Community of Practices and Content Development Expert at Smart Africa Secretariat: (Deadline 11 January 2024)

Community of Practices and Content Development Expert at Smart Africa Secretariat: (Deadline 11 January 2024)

Terms of Reference 

Recruitment 

• Position: Community of Practices and Content Development Expert 
• Duration: Fixed Term, renewable
• Location: Kigali, Rwanda
• Deadline: January 11^th 2024 at 11:00 PM Kigali (GMT+2) time

1. Background and context

Smart Africa is an alliance of 39 African countries, international organisations and global private sector players tasked with Africa’s digital agenda. The alliance is empowered by a bold and innovative commitment by African Heads of State to accelerate sustainable socio-economic development on the continent and usher Africa into the knowledge economy through affordable access to broadband and the use of ICTs.

With a vision to create a single digital market in Africa by 2030, the Smart Africa Alliance brings together Heads of State who seek to accelerate the digitalization of the continent and create a common market. Launched in 2013 by seven (7) African Heads of State, the Alliance now has 39 member countries, representing over 1 billion people and over 50 Private Sector members committed to the vision and the advancement of Africa.

Smart Africa aims to put ICT at the Center of the National Socio-economic development agenda of member countries, improve access to ICT, especially Broadband, improve accountability, efficiency and openness through ICT. It promotes the introduction of advanced technologies in telecommunication while putting the Private Sector first, and leveraging ICT to promote sustainable development.

The Alliance promotes digital transformation by building digital infrastructure, supporting entrepreneurship, fostering innovation, developing human capital, driving digitization, and advocating the development of policies and regulations that support the growth of the digital economy and digital technologies. Recognizing the need for strong capacity building efforts to achieve AU’s goals for digital transformation, the Alliance established the Smart Africa Digital Academy (SADA), adopted during the Smart Africa Alliance ninth Board Meeting Resolution 5, as a vehicle to implement its capacity building and skills development activities across member states, through the establishment of regional and national digital academies.

SADA ensures that policymakers, business leaders, and the wider African population develop the digital skills and knowledge necessary to participate in the digital economy and take advantage of new opportunities. SADA recognized the importance of strong policies and regulations and the need to equip policymakers and regulators to design and implement effective digital policies and regulations. Through collaborative efforts with the World Bank and GIZ, SADA has, in its phase 1, trained over 8000 beneficiaries, out of which over 5000 are Africa’s Policy and Decision makers.  SADA has also implemented National Digital Academies across 12 African countries.

Visit https://sada.smartafrica.org/ for more information about the Smart Africa Digital Academy

2. Digital Transformation for Africa/ Western Africa Regional Digital Integration Program (DTfA/ WARDIP) SOP-1 

The DTfA/ WARDIP SOP-1 is a regional project with financing from the International Development Asociaton (IDA) covering two continental entities, AU and Smart Africa, one REC, ECOWAS and four countries, The Gambia, Guinea. Guinea-Bissau and Mauritania. The DTfA/ WARDIP SOP-1 aims to increase broadband access and usage in participating countries and to advance the integration of digital markets in Western Africa.

The project is designed around the three distinct but interconnected layers of the SDM framework. The three market layers are (i) a single connectivity market, removing barriers to regional telecom infrastructure and services deployment; (ii) a single data market, enabling the secure exchange and processing of data across borders; and (iii) a single online market, allowing the access and delivery of public and private services online and digital trade across borders.

At the continental level the project will support AU´s strategic vision of creating an SDM in Africa by 2030 through the development of appropriate policies and regulations for coordinated digital transformation in Africa. A key element will be a comprehensive training program open to policy and decision makers as well as regulators from all countries in Africa to be implemented by Smart Africa through its Smart Africa Digital Academy (SADA). The training will ensure that participants are updated on digitalization and address the new policies and regulations underpinning single digital markets, with focus on agile regulation, data economy and green digital. This will also foster common knowledge, competencies, and peer-learning to design and implement digital policies and regulations.

The subcomponent of the WARDIP-SOP1 project to be implemented by Smart Africa aims at a rapid-scaling of the Smart Africa Digital Academy (SADA) program at both regional and continental levels by leveraging on the existing SADA implementation, AReg4DT program, and developing a replicable implementation model that caters for the specific needs and the regional context. The overall aim is to establish a new generation of policymakers and regulators across Africa, who are individually knowledgeable on how to harness the potential of green and inclusive digital transformation through new approaches to policy and regulation, and who collectively contribute to the establishment of a Single Digital Market in Africa. With this aim, the scale-up will reach 30,000 unique policymakers and decision makers from all countries in Africa, with a core group of 5,000 being trained in person towards creating a safe, inclusive and sustainable single digital market for Africa, with a participation level of females at 40%. The use of self-paced learning and train-the-trainer approaches are both aimed at further enhancing the reach of the program to propagate new knowledge and new practices across the entire ecosystem including the private sector, academia and in some cases the general public.

In line with the vision of Smart Africa, the program aims to provide foundational knowledge and competencies for the current and future digital policy makers to design, draft and implement digital policies and regulations required to promote a vibrant (i.e, competitive), safe, inclusive and sustainable (i.e., affordable and green) digital transformation that will, in turn, foster the creation of a secured Single Digital Market in Africa with focus on Agile regulation, the data economy and green digital.

In this Phase, SADA builds communities of policy and decision makers in identified domains to foster collaboration, knowledge sharing and learning opportunities. This will be supported by cautiously developed content on various digital transformation streams such as agile regulations, green digital and data economy. To achieve this target, SADA invites suitably qualified experts to indicate their interest in overseeing the development of Community of Practices and contents as part of the DTfA/ WARDIP SOP-1 implementation, as Community of Practices and Content Development Expert.  

3. Duties and Responsibilities   

The Community of Practice and Content Development Expert will foster collaboration, knowledge sharing, and learning within a community of current and future policy and Decision-makers, who share a common interest and set of challenges in a specific Digital transformation domain. The Expert will also oversee the creation, design and development of appropriate courses using the required instructional designing methods to support identified needs from our policy and decision makers ecosystem. The responsibilities of a Community of Practice and Content Development expert include the following:

Community Building and Leadership:

• Develop strategies to build a strong sense of community and belonging among its members, encouraging networking and relationship-building among community members.
• Provide leadership to guide the community towards achieving its goals and objectives and facilitate meetings and discussions within the community to encourage active participation and collaboration.

Learning Development and Knowledge Management:

• Identify learning needs within the community and coordinate relevant learning opportunities such as workshops, webinars, peer learning or training sessions.
• Facilitate the sharing of best practices, insights, and knowledge among community members.
• Help create and maintain a repository of knowledge resources, documents, and information.

 Content Development and Management

• Develop a content strategy aligned with the goals and interests of the stakeholders and policy makers and decision makers.
• Creation of valuable and relevant content that meets the needs of community members.
• Plan and organize the creation and development of learning modules and curriculum to support the scale up phase of SADA
• Oversee the entire content and curriculum development process, from initial planning to implementation, within the stipulated timelines, budgets and resources allocated effectively.
• Work with the required consultancy firm to ensure quality and consistency of course contents by establishing and enforcing the required industry standards, review processes, and feedback mechanisms.

Collaboration and Evaluation

• Maintain a clear communication with team members, stakeholders, and senior management on the progress, updates, and challenges relating to the operation of the community of practices and the development of the required courses and modules
• Establish key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure the success and impact of the community.
• Analyze data and feedback to assess the effectiveness of content created in accordance with the community needs.
• design, creation of SADA courses using Conduct needs assessment to understand the target audience, and establishe the learning objectives, goals and standards required to Identify learning needs within the community and coordinate relevant learning opportunities such as workshops, webinars, peer learning or training sessions.
• Facilitate the sharing of best practices, insights, and knowledge among community members.

Others:

• Supervise and provide support to the implementation team, including coaching and technical capacity building.
• Any other duties as assigned by the Supervisor.

4. Key qualifications

Education: 

• Minimum of Master’s degree in Computer Sciences, Information Technology, ICT Management and Business development, Community Management, Education Development, ICT Management, or related.
• A minimum of Ten (10) years leading and coordinating high quality ICT digital transformation projects.
• At least Four (4) years of experience in community management and content creation or curation.
• Solid experience in project and team management, previous experience in organizational development.

Experience:

• Ten (10) years’ experience in the management and implementation of digital development projects.
• A good understanding of the basic building blocks and experience in digital transformation.
• A good understanding of the community development needs and requirements.
• Experience working with digital development donors and the private sector and drafting, editing, and proof-reading concept notes, strategies, and projects documents.
• Team management experience and ability to work as a team player.
• Sound working knowledge of the ICT Sector, with preference to content development and community management.
• Experience in preparing technical specifications, request for proposals and terms of reference.
• Experience in project supervision of consultants and contractors.
• Experience in recruiting, managing, motivating, and monitoring staff members and consultants.
• Training and/or relevant experience in project monitoring and evaluation.

Knowledge and skills: 

• Advanced ability to conceptualize, plan and implement ideas and concepts clearly and concisely orally as well as in writing.
• Demonstrated experience in developing programs and projects proposals
• Organization and Planning Skills
• Leadership and Problem-solving skills
• Well-developed Interpersonal Skills Creativity/Innovation skills
• Excellent written and verbal English and French communication skills
• Strong analytical and evaluating skills with the ability to generate reports
• Self-starter, flexible and can work independently.
• Team spirit, respect for diversity and confidentiality.

5. Duration of the assignment

The appointment will be three (3) years renewable subject to availability of fund and performance.

6. Duty Station

The position will be based in Kigali, Rwanda.

7. Reporting 

The Community of Practice and content Development Expert will report to the Director – Digital Infrastructure, Skills and Empowerment.

8. Application Instructions and Deadline

Candidates should send the following documents to this email address: hr@smartafrica.org, with mention of “Community of Practices and Content Development Expert” in the subject line:

• A detailed CV with 3 contacts of professional referees.
• A one-page cover letter with a motivation statement in relation to the responsibilities and requirements for this position.
• Copies of academic degree, professional certificates, and other relevant training certificates

The deadline for submitting applications is January 11^th 2024 at 11:00 PM Kigali (GMT+2) time.

Only selected candidates will be contacted for an interview.

Any late application will be automatically rejected.

We look forward to receiving your applications!!!