The BRAC Ultra-Poor Graduation Initiative (UPGI) seeks to recruit a Program Coordinator - MEL in India.  Reporting directly to BRAC’s India Country Lead, the Program Coordinator - MEL will work as a senior member of BRAC’s India team to inform and help strengthen efforts to support state and national government counterparts to scale Graduation.He/she will do this by providing technical assistance and capacity building support to government counterparts on Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) of government led inclusive livelihoods programming, and the Management Information System (MIS) more broadly. They will also help to meet the UPGI country team’s information needs - documenting progress and capturing lessons learned, and supporting strategic learning and continuous improvements - and provide support and oversight on MEL for BI’s grantees in India.

This position will be based in Delhi, India, with regular travels across the country including remote areas. Regular office hours in-person is expected.

Knowledge Building (50%)

●      Work closely with India Country Lead to build a repository of knowledge on inclusive livelihoods programs across India.

●      Provide guidance to research and monitoring agencies to ensure quality and support cross learning.

●      Develop knowledge products and learning notes documenting various practices implemented by the country team and partner agencies.

●      Convene/support peer-to-peer learning and reflection platforms across states and program partners carried out in collaboration with the Country Lead and with the support of the UPGI MEL function.

●      Manage BRAC’s key partnerships in India related to MEL.

●      Build a culture of learning across BRAC’s programs across India.

M&E Capacity Building (30%)

●      Provide responsive and tailored M&E technical assistance and capacity-building support to government counterparts to strengthen monitoring, evaluation and oversight, as required.  This includes supervising the MIS focal who will craft an MIS that facilitates convergence between Graduation and other government programs, supports household monitoring, and ensures program participants receive program components in the correct sequence.

●      Ensure quality of development of data collection tools (interview guides, stakeholder meeting facilitation guides, etc.)

●      Undertake regular field visits to maintain a thorough knowledge and understanding of the project activities and partnerships.

●      Inform the national strategy of program roll out by continuously monitoring the changing political and operating dynamics in the context of National and State Governance structures.  Activities here might include, but are not limited to:

○      regular stakeholder interviews,

○      participant conversation and other data collection activities as required,

○      maintaining regular communication with government agencies and other key stakeholders as appropriate and useful,

○      reviewing documents and data related to the country's strategy

●      Consolidate and share data and analysis with UPGI country lead and wider India team on regular basis in order to document progress and wider changes, and inform decisions on strategic adaptations

●      Provide input into global UPGI reporting as required

●      Support MEL plan for BRAC grantees in India

●      Lead in designing and development of national and state MIS systems.

Manage State Engagements and Team Members (20%)

●      Anchor state program roll out as required.

●      Manage team members as required.

Other (Safeguarding Responsibilities)

●        Ensure the safety of team members from any harm, abuse, neglect, harassment, and exploitation to achieve the program’s goals of safeguarding implementation.

●        Practice, promote and endorse the issues of safeguarding policy among team members and ensure the implementation of safeguarding standards in every course of action. 

●        Follow the safeguarding reporting procedure in case any reportable incident takes place, and encourage others to do so.

●        In coordination with the India Country Lead, facilitate the timely resolution of grievances raised by staff and partners.

●    MA Degree in Development studies, statistics, Social sciences, demographics, or related field required.

●    Over 20 years experience in leading program roll out, knowledge management, monitoring, evaluating, learning, and reporting on poverty alleviation programs, including demonstrated experience in developing learning priorities and research agendas .

●        Experience with M&E of adaptively managed programs.

●        Experience with M&E of policy cycles, and governance more broadly.

●        Experience with indicator selection, target setting, reporting, database management, and developing MEL and performance monitoring plans.

●        Excellent writing skills – reports and proposals.

●        Proactive leader with the ability to prioritize and effectively manage competing work streams Strong interpersonal and representational skills, with fluency in English and Hindi, along with a high degree of political sensitivity.

●        Preference will be given to the candidates with experience in working with government agencies, multilateral organisations or large scale development programs.

About BRAC

BRAC is one of the world’s largest development organizations, dedicated to empowering people living in poverty. Working across 12 countries in South Asia and Africa, BRAC touches the lives of more than 120 million people worldwide. BRAC takes a holistic approach to alleviating poverty with programs that include microfinance, education, healthcare, food security programs, and more.

About the Ultra-Poor Graduation Initiative

The Ultra-Poor Graduation Initiative (“UPGI”) is a global unit of BRAC that was founded in 2016 to build off of the success of BRAC’s Ultra-Poor Graduation program in Bangladesh. BRAC UPGI aims to position the Graduation approach as a key driver to eradicating extreme poverty worldwide. It does this by:

●      Advocating for uptake of the Graduation approach by policymakers, national governments, multilateral institutions, and non-governmental organizations; and

●      Effective adaptation and implementation of the Graduation approach in countries around the world, supported through technical assistance and capacity strengthening for external stakeholders.

In 2002, BRAC pioneered the Ultra-Poor Graduation (“Graduation”) approach in Bangladesh - a holistic intervention to help people lift themselves from extreme poverty - after recognizing that existing poverty alleviation programs were not reaching the poorest people. Through the provision of livelihood assets, cash transfers, and continued mentoring and training, the Graduation approach addresses participants’ multidimensional needs within the local context and ‘graduates’ people from extreme poverty into sustainable livelihoods.

Graduation is an evidence-based, scalable intervention proven to break the poverty trap for the long term. So far, BRAC’s flagship Graduation program has impacted over 2 million Bangladeshi households—totaling over 9 million people. To help eradicate extreme poverty, BRAC UPGI is working to scale globally by integrating Graduation into existing government programs and help 21 million more people lift themselves from extreme poverty by 2026.

But BRAC UPGI cannot do it alone. This is beyond the means and capacity of a single organization- no matter how ambitious or innovative. Sustainability and scale demand change at the systems level with active government engagement. BRAC UPGI is committed to creating effective solutions that leverage the available resources and existing programming to achieve the long-term benefits demonstrated by Graduation. The organization is partnering with governments, as well as multilateral institutions, NGOs, and civil society, in countries where BRAC UPGI thinks it can have maximum impact and drive greater uptake for Graduation.

BRAC is committed to safeguarding children, young people and vulnerable adults, and expects all employees and volunteers to share the same commitment. We believe every stakeholder and every member of the communities we work with has the right to be protected from all forms of harm, abuse, neglect, harassment, and exploitation - regardless of age, race, religion, and gender, status as an individual with a disability or ethnic origin. Therefore, our recruitment process includes extensive reference and background checks, self-disclosure of prior issues regarding sexual or other misconduct and criminal records and our values are a part of our Performance Management System.

BRAC is an equal opportunities employer.