2 Positions at Private Sector Federation (PSF): (Deadline 15 January 2021)

2 Positions at Private Sector Federation (PSF): (Deadline 15 January 2021)

(ToR)- Project Coordinator for the East African Tourism Platform (EATP) at Private Sector Federation (PSF): (Deadline 15 January 2021)

The East African Community (EAC) recognizes the significance of the tourism sector to the national economies of its Partner States. The Sector contributes an average of about 10% to GDP, 20 % to foreign exchange earnings and, creating employment opportunities of about 8.3% in the region.

Review of the Partner States policy and development frameworks reveals that tourism is recognized as a key driver for future growth with a high potential to transform their economies.   In particular, tourism development has been prioritized in the Vision Burundi 2025, Kenya Vision 2030, Rwanda Vision 2050, Tanzania Vision 2025, and Uganda Vision 2040. Given its cross-sectoral nature, tourism can only grow sustainably if it is integrated into each country and the East African Community’s overall economic, social, and physical planning policies.

Open dialogue between the governments, the private sector and civil society, is needed to ensure consensual decisions and full implementation of the Common Market Protocol (CMP).

To Fastrack and fully tap the potential of Tourism to lead the East Africa Community member states economic development agenda, it was necessary to create a regional platform to drive an effective coordination mechanism by way of Public-Private Dialogue and partnerships. It is against this background that, in 2011, key stakeholders led by TradeMark East Africa (TMEA) PSO/CSO programme established partnerships with key private sector tourism actors in the region to develop the East African Tourism Platform.

The East Africa Tourism Platform was therefore established in July 2011and became operational on 2nd April 2012 with start-up funding from Trademark East Africa.  TradeMark East Africa (TMEA) is a not-for-profit organization funded by a range of development agencies to promote regional trade and economic integration in East Africa by working closely with East African Community (EAC) institutions, national governments, and business and civil society organizations.

In 2015, EATP was registered as a company limited by guarantee without share capital, registered under the Companies Act section 486 laws Kenya. With Mission, to promote intra and inter-regional tourism through advocacy, marketing, skills development, research, and information sharing.

II. Objectives and scope of the work

The EATP Coordinator will be responsible for coordinating the establishment of a strategic workplan to address key constraints faced by the Tourism and hospitality sector across the region aligned to Marketing unfavorable tourism business policies, unskilled labor force, limited access to investment financing, and among others, variations in industry standards across the EAC member countries.

III. Duration of the contract

The assignment will run for 18 Months effective January 2021.

IV.   Duty station

The EATP Coordinator will be based in Kigali Rwanda.

V.  Position Summary and Responsibilities

The EATP Technical Coordinator is the focal lead to the establishment of the EATP with Senior Management responsibility of establishing and enhancing key partnerships, increasing the EATP Grant Portfolio and generating Business opportunities for EATP members.

S/he will lead the planning, design, development, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation of EATP and programs and ensuring the quality of projects, implementation, donor reporting, and maintain field-level management at highest standards.

The EATP Technical Assistant will work to translate regional tourism vision and strategy into results ensuring project design and implementation are geared towards achieving scale and impact, attracting funding to diversify funding resources and that the project implementation processes respond to EATP growth need to strengthen partnerships that lead to business development, improving marketing and increasing sales from the tourism and hospitality industry among Member countries.

Core Responsibilities:

Enhance and establish new strategic partnerships, including identifying and working with prospective partners to design proposals (including helping determine the goals of the grant, its activities, expected results, indicators of success and budget), undertaking due diligence of potential partners and projects. Identify needs for business development approaches, plan and implement aligned activities that include but not limited to, financing access plans, customer relationships, business Intelligence to enhance sustainable tourism and hospitality trends.

Contribute to the implementation of EATP Strategic Activities, ensuring that they aligned to the Strategic Workplan.

Manage, monitor and coordinate a portfolio of partners, including reviewing financial and narrative reporting from partners; driving, challenging and holding partners accountable for project deliverables and deadlines.

Engage with partners/grantees to review opportunities; challenges and advances interventions through collaboration, learning, exchange and strategic partnerships.

Provide perspective and expertise on emerging issues and trends aligned to Business Development, Strategic Marketing, financing and entrepreneurship, with a particular focus on Strategic Markets.

Serve as a point of contact and collaborator, supporting the Directors and Program coordinators, across a range of partners; including donors, government officials, and private sector leaders on issues of common concern to leverage positive impact toward common goals.

Together with the team and other partners, work towards maximizing the potential of grant opportunities and bilateral aid available at a national level to broker aligned, harmonized resources to address community priorities and resources for civil society organizations and communities, including for community systems strengthening.

Ensure that technical and Operation reports are generated in a quality and timely manner, and Communicating progress and learnings from projects to colleagues and partners.

Coordinates interaction with donors across the Secretariat, notably Grant Management, in support of overall resource mobilization activities. Further frequently interacts with PSF Procurement, Communications, and Finance to ensure alignment with internal and external policies and procedures.

More specifically, the primary duties and responsibilities aligned to this role will include but not limited to:

Program Strategy, Management, & Development

• Participate in EATP and regional level strategic planning and contribute to the sustainable management of program growth with an eye towards program growth and development.
• Enabling and overseeing the effective, efficient, and timely implementation of all projects according to agreed contracts, budgets, policies and in accordance with specific donor requirements.
• Ensure that relevant beneficiary data is collected, compiled, analyzed, and distributed and that appropriate assessment are conducted in the project areas of focus.
• Lead the planning and development of concept papers, budgets, and project proposals with support from line EATP team.
• Provide regular internal and external reports, and other relevant information on programme activities, policy matters and external relations.
• Support the Technical team to ensure effective coordination and visibility of the implementation of the projects with all humanitarian and development actors.

 Fundraising, Grant proposals writing & reporting processes

• Lead funding opportunities for all projects in all EATP areas of competence and coordinate the activities of the program managers, budget holders, and SMT to identify and materialize opportunities in alignment within Rwanda and regional strategies ensuring that all new funding opportunities and proposals reflect the existing capacities and strategy of the EATP Business Models.
• Lead and oversee the drafting of concept notes, proposals, and donor reports by program managers (including budgets for cost-related activities) in coordination with support departments in compliance with EATP partner
• Ensure all concept notes and project proposals are well written, professionally presented, have undergone technical review by relevant sector focal points, are reflective of best practices and are in line with EATP strategy as well as broader regional and global strategies of the organization. This responsibility may entail support in designing and coordinating needs assessments and other research initiatives.
• Oversee the work of the program support function, and the budgeting coordinator to make sure timely and coherent budget preparation for all new proposals and budget revisions.
• Ensure timely and targeted communication and information flow to all relevant internal and external parties in coordination with the tourism sector, private sector and other regional stakeholders to remain informed about program achievements.

Program Staff Management and Capacity Building

• Effectively manage program teams, including managers, specialists and technical experts across the country with an emphasis on program implementation excellence, learning, creativity, and innovation that promote tourism and hospitality business in Rwanda.
• Lead and manage the programme department staff including people planning, recruitment, objective setting, performance reviews, well-being, and development
• Conduct annual staff performance reviews, ensuring that poor performance is identified and corrective measures are put in place to develop staff capacity and encourage improvements
• Collaborate closely with the Director of Finance and Administration to allocate funding for staff development, performance management, and team-building processes.

Stakeholders’ Liaison, Partnerships, and Representation

• Cultivate key relationships that enhance EATP visibility, credibility and notoriety in across all stakeholders in Rwanda and East Africa.
• Identify local partners with whom to cooperate and partner with focusing on creating a more favorable business environment for the T&H sector.

Implementation & Coordination:  

• Provide oversight, guidance, and leadership to all aspects of EATP in-country and regional projects implementation
• Ensure effective and transparent budget follow up, planning, and use of financial resources in coordination with the Area Managers (budget holders), in compliance with EATP Partner policies and priorities.
• Effectively stay abreast of donor policies, procedures, rules, and regulations; and train EATP program staff in these policies, developing guidelines and ensuring kick-off meetings to ensure compliance with donor rules and regulations.

Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability, and Learning

• Business Intelligence: lead all key business consultancies, focusing on creating business opportunities for the EATP and counterpart regional members: this will include analyzing and presenting key information gathered from diverse sources.
• Coordinates policy development, including the review and analysis of issues and trends, preparation of evaluations, or other research activities and studies.
• Design and ensure the implementation of effective and participatory program monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning strategies at all levels of the EATP strategic plan.
• Ensure that all projects contribute to measuring impact and are in line with EATP strategic plan.
• Ensure quality programming by coordinating the technical support and contributing to the development of M&E tools and indicators and other quality improvement for various business initiatives
• Promote learning and knowledge management within the EATP strategic
• Document lessons learned and best practices for dissemination within EATP Members and EAC Region counterparts to donors and to other stakeholders when relevant in order ensure synergetic programming and cross-program collaboration in EATP Rwanda and in the whole region.
• Supervise monitoring and evaluation of the operations to ensure the overall implementation is in accordance with agreed work plans, donor agreements, and humanitarian accountability framework.
• Develop appropriate monitoring, tracking, and reporting systems, tools, and templates that enhance monitoring of programme outputs and quality, generate quality evidence on program impact and promote and ensure use of data for decision-making processes/ program adjustments.

VI.         Required Candidate Profile:

To be successful in this role, the suitable candidate will possess the following:

• Master’s degree in Tourism and Hospitality Management
• Over 8 years of progressively responsible experience in tourism and hospitality; preferably in areas such as Tourism promotion Businesses, Tourism Destination Marketing, public-private partnerships, management consulting;
• Good understanding of critical issues faced by the Tourism and Hospitality Industry in the East African Community region; with the ability to generate relevant intervention proposals.
• Demonstrate experience and skill in proposal development, budget development, program implementation, monitoring, and evaluation.
• Proven experience in senior public or private sector with a focus on tourism for at least 5 years
• Proven experience in donor funds and effectively coordinating various projects with the private sector, government, international, and national NGOs and Corporate
• Excellent writing, presentation, and interpersonal communication skills across a range of stakeholders, including the private sector or government institutions.
• Substantial experience in business development, and/or developing public-private partnerships with a successful track record in the Tourism and Hospitality related activities across multiple contexts in a multi-cultural
• Ability to assess the viability of Tourism and Hospitality business opportunities and risks;
• Track record in developing and maintaining strong high-level relationships in the private sector, relevant governments, and development institutions;
• Demonstrable understanding and ability to enable and participant in market creation opportunities and interventions to strengthen tourism Business investment
• Ability to represent the EATP externally with the private sector, government, development partners, media, and other stakeholders;
• Team player with strong leadership and influencing skills, and track record in working in a matrix structure; Strong client service orientation; Ability to resolve challenging issues;
• Excellent critical thinking, analytical and presentation skills, and ability to work with or supervise the use of data utilizing standard office software Excel, Word, PowerPoint; among others.
• Excellent written and oral communication skills in English is required; working knowledge of French and Swahili is a strong added advantage.

VII.        Application procedures

• The application should contain the following:
• A detailed CV indicating education background/professional qualifications, all experience, as well as the contact details (email and telephone number) of the candidate and at least three (3) professional references;
• Brief description of why the individual considers him/herself as the most suitable for the assignment.

HOW TO APPLY: Interested candidates should submit their application letters, CVs with three references and notarized degrees to the Director of Human Resource on humanresources@psf.org.rw not later than 15 January 2021 at 23:59

EATP Project Assistant at Private Sector Federation (PSF): (Deadline 15 January 2021)                                            

   Background and Context

The East Africa Tourism Platform is the apex private sector body for Tourism in East Africa. The East Africa Tourism Platform (EATP) ensures active and focused engagement of the Private sector in the EAC tourism development process, this also coming on the background that the private sector drives tourism largely in each of the EAC Economies. The Platform under the leadership of key tourism leaders in the region motivates and defines private sector participation in the emerging EAC policies and behaviour. It makes the voice of the private sector heard and relevant in the regional integration process, pursuing a common agenda as a sector.

EATP’s Mission is to promote intra and inter-regional tourism through advocacy, marketing, skills development, research and information sharing.

II.  Position Summary

The East Africa Tourism Platform Project Assistant will work under the supervision of the  East Africa Tourism Platform Coordinator and will undertake tasks related to promoting and strengthening the EATP programs.

The EATP Project Assistant will support the EATP Coordinator to ensure regional tourism vision and strategy into results, ensuring project design and implementation are geared towards achieving scale and impact, attracting funding to diversify funding resources and that the project implementation processes respond to EATP growth need to strengthen partnerships that lead to business development, improving marketing and increasing sales from the tourism and hospitality industry among Member countries.

Core Responsibilities:

• Contribute to the ongoing development and implementation of EATP Strategic Activities, ensuring that they are aligned to the Strategic Workplan.
• Monitor and coordinate a portfolio of partners, including reviewing financial and narrative reporting from partners; driving, challenging and holding partners accountable for project deliverables and deadlines.
• Engage with partners/grantees to review opportunities; challenges and advances interventions through collaboration, learning, exchange and strategic partnerships.

• Provide perspective and expertise on emerging issues and trends aligned to Business Development, Strategic Marketing, financing and entrepreneurship, with a particular focus on Strategic Markets.
• Serve as a point of contact and collaborator, supporting the EATP coordinator, across a range of partners; including donors, government officials, and private sector leaders on issues of common concern to leverage positive impact toward common goals.
• Together with the team and other partners, work towards maximizing the potential of grant opportunities and bilateral aid available at the national level to broker aligned, harmonized resources to address community priorities and resources for civil society organizations and communities, including for community systems strengthening.
• Ensure that technical and Operation reports are generated in a quality and timely manner, and Communicating progress and learnings from projects to the EATP Coordinator and partners.
• Support interaction with donors across the Secretariat, notably Grant Management, in support of overall resource mobilization activities. Further frequently interacts with PSF Procurement, Communications, and Finance to ensure alignment with internal and external policies and procedures.
• Determine personnel, supplies, equipment, and other resources needed for the project.
• Assist in establishing criteria and measurable for success or completion of the project.
• Nurture relationships with the regional private sector apex body for tourism  and other stakeholders

 QUALIFICATIONS AND REQUIREMENTS

• Proven 5 + years’ experience in a project management role.
• Proven track record of excellent performance related to private sector development.
• At least a Bachelor’s degree in Tourism or a related field, e.g. Business administration, Social Sciences, Public relations, Communication, Project Management

• Excellent writing, presentation, and interpersonal communication skills across a range of stakeholders, including the private sector, CSOs, INGOs or government institutions.

• Excellent verbal and written communication and presentation skills.
• Proficiency in standard Microsoft Office tools (MS Word, Excel and PowerPoint);
• Business English proficiency is a must, with abilities to make conduct meetings in Kinyarwanda; and a working knowledge of  French would be an added value.
• Excellent Communication: Demonstrated ability to articulate Chamber/Associations  mission and program objectives persuasively

• Versatility and good judgment:
• Accountability: Demonstrated commitment to personal responsibility and value for equity
• Influence: Strong leadership and influencing skills, with the ability to engage key stakeholders
• Project management: Multi-tasking, project management, and decision-making skills
• Agility: Flexible, results-oriented, and able to work in a project-driven environment

HOW TO APPLY: Interested candidates should submit their application letters, CVs with three references, and notarized degrees to the Director of Human Resource on humanresources@psf.org.rw not later than 15 January 2021 at 23:59