Community Feedback Mechanisms Specialist - Pacific American Fund (PAF) Third Party Monitoring

Job Description

Background

Panagora Group is a social enterprise dedicated to providing high-quality, high-impact international development, global health, and learning consulting. We are a dynamic, woman- and employee-owned small business partner focused on market-based and integrated local solutions that strengthen country capacity and independence; and on learning, communications, and technology solutions to accelerate and heighten the impact.

Panagora provides technical and advisory services related to monitoring, evaluation, research, and learning to USAID under the USAID/Philippines, Pacific Islands, and Mongolia Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning Activity (PIMMELA).

Under the PIMMELA Activity, Panagora will conduct third party monitoring (TPM) of six sites under the USAID/Pacific Islands Pacific American Fund (PAF), implemented by Social Solutions International. PAF is a five-year grant facility that addresses critical development challenges across 12 Pacific Island Countries (PICs), including the Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Republic of Marshall Islands, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu. The goal of PAF is to award and monitor grants that aim to improve the quality of life in the Pacific Islands by increasing climate change and disaster resilience, facilitating sustainable market-driven economic growth, extending access to quality health care and education, and advancing democratic governance. PAF targets local organizations providing local solutions to local issues.

The objective of the TPM task is to provide USAID/Pacific Islands with accurate, verifiable, and impartial data and information on the program outputs, outcomes, progress, quality, challenges, successes, and lessons learned generated through projects or interventions implemented by select group of grantees of PAF located in hard-to-reach areas in the region. A third-party monitoring team will be dispatched to systematically collect performance data and other quantitative/qualitative information to verify whether the implementation of projects managed by grantees are on track and whether expected results are being achieved. This team will act as the eyes and ears of USAID/Pacific Islands in areas that are difficult to access because of limited access due to distance, geography and other issues. The location of projects to be monitored are in the following countries: PNG, Tuvalu, FSM, Tonga and Kiribati.

The TPM task will be carried out by a team of specialists, including a team leader, the community feedback mechanisms specialist, and field monitors.

Position Summary

Panagora Group seeks a community feedback mechanisms specialist to participate in and contribute to the design and implementation of the USAID-PAF TPM task. The specialist will provide expertise in the management of beneficiary feedback mechanisms that enhance inclusion and understanding of how interventions can be more effective, adapted or refined. The position will report to the TPM Team Leader and the PIMMELA Evaluation Advisor.

Responsibilities:

• Support the TPM team leader in all team coordination meetings and consultations with USAID, the PAF team, and selected grantees.
• Support the TPM team leader in the coordination and planning of site visit locations and beneficiary selection.
• Contribute to the drafting and finalization of the TPM workplan and design report. Ensure that the data collection methods, analysis, and tools are adequate to solicit inclusive and appropriate beneficiary feedback to understand how interventions can be more effective, adapted, or refined.
• Participate in data collection and analysis based on the approved TPM design and methodology, specifically looking at how grantees engage beneficiaries and how beneficiaries perceive the grantees’ activities.
• Working with the evaluation team leader, draft site reports for each of the sites monitored, following the agreed upon structure, six weeks after the TPM is completed for a particular site.
• Support the team leader in preparing and facilitating participatory reviews of the site reports to gather feedback and later integrate comments to finalize the site reports.
• Working with the evaluation team leader, draft a TPM Report, six weeks after the last TPM is completed, providing a summary of all findings, conclusions, and recommendations that have emanated from the six sites monitored.
• Support the team leader in preparing and facilitating a learning event to solicit feedback from other stakeholders on the TPM report.
• Support the team leader to incorporate stakeholder feedback to finalize the TPM report for submission to USAID.

Qualifications:

• Bachelors degree in a relevant field of study required, Masters degree preferred
• Minimum 10 years of experience in community development and empowerment sector in the Pacific Islands
• At least five-years experience managing beneficiary accountability mechanisms as an important element of effective development and for advancing transparent and appropriate interventions is preferred
• Proven experience in design and management of beneficiary feedback mechanisms that enhance inclusion and understanding of intervention effectiveness
• Excellent English written and verbal communication skills

About the Organization

A woman-owned small business dedicated to high-quality high-impact international health and development consulting. ‘Pan’ means all, or everyone, or even the god of stewardship. ‘Agora’ is the heart of the city, the central square or market place where everyone congregates, where ideas bubble between people connecting with others, and where the best ideas thrive and spread.

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