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About WaterAid

WaterAid is an international not-for-profit organisation determined to make clean water, decent toilets, and good hygiene normal for everyone, everywhere within a generation. WaterAid has been operating in Mozambique since 1995, facilitating the delivery of innovative and sustainable Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) services in rural, small towns, and urban settings for 27 years. Throughout its history, WaterAid has played a key role in the sector and is well-recognised by the government and other important stakeholders The overall vision of WaterAid Mozambique’s five-year country strategy (2023-2028) is that vulnerable communities have access to climate-adapted and gender-transformative WASH services to improve their health and resilience. The Mozambique programme will play a key role in contributing to the effective delivery of the Global Strategy (2023-2028), whose transformational change is ending the WASH crisis forever.

About the Role

The Country Director (CD) is a senior leadership role contributing to WaterAid’s regional, Pan-African, and global leadership. The CD achieves this by providing visionary and thought leadership, steering the strategic direction of the Country Programme (CP), empowering and developing staff and partners, and building strategic partnerships and alliances with key players. Additionally, the CD takes a leading role in strategic influencing of public and private institutions, targeting multiple key actors – policymakers, donors, and the private sector on the real and meaningful impact that improvements in sustainable and safe water, sanitation, and hygiene can make to the poorest and marginalised – therefore contributing to wider poverty reduction and human development. The most important thing is ensuring that sustainable and safe WASH is accessible to everyone, not just those with power, wealth, and influence.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Provide visionary and strategic leadership to the country team, promoting a management culture that is supportive, empowering, and collaborative.
• Build, lead, and manage high-performing and diverse teams by creating an environment that enables staff to maximise their full potential and facilitates high performance.
• Develop and successfully deliver the country programme strategy and annual business plans per WaterAid’s Global Strategy (2022-2032), organisational principles, and values.
• Represent WaterAid externally, ensuring that WaterAid’s vision, mission, values, and aims are communicated in a compelling way. Facilitate the building of strategic partnerships between partners, staff, and other stakeholders (government, donors, other NGOs, private sector, academia, etc).
• Actively facilitate the development of strategic relationships between sector stakeholders to support the development of the sector and the integration with other sectors.
• Accountable for effectively and efficiently using WaterAid’s financial resources, transparent management and reporting of all income streams, and compliance with restricted funding processes and contractual obligations.
• Identify appropriate and strategic funding opportunities to increase income for delivery of the CP Strategy.
• Overall accountability to ensure integration and impact of the two main focus areas of work:
  • Sustainable, integrated Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) programmes that are scalable and innovative.
  • Advocacy, policy, and sector strengthening work to influence government, donors, the private sector, and other key role-players.
• As a member of WaterAid’s global and regional leadership teams, support organisational effectiveness and development. As appropriate, engage and collaborate at regional and global levels on strategic, thematic, and learning priorities.

Skills and Experience

• Proven experience working at a senior level with strategic leadership, people management, and financial accountabilities in an international development organisation.
• Proven leadership and management skills in building high-performing, multi-disciplinary and diverse teams. Consultative and empowering management style and ability to work within an organisational framework in the spirit of mutual trust and respect.
• Proven experience in strategy planning and development and in managing organisational growth and change.
• Track record of developing strategic and operational partnerships with different levels of government, donors, NGOs, and other actors in the sector.
• Proven record of raising funds from government and/or international agencies (bilateral/multilateral) or the corporate sector, managing large budgets with diverse international donor bases.
• A sound understanding of international development (in terms of policy influencing and programmes), especially in WASH in developing countries.
• Solid financial management skills and experience working with an annual budget of at least £ 3 million.
• Ability to clearly communicate and make presentations in Portuguese and English.
• Experience working in Mozambique and/or other African countries.
• A strong commitment to gender transformative, inclusive, and pro-poor development work.
• Commitment to WaterAid’s values and a working style that reflects these.

WaterAid is an equal-opportunity, disability-confident employer and is dedicated to achieving the highest standards of diversity, equity and inclusion. We welcome applications from people of all backgrounds, beliefs, customs, traditions, and ways of life. This includes but is not limited to race, gender, disability, age, sexual orientation, religion, national or social origin, health status, and economic or social situation.

Safeguarding commitment
WaterAid is committed to ensuring that wherever we work in the world, there is no tolerance for the abuse of power, privilege or trust. WaterAid reinforces a culture of zero tolerance towards any form of inappropriate behaviour, abuse, harassment, or exploitation of any kind. The safeguarding of our beneficiaries, staff, volunteers and anyone working on our behalf is our top priority, and we take our responsibilities extremely seriously. All staff and volunteers are required to share in this commitment through our Global Code of Conduct. We will conduct the most appropriate pre-employment references and checks to ensure high standards are maintained. WaterAid is an equal opportunity and disability-confident employer and committed to achieving the highest standards of diversity, fairness, and equality.