Location: Dhangadhi, Nepal
Position Status: Full-time, Regular
Salary Level: O1

General Position Summary:

The M&E and Documentation Officer is a key national staff position for Mercy Corps Nepal’s Managing Risk through economic Development Program (M-RED). Working with the country-level PQA Manager and Resilience MERL Advisor for MRED II project, the M&E Officer will play a formative role in developing a rigorous and effective monitoring, evaluation, and database management system that supports current Mercy Corps programming, as well as take a leadership role in the developing the M&E systems for MRED Program. He/she is responsible for cross-cutting programmatic M&E, knowledge management, and information dissemination and utilization for ongoing program improvements, internal and external reporting, and facilitation of Result measurement framework design in proposal development. This includes the creation and testing of measurement tools for both quantitative and qualitative monitoring, as well as design of discrete assessment measurements. The M&E and Documentation Officer is also responsible for capacity building of the program team and maintaining and strengthening collaboration between M&E, program staff, and management to ensure that high quality and timely reports are generated and program decisions are made based on evidenced established through M&E. 

mercycorps.org 

Mercy Corps Nepal utilizes mobile data collection through a tablet-based application, and the M&E and Documentation Officer will lead on mobile form authoring and testing. Additionally, the position requires management and analysis of cloud-based datasets for timely, and often real-time, visualization and utilization. Mercy Corps’ M&E team will continue to develop an end-to-end standard for mobile data, which includes building and maintaining dashboards of program progress and performance. The M&E and Documentation Officer will be heavily involved in coordination with tech partners, as well as rolling out internal approaches to utilization of tech solutions. S/He will play a lead role of evidence based program documentation and management of proper data filing and record keeping. 

As gender and social inclusion (GESI) and governance cross-cutting components of all Mercy Corps program(s), M&E and Documentation Officer is required to own these components and ensure GESI sensitivity and integration and governance practices are integrated into his/her work area. 

Essential Job Responsibilities:

The specific duties and responsibilities of the M&E and Documentation Officer includes, but are not limited to, the following: 

Monitoring & Evaluations (M&E)

• Provide leadership to field offices in developing program-level M&E systems that meet donor requirements and Mercy Corps minimum standards, as well as feed into a standardized countrywide M&E system and strategy. 
• Develop data collection tools and protocols and oversee data collection events, including data collected through mobile applications. 
• Provide oversight and development of program databases, including migration of data from cloud-based aggregation platforms to internal databases. 
• Design analysis protocols and conduct analysis to monitor program progress and measure program impact. This includes linking of analyzed data to both internal and web-hosted dashboards that visualize program progress. 
• Lead to design and conduct the base line, mid-term, end-line survey, KAP and Impact Evaluation of project 
• Closely monitor on site data collection and reports the progress in related to survey of projects 
• Ensure that information is systematically and regularly gathered following M&E tools 
• Coordinate and play a role in assessments as per requirements 

Data Management 

• Develop and implement data management plans 
• Manage data entry works/teams 
• Oversee data management performed by project staff and partners 
• Support to collect regular monitoring data following standard M&E system and tools of organization 
• Ensure timely reporting of all required data by partners’ team 
• Produce monthly data analysis report and share with partners’ team on monthly basis for effective and efficient M&E system in place 
• Participate in the preparation and presentation of data, when applicable 

Capacity Building 

• Build the capacity of all relevant team members, including partner team members, to develop and maintain an excellent M&E system and tools. 
• Regularly conduct project site visits to provide hands-on training to field staff on how to capture and organize information for accurate documentation and reporting. 

Documentation and Reporting 

• Take a lead role of program reporting from Partners on timely manner and provide feedback 
• Assist the program team with timely and accurate reporting to donors 
• Develop project documentation and communication plans/strategies. 
• Take lead role and provide technical support to district project team and partner staff to collect project learning’s and good practices. 
• Write a variety of communications and promotional materials including developing and editing success stories/case studies. 
• Provide a central role of program documentation and prepare sharing documents for program stakeholders on timely manner. 

Coordination 

• Manage good relationships with project stakeholders, including GoN and Non-government officials, community institutions. 
• Work with the program team, especially the partner staffs and the Mercy Corps Project team (to ensure effective monitoring, evaluation and reporting of program deliverables, which are consolidated and analyzed in a timely manner and provided to the Project Manager to be integrated into donor reports. 
• Coordinate closely with District Coordinators in the field, and the partner Project Officer and Supervisors to ensure upwards and downwards communication of developments in M&E related thinking. Others: 
• Ensure GESI sensitive monitoring and evaluation process (for eg: ensure disaggregated data and information is regularly collected, analyzed and updated to monitor the progress of the program implementation, by closely working with other team members including GESI. 
• Mercy Corps as a humanitarian agency is expected to response as and when crisis and humanitarian situation engulfs. As an MC employee all staff are expected to be part of humanitarian and emergency response in addition to their regular roles and responsibilities. 
• Ensure that MC operational policies and procedures are followed, while ensuring downward and upward project efficiency, transparency and accountability 
• Conduct himself/herself both professionally and personally in such a manner as to bring credit to Mercy Corps and not to jeopardize its humanitarian mission. 
• Other duties as assigned by his/her supervisor and or Country Director 

Organizational Learning 

• As part of our commitment to organizational learning and in support of our understanding that learning organizations are more effective, efficient and relevant to the communities they serve, we expect all team members to commit 5% of their time to learning activities that benefit Mercy Corps as well as themselves. 

Accountability to Beneficiaries 

• Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our beneficiaries and to international standards guiding international relief and development work, while actively engaging beneficiary communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects. 
• Team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner and respect local laws, customs and MC's policies, procedures, and values at all times and in all in-country venues. 

Supervisory Responsibility: N/A 

Reports Directly To: Deputy Program Manager and Resilience MERL Advisor 

Accountable To: Country Director; Director of Programs; Program Manager; Mercy Corps policies and procedures; MAC grant agreement and policies; M-RED project team in the field; Position Description; DRR and market development best practices 

Works Directly With: Program Manager, Deputy Project Manager, Resilience MERL Advisor, Senior Project Engineer, District Coordinators, Advocacy Coordinator, Partners’ Project Team, Disaster Management Committees

Knowledge and Experience 

• Bachelor degree in Development Studies/Social Works/Communication/Sociology/Finance, Economics or relevant topics
• At least 3 years of M&E or relevant research experience for I/NGOs and development agencies
• Proven ability to design both qualitative and quantitative data collection tools and provide relevant analysis and to build staff capacity in those areas 
• Fluent English language skills (written and speaking) to communicate with international stakeholders and prepare reports on program progress 
• Statistics skills and experience working with statistical software strongly preferred, in particular R Statistics Package 
• Confidence with new software packages, open-source platforms, web design, and/ or XLS Form syntax for survey authoring
• Willingness and ability to travel frequently to project villages, often in remote locations. Strong curiosity for understanding and working effectively within the complex cultural, political, security, and social environment of Nepal
• Excellent communicator, multi-tasker, and able to work in ambiguous situations. S/he will be a tolerant and flexible individual able to work in difficult and stressful environments and follow procedures 
• S/he will be a team-player with a positive attitude toward problem solving and conflict resolution. 

Success Factors

A successful M&E and Documentation Officer would be able to collect and document all program intervention results, manage learnings, and collaborate on any research or studies. S/he will have proven experience with cross- cultural team and capacity building of partner and internal M&E team. Multi-tasking, prioritizing, problem solving and simultaneous attention to detail as well as strategic vision are essential. The most successful Mercy Corps staff members have a strong commitment to teamwork and accountability, thrive in evolving and changing environments and make effective written and verbal communication a priority in all situations.