Catholic Relief Services-Vacancy,Knowlede Management & Learning, Baltimore, United States

Manager, Knowlede Management & Learning, Baltimore, United States
Catholic Relief Services
228 W. Lexington St.
Baltimore, Maryland

Tel: 21201-3443
877-435-7277


Job Title:Manager, Knowlede Management & Learning

Requisition Number:D1300

Area of Interest:Fundraising

Position Type:Full Time

Location:United States/Baltimore

Job Description:

Background:

The Resource Acquisition Department supports CRS' acquisition of institutional donor resources through the identification and development of relationships, capacities, and business processes that enhance the agency's competitive positioning for and pursuit of new funding opportunities. Department staff are collectively responsible for advancing the agency's competencies and competitiveness for institutional fundraising; strengthening institutional donor and cross-sector partner relationships; providing direct assistance to field programs in all aspects of the business development cycle; and managing and monitoring progress towards the department's objectives and CRS' resource mobilization strategy. Specific units within the department focus on opportunity creation and pursuit; donor relationship management and stewardship; cross-sector engagement; and knowledge management and learning.

The two-person KML unit within RAD collaborates closely with multiple teams in CRS' Overseas Operations division: other RAD teams (responsible for public-donor business development, foundation fundraising, corporate engagement, and donor relationship management); other Overseas Operations departments in headquarters (responsible for supporting and promoting CRS' technical and operational excellence at a global level); and CRS' country and regional teams (responsible for program development and implementation within CRS' decentralized management structure). The KML unit and other RAD staff also work closely with other functions throughout the agency – including policy and advocacy, finance, marketing, charitable giving, and human resources – to strengthen CRS' position as a well-resourced, influential, reliable, and highly regarded actor in the fields of humanitarian aid and development.

Primary Function:
The primary function of the KML Manager is to develop and execute a sound knowledge management and learning process to advance CRS' resource mobilization strategy. S/he will employ and champion innovative methods to close knowledge gaps and to promote sharing, learning, and collaboration across departments, divisions, and geographies. S/he will effectively utilize CRS' online information management platform and systems, and will lead and support a robust knowledge generation process across relevant staff functions, to strengthen the agency's growing global community of practice for business development and to ensure the availability of strong in-house capacities and resources for growth.

Responsibilities:

Strategic Leadership

    Support the advancement of CRS' strategy for leadership in signature program areas and other global priorities, and the acquisition of institutional donor resources to support that strategy.

    Support an enabling environment for funding acquisition and a “culture of philanthropy” by nurturing mutually supportive relationships between divisions, departments, and teams in HQ and overseas.
    Work with technical, marketing, and representation-focused staff to identify, document and promote to target audiences CRS' value addition and achievements, to influence the direction of donor strategies and CRS' competitive position for donor resources.

Knowledge Management

•     Develop, strengthen, and contribute to a comprehensive competitive intelligence management system to enable CRS' effective tracking of and preparedness for upcoming strategic funding opportunities.
•     Oversee the development and improvement of templates, narrative and graphic boilerplate content, corporate capacity and performance data, and other tools for competitive positioning, pursuit, and promotion. Coordinate closely with CRS' Marketing & Communications, Charitable Giving, Finance, and OverOps staff to ensure quality and alignment of these contributions to CRS' overall donor engagement and brand management strategies.
•     Manage the Resource Acquisition department's sharepoint site(s) on CRS/Global, ensuring user-oriented structure that facilitates easy access to information and effective virtual collaboration and learning.
•     Oversee CRS' business development data systems, including opportunity pipeline and proposal tracking, to ensure accuracy of content and accessibility/utility for all agency stakeholders. Carefully manage the integration of these data systems with broader enterprise architecture initiatives to ensure a robust global knowledge management system that meets staff needs for improved fundraising and positioning.
•     Develop analytical resource acquisition reports for internal and external use, including performance trends and competitiveness analysis across CRS' institutional donor portfolio as well as specific to its strategic priorities.

Learning and Capacity Building

•     Develop and lead a learning and capacity building agenda that responds to CRS' competitiveness constraints, as well as to the expressed needs of CRS' staff directly involved in resource acquisition.
•     Lead the creation, improvement, and dissemination/delivery of appropriate professional development materials to enhance staff capacity across CRS' business development cycle. Collaborate closely with Human Resources and other teams to ensure a well-coordinated, holistic, and effective approach to staff development across disciplines and strategic priorities.
•     Lead and support CRS' continued improvement of in-house guidance and best practice standards for resource acquisition targeting both public and private institutional donors. Stay abreast of state-of-the-art methodologies, techniques, and industry standards within the broader business development and institutional fundraising disciplines. Identify appropriate elements from these external sources as well as CRS' own internal innovations to incorporate into CRS' KML resource base.
•     Prioritize areas of the CRS business development cycle that have weaker/fewer learning resources yet high demand from staff, such as Relationship Management and Positioning (Intel and Capture Planning).
•     Utilize a wide range of context-appropriate mechanisms to build staff capacities, including formal training, distance-learning, self-study, just-in-time learning bites, and virtual/peer collaboration.
•     Facilitate CRS' global business development community of practice, ensuring well-coordinated support to agency KML needs and the generation and sharing of knowledge and skills for resource acquisition.

Supervision :

Supervise one Knowledge Management Specialist, including performance planning and management. Provide experience-based mentorship and coaching to department and divisional staff (including global community of practice) as opportunities emerge.

Program Support:

    Support the design and production of select large, complex, and highly strategic proposals for CRS surge capacity when needed.

    Carry out additional responsibilities and projects as assigned.

Key Working Relationships:

INTERNAL: Overseas Operations Leadership and HQ departments; Regional and Country Program staff; Human Resources; Global Knowledge and Information Management; Marketing and Communications.

EXTERNAL: Relevant peers within the business development and foreign aid communities.

Qualifications:

•     Masters degree in Development, International Relations, or relevant field required.
•     Minimum 8 years international development experience required, including at least 4 years of work in a developing country with demonstrated progressive levels of management responsibility.
•     Minimum 5 years of direct experience in business development targeting US Government, major foundations, and other institutional donors in the foreign aid industry required.
•     Significant recent experience leading, designing and preparing USG Requests for Applications (RFAs) required; experience with USG RFPs highly desirable.
•     Knowledge of private giving trends, foundation grant making processes, and corporate philanthropy in contexts relevant to CRS highly desirable.
•     Significant experience designing and producing professional capacity building strategies, tools, and resources required. Knowledge and application of adult learning principles, core competency formation, and technology-assisted distance learning mechanisms required.
•     Excellent training, facilitation, public speaking, and coaching/mentoring skills in English required.
•     Familiarity with Sharepoint-based information management platforms highly desirable; ability to learn content management skills of CRS/Global on the job required.
•     Excellent interpersonal, team coordination, and communication skills in English required.
•     Strong data analysis skills required.
•     Knowledge of CRS programs and relevant business processes/systems a plus.
•     Ability and willingness to travel as needed, up to 30% of job time.
• Physical Requirements/Environment : Normal conditions for an office environment. This position will require travel up to 30%.

NOTE: All interested applicants must be authorized to work in the U.S. at the time of application.

EOE/M/F/D/V
Closing Date: Friday, 12 July 2013
http://unjobs.org/vacancies/1368487866134