FRIENDS IN VILLAGE DEVELOPMENT BANGLADESH (FIVDB)
ROLE PROFILE

Coordinator – Participatory Rural Appraisal  Coordinator (19)
TEAM/PROGRAMME: USAID HICRA
 LOCATION: TBD Unions within Cox’s Bazar and CHT Districts 
GRADE: VII
 POST TYPE: 4 months with possibility to extend

INTRODUCTION:

Cox’s Bazar, Bandarban, Rangamati and Khagrachari districts are among the lowest ranked in Bangladesh for education, skills training, food security, poverty and agricultural productivity. The situation has worsened since 2017, with the Rohingya refugee influx, which has put enormous pressure on the local economies, resulting in loss of livelihoods, depressed local wages, and distorted local markets. Moreover, these districts are prone to chronic and rapid onset disasters.
In response, the USAID Host and Impacted Communities Resilience Activity (HICRA) led by Friends In Village Development Bangladesh (FIVDB) is taking an integrated approach to improve the overall well-being and resilience of people residing in the communities hosting or impacted by the Rohingya refugee crisis.  This includes implementing livelihoods; water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH); natural resource management (NRM); and disaster risk reduction (DRR) interventions with an estimated 114,000 households across the four prioritized districts.

ROLE
The Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) Coordinator responsible for leading a team that will carry out the PRA at the community level which forms part of the process required for HICRA participant selection. This includes using leading teams of technical and frontline staff (field facilitators and community mobilizers) to carry out a series of qualitative PRA tools including community mapping, wealth ranking, etc. followed by a quantitative household survey. The process is designed to identify poor and extreme poor members of the community, along with existing water and sanitation sources, livelihoods engagement and disaster-related risks. The process will be inclusive and equitable to ensure community buy-in. This short term position will lead the process for his/her respective unions,  training, coaching and mentoring the frontline staff to conduct the related processes, including piloting and leading several of the PRAs directly with the communities.  S/he will also plan and track progress and coordinate closely with the MEL team.

SCOPE OF ROLE:
Reports to: Coordinator MEL
Dimensions:  At least 50% field visit,
Staff directly indirectly reporting to this post: None
Key contacts: MEL Team, Technical Coordinators, Technical Officers,  Upazila Coordinators, Area Coordinators, Field Facilitators, Community Mobilizers

Main Areas of Responsibilities.

  • Support the training of all frontline staff to carry out the PRA protocols
  • Collaborate with local stakeholders - government officials, community leaders, etc. to establish report and orient them HICRA, the PRA and participant selection process
  • Work with district, union and upazila teams to effectively carry out the PRA
  • Work with Field Facilitators and Community Mobilizer to:
    • Orient communities and build rapport
    • Organise sessions with required to conduct the social mapping, transect walk, conduct survey, etc.
    • Map communities to identify the boundaries number of households, and key landmarks such as water, latrines, commercial enterprises, government offices, existing groups (water user group, community management organization, VSLA, etc.) roads, as well as natural features such as forests, degraded land, rivers, floodplains, etc.
    • Conduct a wealth ranking exercises
    • Identify individuals and household engaged in Government of Bangladesh or other Donor Programs similar to HICRA’s Ultra Poor Graduation Approach, homestead food production, high value commodities, IGAs, etc.
    • Categorise families by wealth, e.g., poor and extreme poor
    • Collect demographic data from households to validate wealth ranking/categorization and populate HICRA’s database with all relevant data needed for contextualizing and properly offering effective programming such as age, ethnicity, languages spoken, ownership of assets, access to land, livelihoods
  • Work with MEL team to properly collect and upload data
  • Mentor Field Facilitators to ensure consistency in methodology in all the communities.
  • Provide weekly reports to the Supervisor to report on progress, challenges and solutions
  • Document and share lessons learned to contribute to continuous improvement and knowledge sharing within the program
  • Represent HICRA

Required Qualifications

  • Master’s degree in Social Sciences or a related field
  • Minimum of five years’ experience implementing qualitative research, ideally participatory rapid appraisal tools with marginalized communities to engage extremely poor households 
  • Experience working in MEL, qualitative research, participant selection processes and/or using PRA tools such as wealth ranking, social mapping, etc. (often known as well-being analisis) within a USAID-funded project preferred
  • Experience in planning, tracking and reporting program progress
  • Experience in building capacity of field agents
  • Ability to work effectively with diverse communities, local government representatives, and stakeholders
  • Experience working in Cox’s Bazar and/or Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) with similar programs is highly preferred

Skills:

  • Strong facilitation, relationship and communication skills
  • Ability to facilitate large, diverse groups of people
  • Skills in using and facilitating participatory processes
  • Excellent skills in coordinating, representation, and collaboration skills
  • Ability to work and relate with community members
  • Ability to work with Kobo Toolbox a plus
  • Passionate about taking on challenges, applying innovative approaches and learning
  • Highly versatile, ability to work well under pressure and to manage a variety of issues at the same time
  • Excellent interpersonal and cross-cultural skills.
  • English and Bangla language skills required
  • Additional language skills with one or more regionally spoken language - value added

Competencies:

  • Strong organizational and planning skills
  • Excellent interpersonal and communication abilities
  • Commitment to community development and sustainable financial inclusion
  • Knowledge of monitoring and evaluation practices for community-level programs

SKILLS AND BEHAVIOURS (our Values in Practice)
Respect: We strive to acknowledge the contributions of stakeholders and staff and foster an environment that values dignity.
Diversity: We value, respect, and appreciate the unique talents of every individual and work to remove bias for our decisions and actions in our efforts.
Quality: We value the experience and skills of individuals and support and encourage excellence.
Participation: We empower constituents through active participation, and amplify diverse voices, fostering inclusive decision-making and community-driven development.
Integrity: Committed to improving lives with integrity, we uphold honesty, fairness, and truthfulness in all our actions and decisions.
Do no Harm: We ethically enhance communities' lives across all programmes, ensuring equitable, empowering, and non-exploitative interventions that respect and uplift the vulnerable without reinforcing societal inequalities.

Additional job responsibilities
The duties and responsibilities as set out above are not exhaustive and the role holder may be required to carry out additional duties within reasonableness of their level of skills and experience.

Child Safeguarding:
We need to keep children safe so our selection process, which includes rigorous background checks, reflects our commitment to the protection of children from abuse.

Gender
The role holder is required to carry out the duties in accordance with FIVDB gender policy.

Application Deadline : December 21, 2024