Chief of Party, Center of Excellence Water, Office of the Provost, Grant Position

Purpose: The purpose of this position to provide technical, strategic, administrative and budgetary oversight of the Center of Excellence for Water activities within the duration of the project. The overall goal of the project is to substantially improve the capacity of Egypt’s higher education institutions to drive public and private sector innovation, modernization, and competitiveness, strengthen government policy to stimulate economic growth and contribute solutions to Egypt’s development challenges in the key sector of water. Specifically, the COE project is designed to meet these objectives by strengthening university capacity to deliver relevant, high quality applied research; engaging government stakeholders in dialogue to advance evidence-based policy-making; and training highly skilled graduates to meet the evolving needs of industry, government, and their communities, and to Egypt’s development challenges.

Principal Accountabilities:

• Responsible for the overall management of this activity, ensuring the achievement of results and objectives
• Serve as the primary liaison to USAID on all activity matters, and provide overall technical, management, and financial oversight
• Provide leadership and direction for the activity
• Ensure effective activity management
• Set a clear strategic vision
• Oversee fiscal and procurement integrity
• Ensure high quality and timely submission of deliverables; and ensure harmonious coordination with USAID Egypt, the Government of Egypt, other donors, and partner organizations/universities
• Ensure compliance with USAID and United States Government rules and regulations
• Chair and lead several activity committees to monitor the implementation of project efficiently
• Coordinate with the technical advisor to monitor activity-related results in all aspects of programming
• Supervise local project personnel
• Closely monitor and mentor COE staff in each university and responsible for overseeing COE personnel training programs
• Liaise with university administration teams to address sustainability issues; and ensuring that each COE delivers quality student services and effectively uses local private partner resources
• Manage implementation of the monitoring, evaluation and learning plan
• Oversee the development of the annual work plan, budgets, and other USAID deliverables
• Provide USAID with progress reports and situational analyses as requested
• Foster and maintain effective, professional relations with a broad range of government counterparts, local organizations, multi-nationals and other stakeholders for successful implementation
• Ensure synergies across technical components of the project
• Ensure good team planning, coordination, deployment of resources, and intra-team communication in support of project objectives

Requirements:

Minimum Education Requirement:

• Master’s degree in the relevant COE technical field (water), public policy, higher education, administration, international development or another relevant field from an internationally recognized university

Experience:

• Minimum of 10 years of professional experience in the successful implementation of international development programs of higher education and/or human and institutional capacity development programs
• A minimum of 5 years of international experience leading capacity development programs that involved collaborative design and implementation across multiple institution

Skills:

• Proven leadership in the administration of similar-sized international donor technical assistance projects, or universities and with skills in strategic planning, management, supervision and budgeting
• USAID experience required; prior USAID Chief of Party (COP) or Deputy Chief of Party (DCOP) experience preferred
• Strong multi-cultural, inter-personal, and supervision skills
• Demonstrated experience managing successful, multi-sectoral donor-funded projects
• Experience working on the development of scholarship programs in Egypt is highly desirable
• Fluency in English and Arabic with excellent written and oral communication skills
• The ability to participate in all representation and technical meetings in English
• Demonstrated effectiveness in developing and maintaining unbiased and professional working relationships with government officials, civil society partners, and other counterparts and clients
• Familiarity with the Middle East preferred; familiarity with Egypt strongly preferred
• Demonstrated ability to develop and communicate a common vision among diverse partners
• Familiarity with the political, social, economic and cultural context of working in Egypt is also necessary

This position is open until January 12, 2022

Placement is based on the candidate’s experience and skills. Only candidates who make it to the short list will be contacted.

“We thank all individuals who have expressed interest in working at The American University in Cairo.”