1. BACKGROUND AND OVERVIEW

CARE’s vision is to seek a world of hope, inclusion, and social justice; where poverty has been overcome and people live in dignity and security. CARE[1] puts gender equality, diversity, and inclusion at the centre of all we do because we know that we cannot overcome poverty and social injustice until all people have equal rights and opportunities.  CARE’s Vision2030 places gender equality at the heart of our ambitions and it radiates through all our work at the level of individuals, teams, the organisation, our programs and our partnerships.

CARE International (CI) is among the world’s largest international non-governmental humanitarian relief and development Confederations. Drawing on its 75 years of experience, through its 21 Members, Candidates and Affiliate, as both a practitioner and thought leader, CI’s work reaches over 100 countries worldwide to save lives, defeat poverty and achieve social justice.

At the core of the Confederation is a small, globally distributed Secretariat, which provides coordination and support to its members in many areas as governance, strategic planning, communications, membership development and accountability, advocacy, humanitarian response, and program development. CARE International is committed to gender equality and inclusion, gender justice, human rights and women’s and girls’ empowerment. This commitment is manifested at the individual and team level as well as in our programming, communications, fundraising and advocacy.

2. POSITION SUMMARY

The role of the Head of Global Advocacy is three-fold:

• to line manage Secretariat based advocacy staff and promote a culture of strategic and impactful advocacy across CARE
• to lead the Secretariat’s function and coordinate members to achieve common advocacy impact goals and shared global priorities and campaigns
• and to represent the confederation and advocate for change in line with CARE’s advocacy impact goals.

The post holder will work with CARE advocacy networks and ensure their collective plans build on success and learning from CARE’s experience and the experience partners and peers. The post holder will also ensure that CARE is proactive in developing and seizing opportunities to cede space to and amplify the voices and experiences of CARE partners and colleagues in the Global South, particularly women led and women’s rights organisations.

CARE is an interdependent confederation with a lean centre, advocacy responsibilities are shared across the Confederation and managed by members, so the role facilitates, coordinates and ensures global coherence. The role offers an exciting opportunity to grow and build CARE’s ability to deliver on its mission and global strategy.

3. MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES – specifically but not limited to

Team management and embedding a strategic and impactful advocacy culture – approx. 40%:

• Effectively performance manage the CI Secretariat Advocacy team, including recruitment, objective setting, feedback and performance appraisal and management and staff development.
• Work closely with member-based CARE Global Advocacy teams to accelerate national and regional advocacy in the Global South in line with programme goals.
• Work with the CI-Secretary General, , Programme Director and across advocacy teams to support a positive and growing advocacy culture within CARE.
• Work closely with global Humanitarian and Program Teams to embed advocacy strategically and operationally into our programs and ensure it is adequately resourced and responds contextually to country and regional priorities
• Work closely with the CI Secretariat Head of Communications to develop an integrated approach across our public engagement work.

Facilitate, coordinate and provide direction for global coherence across CARE’s advocacy agenda – approx. 40%:

• Work with program and advocacy leaders within CARE to develop and coordinate an impactful global advocacy and campaign strategy in line with CARE’ goals putting the voices of marginalised women, girls and their communities at the centre and driving policy change that positively impacts their lives.
• Convene and motivate CARE’s global advocacy community to prioritise, work plan and coordinate implementation ensuring that CARE’s advocacy is connected and coordinated across the Confederation, consistent with our shared goals.
• Ensure that the Advocacy Community is proactively tracking and measuring the impact of its advocacy, learning from experience and adapting approaches to maximise impact.
• Work closely with the Communications team to ensure that communication (including for marketing and fundraising) is coherent with our advocacy goals and to develop advocacy calls to action and compelling stories.
• Support the Confederation to keep track of policy trends, develop effective policy analysis and translate this into effective advocacy positions and strategies in line with CARE’s Vision 2030 goals.
• Oversee and ensure appropriate sign-off for CARE-wide advocacy positions including within public statements and support the Confederation to balance risk, speed and impact.
• Enable the effective use of research, knowledge and programmatic evidence to underpin, inform and strengthen policy asks.
• Support CARE to develop a wide range of advocacy approaches, including applying new technology and campaigning.

Global representation, advocacy and positioning – approx. 15%:

• Represent CARE at high level fora where appropriate and/or support effective representation by partners, women-led organizations or key senior advocates across CARE to represent and influence effectively.
• Support the Confederation to deliver powerful interventions and inputs into relevant key global processes - e.g. CSW, Women Deliver, G7, Grand Bargain, UNGA, UNFCCC COP, World Bank annual meetings -  that will improve the lives of the most marginalized women and girls.
• Maintain and build strategic advocacy alliances with key external partners, including peer organizations, organizations and partners from the Global South and particularly women led and women rights organizations, feminist movements, multilateral bodies, and private sector partners.

Inclusion and Safeguarding – approx. 5%

• Promote, create and maintain a diverse and inclusive organisation where a culture of curiosity, learning and trust is the foundation for all teams and different backgrounds, experiences and opinions are encouraged
• Promote, create and maintain a safe organisational culture, including championing the CI Safeguarding Policy and preventing sexual misconduct, within the CI Secretariat and as part of your overall role and wider responsibilities across the CI Confederation.
• Ensure that all direct team members are aware of their responsibilities with the CI Safeguarding Policy commitments, including signing of the Safeguarding Policy and Code of Conduct, and completing induction and refresher trainings.

4. KEY WORKING RELATIONSHIPS

Internal:

• Advocacy Working Group
• Advocacy Working Group core team
• Member based advocacy staff
• CARE International Secretary General
• CARE International Program Director
• CARE International Head of Global Communications
• Senior Leadership Team Program Quality and Impact
• Strategic Leadership Team Organisational Development and Accountability, Strategic
• Leadership Team Fundraising & Mobilization
• Member based program leadership
• Humanitarian Working Group
• Communication Working Group

External:

• Global women-led and women’s rights organisations and feminist movements
• Peer Advocacy leaders in international NGOs
• Multi-lateral agencies such as UN

5. QUALIFICATIONS (Key Selection criteria)

Essential technical competencies for the role:

• Commitment to gender equality and to defending women and girls’ rights combined with demonstrable experience working on gender policy. Demonstrated ability and commitment to apply gender and diversity strategies within advocacy work and team management.
• Experience developing and implementing high impact advocacy campaigns and strategies that integrate lobbying, research, media and other approaches and tools in order to influence governments and other decision-making bodies.
• An ability to provide strong policy development and strategic analysis on multilateral policy issues and a strong understanding of the multilateral institutions and processes and how to influence them.
• Ability to balance vision, strategy and pragmatism.
• Strong interpersonal and facilitation skills that include experience with coordination, mediation, consensus-building and working well with diverse groups within a global confederation.
• Strong people and project-management skills with experience working in diverse alliances – a proven ability to build bridges and break down siloes.
• Outstanding communications skills, including the ability to communicate effectively in writing in English in a succinct and compelling way.
• Demonstrable experience of effectively representing complex issues before high level decision-makers, colleagues, media and the general public
• Good coordination and organization skills with an ability to prioritise and handle a large amount of information.
• Adaptability and commitment to work within a small, flexible team.
• Ability to work under pressure to tight deadlines.
• Experience living and working in a Global South context.
• Diversity: A global citizen that seeks inspiration through working with diverse individuals and teams
• Inclusion: Committed to a just world where all people live in dignity and security and equality is a reality

Education or work experience:

• Degree level education (postgraduate degree level required or equivalent professional experience) with significant international advocacy experience in the international development/ humanitarian/human rights sector.
• At least ten years in a senior team leadership role.

 Languages:  As a global organisation we celebrate those that can bring different languages to the workplace. Our official working language is English, and fluencey is required. However fluency in our other working languages Arabic, French and Spanish are also an advantage.

 CARE International is committed to preventing all unwanted behaviour and all forms of misconduct at work, including fraud and corruption and sexual harassment, exploitation and abuse, and child abuse. Everyone who works for CARE is expected to share this commitment and work within CARE International’s Safeguarding Policy and sign our Safeguarding Code and Conduct.

CARE International is committed to a safe recruitment process to help attract and appoint the right staff for the role and responsibilities set out in the vacancy notice. All offers of employment will be subject to satisfactory references and appropriate screening checks, which can include criminal records and terrorism finance checks.  We will seek at least two references, one of which must be your most recent employer. In addition, we participate in the Misconduct Disclosure Scheme and will request information from job applicants’ previous employers, about any findings of sexual exploitation, sexual abuse, child abuse and/or sexual harassment during employment or incidents under investigation when the applicant left employment.  By applying, you confirm your understanding and agreement of these checks.

HOW TO APPLY

Interested and qualified candidates should submit their CVs and a brief covering letter of interest in English to cirecruitment@careinternational.org by May 19, 2023.  Only short-listed candidates will be contacted. Only candidates with the relevant work authorization will be considered.

More Information on CARE International is available at www.careinternational.org.

CARE puts gender equality and social justice at the front of our work. We seek to ensure that who we are as an organisation reflects our vision of a world where ALL people can live in dignity and security.  Our diversity is our strength. We encourage people from all backgrounds, nationalities, abilities, beliefs, genders, and experiences to apply.

[1] Throughout the guidance, the term organisation is used to represent the combined total of the confederation, CARE is a confederation of independent globally connected organisation. CARE is not one single organisation; membership is diverse and we are seeking to further diversify it.