Senior Manager, Child & Social Protection - EVAC, India

India is one of the most critical countries in the world as we seek human advancement. Shifting the needle on most global indicators can only happen if there is progress made in India. India is amongst the biggest countries in the world for CIFF. The entirety of the CIFF’s portfolio is active in India, i.e., child health and development, ending violence against children, adolescence, child protection, women’s economic empowerment, and climate change.

Built on in-country and global workstreams, CIFF’s newly approved Ending Violence Against Children (EVAC) mission affirms and widens in scope the foundation’s decades long commitment to ensure a bright future and aims to protect millions of children from VAC over the next decade. The EVAC mission pools together multiple programmes under it to end manifestations such as Child Marriage, Child Labour, Child Trafficking, Child Sexual Assault and others through a comprehensive approach entailing pillars such as access to secondary education, access to social protection, and access to child protection. In India, the EVAC Mission is now at the cusp of rapidly scaling Kawach, its signature Child Protection intervention through government Child Protection systems across multiple states. The EVAC Mission is also building its portfolio for helping households develop resilience, particularly to economic shocks through investments such as Migrants Resilience Collaborative and others.

This role will be responsible for strategic leadership, investment proposition, and portfolio management of Child Protection (CP) and Social Protection (SP) investments of the EVAC Mission in India to deliver our priorities. It will include developing strategy, innovating delivery models, refining execution strategy and cultivating partnerships with Government and ecosystem, that accelerates India’s demographic dividends.

Strategy & planning

• Lead the Mission’s strategic functions for India (and across CIFF as applicable) entailing strategy planning using evidence-informed prioritization, strategy review based on actionable insights, programme and grant structure design, strategic communication, and strategic partnerships

• Proactively assess the context and ecosystem to modulate the strategy of the relevant mission components for ensuring robust pathway to mission objectives through CIFF investment and ecosystem initiatives informed by CIFF

• Develop and execute an innovation track; especially on promising forward-looking ideas in CP and SP

• Identify synergies and actively strengthen integration of CP and SP programmes with other EVAC programmes as a paramount goal by working closely with the EVAC and Programme Excellent teams

• Identify and enable opportunities for improving processes, procedures and programme management approaches within (and beyond) the team for supporting increased organisational efficiency and effectiveness

Programme Delivery and Performance

• Lead and manage a portfolio of complex and multi-layered programmes (~$25M+), implemented across multiple states with significant national government engagement. involving 4+ key execution partners — including large inter-sectional investments under the EVAC India portfolio — with end-to-end accountability for planning, design, and delivery of short- to medium-term results.

• In close collaboration with Director EVAC and Programme Excellence team, build and lead CIFF-investable pipeline encompassing design of programmes, identification of appropriate grantees and commissioning of programmes for implementation.

• Lead the internal communication / socialization of pipeline with CIFF leadership for participatory decision making and successful conversion from ideation to approval

• Innovate and execute active portfolio management techniques in collaboration with the Programme Excellence team that are customised to the CP and SP portfolio contexts and built on multi-sectoral and multi-source insights for ensuring continuous improvement towards mission and programme goals; especially on opportunities, risks, and momentum

• Conduct regular evidence-informed reviews of the progress and performance of CP and SP programmes, for identifying challenges early and work with governments and partners to develop effective course correction measures and solutions and co-lead with Programme Excellence team the MEL systems and deliverable for programmes

• Apply agreed due diligence and risk management protocols appropriately throughout the development and delivery of CP and SP proposals and programmes, to ensure the interests and reputation of the Foundation are protected.

• Proactively engage senior leaders and peers to raise profile of CP and SP portfolios and impart an early sense of ongoing work and its impact, evolving contexts including challenges and opportunities, and exploratory course corrections

• Work closely with members of the Finance and Legal teams for developing grant agreements, forecasting and processing grant payments, and enabling effective grant management and reporting within the organisation.

• Lead the preparation of synthesised, high-quality deliverables — including insight reports, Board papers, portfolio investment updates, presentations, and briefs — ensuring they are produced to an exceptional standard and within rapid turnaround timelines

• Prepare and present high-quality analysis and research, as required, to support the sector in determining longer term future strategic priorities. Setting and implementing sustainable operational plans.

Sector knowledge and profile-building

• Keep abreast of national and international developments of CP and SP portfolios priority areas, establishing appropriate information gathering networks and channels for deepening professional knowledge and skills and applying towards programme excellence

• Contribute to, lead and shape the community of practice as a sector expert and act as a knowledgeable resource about CIFF’s programmes and priority areas.

• As required, work with the communications team on the development of thought leadership, communication and advocacy materials, to support CIFF’s ambitions to scale-up, mainstream and leverage additional support for its initiatives.

Stakeholder and partner management

• In collaboration with Programme Excellence and Partnerships teams, conduct rigorous appraisal of potential CP and SP partners using agreed corporate protocols and techniques for assess their suitability and credentials for collaborating on CIFF initiatives.

• Apply CIFF’s agreed account management and CRM disciplines and approaches in all dealings with programme partners and stakeholders, to ensure productive and professional relationships are maintained in a coordinated and strategic manner.

• In collaboration with Portfolio Lead and India leadership, develop strategic partnerships with international and Indian donors and governments to support adoption, replication, co-funding or scaling-up of CIFF programmes.

• With a variety of external audiences, act as a knowledgeable resource about CIFF’s programmes and priority areas.

• As required, collaborate with Finance Portfolio colleagues to contribute to the management and implementation of cost effective, robust and financially well-structured programmes.

• Engage with and maintain open and constructive dialogue with relevant Government ministries and agencies and central and state levels to ensure effective programme implementation and sustainability of outcomes.

Membership and leadership of the team

• Provide coaching and mentoring support to identified India and other colleagues, as required, to help build skills, confidence and capability in particular areas, processes or procedures.

• In collaboration with the team members, including HRBP; strengthen the culture of the EVAC team and the organisation towards avowed and shared values, attitudes, and behaviours

• Actively participate in cross organisational working groups related to philanthropy and partnerships

• Adopt a coaching approach with colleagues – particularly on partnership building - which instills a culture of openness and trust, embraces diverse thinking, and encourages continuous improvement and learning.

• We operate a matrix structure so reporting lines can vary between specific aspects of the role.

• Contribute to corporate initiatives, as required by the ED and Directors

Requirements

Skills & Experience

• Advanced understanding of and expertise in relevant disciplines

• Demonstrable experience in analysis and due diligence; policy, planning and programme delivery, including field experience, all within the development sector

• Demonstrated experience in government social development programme systems such as governance and data, planning and financing, and delivery and in behaviour change / mental models preferred

• Demonstrated experience in the private sector, particularly in informing decision making for CxO / CxO -1 decision making preferred

• Detailed understanding of using cost-benefit and ROI methodologies and metrics to inform strategy and business planning

• Knowledge of the evidence bases pertaining to programme design and implementation, and belief in the importance of evidence-based decision making

• Strong working knowledge of impact measurement and programme monitoring and evaluation

• An innovative thinker with a pragmatic and solution-oriented mindset

• Ability to analyse an organisation’s strength of management, vision and adaptive capacity. Ability to recruit, guide, influence and/or advise management teams to effectively implement programmes

• Experience working within government systems and/or experience influencing the policies of government agencies, private sector organizations or donor organisations

• Effectively champions and promotes causes – credible and professional, they always present the Foundation’s programmes in a compelling way to engage the audience

• Skilled in relationship building and strengthening; able to influence others and work collaboratively, uniting groups with a shared purpose

• English is CIFF’s business language – we expect all of our people to display outstanding verbal and written communication skills across all aspects of their role

• Capacity to work in a range of cultural and socio-economic contexts, adapting style and approach appropriately and in a culturally sensitive manner to maximise effectiveness

• IT proficiency (most specifically in Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint)

• A proven self-starter, who works with pace and resilience

Key working relationships

• CIFF Board members

• Other CIFF teams – particularly EME and functional teams (e.g. legal, HR, finance)

• Global partners and stakeholders – e.g. WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA, DFID, World Bank, USAID et al

• International charities and NGOs – e.g. Gates Foundation, Save the Children et al

• National governments and local NGO partners in priority geographies

• Research and academic institutions active on child protection and related issues.

Benefits

The salary for this role starts from 51,61,809 INR. CIFF operates a hybrid work policy across all locations, which means employees work in the office and some of the time from home. We are happy to provide more information on this as part of the recruitment process.

Alongside a competitive salary, we offer a generous benefits package here at CIFF that includes, but is not limited to the following.

• Annual leave - 25 days per annum. Increasing by 1 day after each year of service to a maximum of 30 days.
• Training allowance
• Wellbeing allowance
• Life insurance
• Medical insurance

Please submit your application on or before Friday, 13th February. CIFF reserves the right to close the job advert early if we receive a high number of suitable applications.