Economic and Urban Programme Manager at Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office

Main purpose of job:

Many countries, including middle-income countries - still face considerable challenges such as youth unemployment, climate change, high and persistent inequality (including gender inequality) and digital exclusion, which can lower long-term growth prospects.

The British High Commission in South Africa delivers a portfolio of activities to support the broad-based and inclusive growth needed for poverty reduction. Our strategic priorities within the Resilient and Productive Economies Campaign team include supporting bilateral and regional trade and investment, improving business environment and economic reform, driving productivity in key sectors through education, employment and skills development, improving digital access, support for entrepreneurship and MSMEs and sustainable urban development. 

Roles and responsibilities:

You will have responsibility for the management of the International Economic Partnerships Programme and the Urban Resilience programme. The International Economic Partnerships programme (£4m) focuses on working with South Africa to strengthen shared priorities in the Rules based International Economic System and support the effective implementation of domestic economic reform. The Urban Resilience programme (£8m) works with municipalities across South Africa to strengthen resilience to climate and economic shocks, including through improved data capabilities, township and local economic development and diversification.

In practice this means:

Programme and risk management

• Work with FCDO technical leads and advisers to ensure the successful delivery of economic and urban programming portfolio (£12m) ensuring projects are delivered on time and within budget, in accordance with the project plan and the PrOF.
• Lead on due diligence assessments of partners including scoping, fieldwork and reporting.
• Regularly review partner reporting, alongside the FCDO technical lead. Critically appraise progress, troubleshooting project issues, maintaining and monitoring risk registers and inputting into annual reviews and dissemination activities.
• Build and maintain effective working relationships with programme partners/ suppliers, key donors and stakeholders.
• Work collectively with programme managers across the BHC to support delivery of objectives, share lessons and best practice, problem solve, and flex to provide cross-cutting programme management support.

Financial management

• Manage the team’s economic and urban programming budget, monitoring expenditure and costs against delivered and realised benefits/outputs throughout the project lifecycle.
• Ensure all requisitions, purchase orders and receipting/payment of invoices meet FCDO’s financial rules, and are linked to agreed project milestones and/or partner or supplier reporting obligations.
• Ensure budgets are accurately recorded, forecast, and profiled throughout the life of projects and payments actively managed in line with FCDO PrOF benchmarks and quality standards.
• Ensure that the team and delivery partners are consistently practising sound financial management, delivering Value for Money.
• Managing the team’s non-pay budget (travel and training), forecasting and monitoring spend throughout the financial year.

Communication and knowledge management

• Coordinate proactive reporting on projects, emerging risks and lessons learned, for the team.
• Working with communications colleagues in the region, support team in developing and implementing a communications strategy to disseminate programme results, outputs and outcomes to internal and external audiences.
• You may also be asked to provide high quality contributions to briefings and other parliamentary and ministerial deliverables
• Effective adoption of practices to ensure sustainability of programme activity, assessing and capturing key learning from programme activity, including through completion of Programme Closure Report and any wider evaluation practices.
• Contribute to the development of future project and programme proposals
• You will also be expected to act as a gender champion in your role, ensuring Gender Equality Act (2014) compliance and supporting the implementation of gender policy and guidance so that, at the least, no harm is done and gender inequality is not worsened. You will actively support Economic Growth team’s ambitions on women’s economic opportunities, inclusive growth and poverty reduction through your department / team.

All of this makes for an exciting, busy and varied job with travel opportunities. You will be a dynamic individual with good communication skills and able engage credibly with senior people.  You will be good at delivering at pace, managing complex portfolio of projects, and be creative in solutions to challenging problems. You will have a proven ability to build good relationships with stakeholders and suppliers. You will be an exceptional team player, able to work closely with colleagues across the High Commission to ensure activity is joined up and well represented across the One-HMG platform, and have the confidence to represent to interests of the SA economic growth team. 

South Africa is a culturally and racially diverse country, with a complex history. You will be skilled in navigating diverse social and cultural environments and committed to creating an inclusive workplace.

Resources managed (staff and expenditure):

The role will have responsibility for the programme management of the International Economic Partnerships Programme (£4m) and the Urban Resilience Programme (£8m).

Essential qualifications, skills and experience 1 

• Strong interpersonal and communication skills with the ability to work across teams and  cultures to support the delivery of priorities
• Strong project and financial management experience
• Strong IT skills including a thorough understanding of Microsoft 365 software products, particularly Teams, SharePoint, Excel, Word, and Outlook
• A proactive approach and a focus on continuous improvement of self and service, with an appetite to work with others to simplify processes and improve efficiency
• Strong organisational and time management skills; excellent attention to detail
• Adaptability to flex across portfolios in delivering tasks and responsibilities for effective team delivery
• The resilience to manage multiple projects concurrently, with the ability to support project monitoring and evaluate project delivery to tight deadlines
• Fluent in both written and spoken English

Desirable qualifications, skills and experience 1 

• Qualification in programme/project management, including financial management, risk management, and monitoring and evaluation
• Experience in working on economic or urban issues
• Experience working on similar projects with partners in South Africa
• Experience in portfolio financial management