Head Strategic Partnership And Communications Mary’s Meals Zambia

Mary’s Meals is a fast-growing international charity, currently providing a daily meal to two million hungry and impoverished children across four continents in their place of education. Mary’s Meals Zambia delivers school feeding to children in the Eastern Province of Zambia.
Mary’s Meals Zambia is currently recruiting for the roles of Head Strategic Partnership and Communications, Procurement Manager and Human Resource Advisor – Learning and Development.

1. HEAD STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP AND COMMUNICATIONS (1)

Station: Chipata

PURPOSE OF THE ROLE

Development and implementation of the Mary’s Meals overall strategies for Strategic Partnerships, Communications and Media. The role holder will lead in the identification of key and strategic partnerships for engagement. S/he will also lead in advocacy and communications activities. The role will oversee all media and related external communications activities. In addition, the role will be responsible for building capacity of the programme delivery team in undertaking advocacy activities at their level of operation.

REPORTS TO: Country Director

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

• Positioning Mary’s Meals as the leading advocate on school feeding and excellence in the education sector in Zambia.
• Leading in planning of stakeholder engagement and communications plans for Mary’s Meals Zambia
• Producing engaging materials (stories, audio-visual material, brochures, factsheets etc) to communicate the work of Mary’s Meals to a wide range of audiences including donors, media, government, and community-based partners.
• Engaging with national media and developing media products and relationships that advance the objectives of Mary’s Meals. This includes developing the media strategy to guide engagement with media.
• Overseeing internal communication to build awareness and cohesion among staff and ensuring branding guidelines are known and adhered to by all staff.
• Lead and coordinate the delivery of national campaign initiatives for visibility and resource mobilization.
• Supporting the program delivery team in implementing, mobilization and advocacy campaign activities taking advantage of key national events.
• Ensuring all creative content (photos, stories, and videos) are collected with informed consent and are in line with safeguarding policies.
• Leading in the dissemination of evidence-based impact of our programme on the lives of children and their families.
• Develop talking points, messages, speeches, briefing papers and other advocacy material.
• Conduct stakeholder analysis, map out the work, interests and plans of other stakeholders to ensure effective collaboration with like-minded organisations.
• Represent Mary’s Meals in Zambia at a variety of collaborative platforms.

Qualifications, Skills and Experience

• Minimum of bachelor’s degree in subjects such as Development Communication, International Relations, International Development, Journalism, Mass Communication, or other relevant subjects. A Post Graduate Degree will be an added advantage.
• At least 5 years of practical experience in strategic communication, major advocacy, media, and communication initiatives in a development context, preferably with focus on poverty and child centred issues.
• Experience in policy analysis and influencing with partners, government, other NGOs, and other stakeholders in the education sector.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, and an ability to produce good quality documents, information for a variety of audiences and communicate good practices.
• Strong computer skills to produce advocacy documents and document and communicate good practices.
• Practical skills and experience with graphic design software, photography and video making.
• Experience of working in the rural areas and cultural sensitivity.
• Knowledge and strong proficiency in Zambian local languages will be an added advantage.