ABOUT US

We are an international development organisation putting ingenious ideas to work so people in poverty can change their world.

We help people find solutions to some of the world’s toughest problems. Challenges made worse by catastrophic climate change and persistent gender inequality. We work with communities to develop ingenious, lasting and locally owned solutions for agriculture, water and waste management, climate resilience and clean energy. And we share what works with others, so answers that start small can grow big.

We’re a global change-making group, working with communities who are vulnerable to poverty and climate change to support them to change their world. Together we develop innovative, community powered and locally owned solutions that achieve transformative change in lives and livelihoods. And we work with a range of partners, including governments, business and international organisations to ensure improvements are sustained and scaled and to change the systems that keep people poor and vulnerable.
We were founded in 1966 by radical economist EF Schumacher who challenged the development thinking of the time.  He believed in solutions suited to context, equipping people with the skills and knowledge to change their situation, economic systems that work for all and living within the planets means. This ethos continues to fuel all our work. Schumacher was the author of ‘Small is Beautiful: A study of economics as if people mattered’. In our work we start ‘small’, ensuring we understand what is already working but we aim big focussing on what will deliver the systems change required.

We have over 50 years of experience working across Africa, Asia and Latin America. Our group consists of a UK registered charity with experienced country teams, an expert consulting service and an independent development publishing company. We combine these specialisms to multiply our impact and help shape a world that works better for everyone.

OUR AIMS

We work across four thematic areas. Much of our most impactful work combines our expertise across issues to solve complex and interconnected problems such as supporting smallholder farmers with renewable energy to increase yields and open up bigger opportunities for the wider economy.

Harnessing energy that transforms for the one billion people without electricity, and the three billion people without clean cooking solutions. We’re bringing together rural communities, displaced people, energy providers and decision makers to put clean energy to work. By 2025, our work with partners will have led to affordable, low-carbon energy access and cleaner cooking for two million people in ‘last mile’ communities and 18 million people through wider systems change.

Building resilience that protects for vulnerable people whose lives and livelihoods are threatened by climate-related and natural hazards. We’re working with people threatened by natural and climate related hazards, reducing vulnerability and minimizing the impact on their lives and livelihoods. By 2025, 0ur work with partners will have enhanced risk knowledge systems so that four million people living in hazard-prone, climate-vulnerable communities are better protected.

Making cities fit for people for the millions of people living in urban slums and settlements without proper sanitation, clean water and waste services. Our work with communities is making cities in poorer countries cleaner, healthier, fairer places for people to live and work, with clean water for drinking and sewage safely contained, collected and processed. By 2025, our work with partners will have led to improved water, sanitation and waste management services for one million people living in slum communities and a further 2.4 million people through wider systems change.

Cultivating farming that works for smallholder farmers struggling to make a sufficient income and adapt to the negative effects of climate change. We’re teaming up with smallholder farmers, many of whom are women, so they can adapt to climate change and achieve a good standard of living. By 2025, our work with partners will have improved food security and incomes for two million people in rural communities and a further one million people through wider systems change.

Practical Action
ABOUT THE ROLE

ABOUT THE ROLE  

Reporting to the Asia Regional Director, the Country Director has overall responsibility for shaping and delivering on our ambitious strategy in Bangladesh. They will lead a high performing team to develop and test out ingenious ideas that can address systemic challenges, demonstrate and learn from what works, and inspire others to adopt successful approaches at scale.

In Bangladesh, we work in both a development and humanitarian context supporting communities and government to build resilience to climate change, make cities safer, make farming work for smallholder farmers and use energy to transform lives. We do this through a range of programmes, consultancy services and policy/advocacy work with communities, local authorities and the private sector, national government, academic institutions, other NGOs and donors.

The Country Director will be a dynamic, exemplary leader with the drive and experience to manage change and achieve impact. Entrepreneurship and new ways of thinking and working will be essential in this role as will good knowledge of the country context. Externally oriented with a proven track record of successful fundraising, building and nurturing strategic relationships with partners, development donors, commercial clients and government, the Country Director will strengthen our profile and grow our portfolio to achieve impact.

Internally, the Country Director will ensure sound, high quality management of all programmes, consultancies and operations to meet our standards and those of the donor or client. S/he will drive a focus on quality, results centred delivery and accountability. This will include sound financial management and controls that mitigate risk and ensure that our business model is viable. S/he will have demonstrated experience of managing and mentoring high performing teams and promoting a culture of excellence and professionalism in all we do.

The Country Director is also a member of Practical Action’s global Strategic Leadership Team, contributing to shaping the group’s overall strategic direction and leading on specific global pieces of work. We expect all our teams, and especially our leaders to have a strong commitment to Practical Action’s vision, mission and values and ensure the protection of children and vulnerable adults with whom we work.

SCOPE

ACCOUNTABILITIES

Strategic Leadership

1. Ensure that systems and other strategic analysis leads to identification of most impactful roles and partnerships to achieve our mission in Bangladesh. Ensure that this leads to high quality propositions for programmatic and consultancy work and partnerships.
2. Maintain good understanding of external context and seek and foster opportunities for bold collaboration for work in Bangladesh, and link to work in other countries to maximise our regional and global impact
3. Lead the Senior Management Team in Bangladesh to develop, implement and monitor viable strategic business plans based on entrepreneurial ways of working to achieve impact against Practical Action’s mission.
4. Demonstrate and model strategic leadership qualities and behaviours at all times to foster a culture that values collaboration, dynamism, accountability transparency and learning.
5. Contribute to setting, guiding, and monitoring Practical Action’s global strategic direction and priorities taking into consideration global trends and our capacities, opportunities and risks. 
6. Ensure our ethics and values, as set out in our Code of Conduct and related policies, including safeguarding, are embedded in team culture and well modelled through the leadership team.
7. Ensure that we apply our best practice through our Programme Quality & Delivery framework, using systems analysis, designing for impact and integrating gender, to achieve sustainable impact at scale.
8. Nurture a culture of strategic and purposeful learning across the team to continuously improve our work and inspire others to adopt models that are proven to work.

Generating Income and Nurturing Relationships

1. Foster and lead relationships with partners and development donors that support our fundraising strategy for our programmes. This will require external-facing representation, networking, visibility, creativity and engagement.
2. Provide the vision and leadership for an ambitious but feasible fundraising strategy and plan.
3. Ensure our business development processes align to our strategy, yield high quality design, promote business viability and minimise or mitigate risk.

People, Capabilities and Leadership

1. Create and nurture a culture of collaboration, ingenuity, and engagement with high standards of accountability and performance for maximum impact; measuring success through the employee engagement survey.
2. Undertake business planning to identify the capabilities, accountabilities and structures needed to deliver strategy and ensure that resulting plans are appropriately funded.
3. Develop an effective approach to people and performance through Practical Actions’ Be Your Best (appraisal) process to create strategic alignment of individual objectives, offer focus and feedback on performance and encourage professional learning and growth.
4. Promote activities that enable leadership development for the strategic needs of today and the future.
5. Implement and maintain safeguarding practices relating to our people, partners, programmes and communities in accordance with our global Safeguarding policies and frameworks to create a culture in which safeguarding risks are mitigated and where people feel safe to report concerns.
6. Manage effective approaches to recruitment and reward in accordance with global standards to ensure that we recruit and retain the skills needed for strategic success in a fair and transparent way.
7. Create an inclusive and equitable working environment in which everyone is accepted and respected, regardless of differences and where everyone’s contribution is valued and respected.

Delivering Performance

1. Ensure that the delivery of programmes, influencing and knowledge work in Bangladesh is effective, efficient, timely and compliant with our policies and procedures and those of donors and the Government of Bangladesh.
2. Ensure the financial viability and proper financial management at all times, working with the UK to identify and mitigate any financial risks.
3. Identify, mitigate and manage operational risks and ensure proper functioning of controls in finance, human resources, logistics/procurement, administration, communications, reporting and M&E.
4. Be accountable for monitoring, achieving and reporting on global KPIs, impact and project indicators, promoting a culture of continuous learning to improve accountability and impact.
5. Be accountable for findings and recommendations from evaluations and actively promote their use in improving the quality of and learning from our programmes.
6. Be accountable for all audit findings and ensure that recommendations are implemented.
7. Be accountable for overall safety & security management, ensuring that policies and procedures are consistently applied. 

Strengthen Organisational Profile

1. Actively enhance Practical Action’s visibility and impact through strategic partnerships, representation, communications and engagement with government, non-government, and private sector actors, as well as the media.  
2. Ensure that all our endeavours accrue maximum benefit to enhance Practical Action’s local and global reputation and brand awareness.
3. Manage Practical Action’s reputation, combining global and local reputational perspectives to identify and manage challenges and risks.

PERSON PROFILE

To be successful in the role, the ideal candidate will be able to demonstrate:

Apply Procedure

Application Deadline : 16^th May 2024.