidates will be provided with housing in the Consilient guesthouses in Hargeisa;
• Travel to the duty station at the start of the contract, and back to the home base at the end of the contract, will be covered by Consilient. An annual travel allowance will also provided for additional travel;
• A monthly stipend is provided on top of salary for in-country expenses;
• International staff at Consilient are provided with health insurance with international coverage, inclusive of their home country;
• This is a non-family duty station.