Partnerships Manager – NGO

Division: Strategy & Partnerships

Reporting to: Director of Partnership, Knowledge & Impact

Location: Nairobi or Abidjan

Type of Employment: Permanent

Brief on Client

Our client is a development institution that supports businesses to innovate, scale up and leverage investments to create resilience and sustainable incomes in rural and marginalized communities in Africa. It provides concessional capital, technical assistance, and support to the wider enabling environment for emergent and scaling SMEs. 

Role Summary

As the Manager- Partnerships, you will maintain, develop and scale organization’s portfolio of work across our investment thesis, and deliver innovative vehicles and initiatives that catalyse investments into transformative change through SMEs and financial institutions. You will also strengthen partnerships with key institutions and alliances and develop investment opportunities and proposals to de-risk and catalyse commercial financing in the organization’s portfolio companies. 

Responsibilities

• Continuously innovate and co-create with partners and funders catalytic vehicles to tackle the root causes of poverty, gender investment gap, food insecurity and climate vulnerability of African economies in business, investment and power relations. 

• Contribute to the partnership team’s relationship management with current high-priority partners and identify strategic future partners (including funders, implementation and knowledge partners or consortium partners), understanding their partnership priorities and their near- and long-term goals. Securing partnerships and resources to deploy high-impact gender-lens, refugee-lens, climate smart (adaptation, mitigation, biodiversity, circular economy, energy access), agriculture resilience and food security investments and initiatives contributing to achieving the SDGs (60%). 

• Design and deliver proposals and partnerships to implement innovative catalytic investment vehicles contributing to grow the volumes of investment into pioneering and high impact SMEs contributing to the SDGs in Africa. The manager is expected to be able to identify opportunities and pursue them end-to-end independently.

• Nurture and grow existing fundraising streams including grant applications, advisory service offering, and fund management service offering.

• Stand as a key account manager for relationships with defined pool of partners depending on expertise within the scope of the organization’s footprint.

• Prioritize and lead on new business pipeline 

• Contribute to the establishment of appropriate linkages with the relevant state/government departments, implementing partners, donors, private sector bodies, potential project partners, and civil society

Qualifications

• Graduate/Master’s qualification in Development finance, MBA, Development economics, climate finance, Entrepreneurship Studies or other relevant field of study.

• A minimum of seven (7) years of experience in partnership building and business development, secured / retention of multi-million-dollar partnerships and leading high-profile partnership engagements.

• A strong commercial acumen and deep understanding of SME finance, climate finance and impact investing space in sub-Saharan Africa, as well as understanding of dynamics and key sectors operating in rural economies (particularly Agribusiness and Renewables) in sub-Saharan Africa.

• Experience in the design of inclusive investment vehicles, and experience developing proposal for bilateral donors, philanthropies and in partnership with commercial investors in blended vehicles. 

• Excellent analytical and communication skills with the ability to prepare proposals, reports and concept papers to a high level of proficiency.  

• Experience in leading teams and growing junior staff. 

• Fluency in English is essential. French is a strong added advantage.

Key Skills:

• Have excellent communication and presentation skills.

• Demonstrate strong people management and negotiation skills.

• Strong Analytical and Entrepreneurial skills.

• Strong in relating and meeting Customer expectations.