Our searches

As Head of Country Support, you will coordinate ActionAid’s members in Europe and the Americas, providing support in operations, fundraising and governance. You will bring together ActionAid leaders from across these two regions, understanding what support they need from each other and from the centre—and making sure they get it. You will also work on risk management and compliance issues, as well as help coordinate external engagements with bodies such as the European Union. Your work will involve travel and working with people from a range of cultures.

About Actionaid

ActionAid have helped over 15 million people in 45 countries worldwide and are making a lasting difference working with communities to reduce poverty and promote human rights.

They focus on the people that others forget. People in poverty. People who face discrimination. People whose voices are ignored. They help people fight for the rights that they are denied. Simple things, like the right to eat. The right to stay on their land. To an education. To have a say in the decisions that shape their lives.

ActionAid is not about giving handouts or telling people what to do, because in the long run we know that doesn’t work. Instead, they use their resources, influence and experience to help people find their own solutions. ActionAid listens to what people really want and need. They help communities take action together to hold their governments to account, and they give local organisations support where they need it.

Main Purpose of the Role

The Head of Country Support will support the delivery of the Federation Development Directorate’s mandate through collective management decision making as a member of the leadership team. This role provides strategic leadership, coordination and management support to country management teams and national boards (for members) to enhance organisational performance and effectiveness through management and coordination of functional support to countries, with the aim of ensuring that country programmes are better managed and members well governed.

Main Responsibilities

• Line manage Directors of country programmes and country support functional team, co-line manage associate members and advise and guide affiliate members in the delivery of the country and federation-wide strategy mandates.
• Lead the country support team to ensure appropriate functional support is provided to countries so that they are better managed, governed and aligned to federation-wide processes, systems, policies and standards to enable effective implementation of the federation’s goals and mission. Where applicable, coordinate functional communities of practice ensuring they have necessary support and governance to succeed.
• Lead country support team to monitor alignment and cohesion between countries and international strategies and compliance with federation policies, frameworks, standards and systems and support strengthening of country systems & procedures, planning and reporting, staff security and implementation and reporting on compliance through the Assurance Policy.
• Lead identification and coordination of peer support across countries, encourage collaborative working and mutual accountability, and support timely resolution of disputes/conflicts among countries and with other parts of the federation in line with established guidelines.
• Convene Country Directors to identify and discuss common issues at the regional level that are of common interest to the countries, to inform engagement with the rest of the federation.
• Line manage the country programme in Haiti, as ActionAid’s only country programme in the region.

Essential Skills and Experience

We expect you to be able to demonstrate your capabilities in:

• Remote management: Experience in managing remotely and guiding leaders from different countries and cultures, ideally supporting development programmes at a country level.
• Change manager: Track record in supporting team members through a change process, helping them to share their own learning and to benefit from the learning of others.
• Coordination and support: Experience coordinating programs across multiple countries, ideally at the leadership / governance level. Experience negotiating tensions and facilitating resolutions between country programs (or similar context).
• Influencer: Experience guiding members of or international organizations to work together on common strategies, as to be able to encourage and guide members to contribute to the Federation, its strategy, and its plans for growth.
• Networker: Experience in engaging internally and externally, convening stakeholders and agreeing external agendas for institutions such as the European Union.

Other Qualifications and Experience

• Fluency in spoken and written English. Competence in French, Portuguese or Spanish would be an added advantage.