View Vacancy - JKT - Education and Skills Adviser, Prosperity Fund (C5)

Main purpose of job:

Provide high quality policy and technical advice on, and help define and implement a £19 million multi-year Prosperity Fund programme supporting Higher Education and Skills in Malaysia, Indonesia, and Philippines which:

-        Reduces poverty and stimulates inclusive, sustainable economic growth.

-        Opens new markets for international businesses, including UK companies.

-        Is aligned with equivalent UK programmes in other middle-income Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) - eligible countries.

-        Is coherent with wider Embassy/HMG efforts to build education links with the UK.

-        Has impact and is good value for money.

Roles and responsibilities / what will the jobholder be expected to achieve?:

Prosperity is one of the UK’s three Foreign Policy Priorities.  We seek to ‘build the UK’s prosperity by increasing exports and investment, opening markets, ensuring access to resources, and promoting sustainable global growth’.

One tool for achieving this objective is a £1.2 billion ODA five-year Cross-Government Prosperity Fund, which was launched in April 2016 to help promote economic growth in developing countries.  The purpose of the Prosperity Fund is to:

-        Promote economic reforms and remove barriers to trade

-        Strengthen policy capacity and build strong institutions

-        Develop sectors which support growth such as education

In ASEAN, a country grouping of 600 million consumers and growing, education and upgrading skills is a crucial element of national economic development strategies.  As part of this, we plan to invest in a £19 million multi-year Prosperity Fund programme on education called the Skills for Prosperity programme, which is a priority sector for UK Ministers. The programme will be implemented by a contracted out external entity, and the implementation contract will be managed centrally in London. Your job will focus on Indonesia (including outreach at sub-national levels) to provide high quality policy and technical advice on, and help design and implement this programme.  Broadly speaking this will take place in three stages:

Stage I: Transition.  We expect this stage to last until December 2018.

-        Help finalise a global business case, including annexes (such as the economic appraisal, logical framework, theory of change, risk assessment).

-        Run small-scale transition activity (such as pre-implementation outreach to government, private sector, academic institutions).

-        Contribute to a London-led procurement exercise to contract lead global programme implementers (for example by contributing to drafting a terms of reference or Memorandum of Understanding).

-        Build a strong network for the Embassy amongst education, skills, and Technical Vocation Educating and Training (TVET) stakeholders in Government (Federally and at sub-national levels). The sub national element is important in Indonesia as the challenges of education policy reform are not uniform across all of Indonesia’s 34 provinces. Understanding and engaging with key sub national education policy makers will be crucial for the success of this PF programme. In addition outreach will be required among civil society and business.

-        Develop strong relations with education, skills and TVET leads in London and other priority Prosperity Fund countries.

-        Use this network and knowledge to draft or update a cross-cutting Embassy Education Strategy, which coordinates with DIT’s High Value Education campaign, and the GREAT Challenge Fund, into which the Prosperity Fund programme will feed.

Stage II: Inception (Phase 1).  We expect this stage to last until June 2019.

Support the programme implementing entity by:

-        Connecting the global programme implementers with the right organisations at post (both at federal and subnational levels).

-        Ensuring that the programme is de-conflicted with, but complements other Prosperity Fund work at post on areas such as energy, health, financial services, future cities and the business environment

-        Identifying opportunities to link the programme further to national education policy making and updating of skills/TVET regulations.

-        Securing buy in from government partners and seek opportunities to get financial or contributions in-kind.

Stage III: Implementation (Phase 2).  We expect this stage to last until March 2021.

Support the programme implementing entity by:

-        Ensuring that the programme is run effectively, monitored intensively, and that risks are mitigated appropriately.

Lead on the following:

-        Continue de-conflicting the programme with other UK-funded work at post.

-        Ensure that the UK gets due credit for successes, and that posts’ contribution to the overall programme’s annual reviews has impact

-        Deploy Embassy diplomatic levers to support the programme’s primary aim of reducing poverty

-        Deploy Embassy commercial levers to support the programme’s secondary aim of opening new markets, including for the UK.

Throughout this period you will also need to ensure the implementing entity:

-        in inception and implementation are complying with the International Development Act, including the International Development (Gender Equality) Act 2014; meets the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC)’s ODA criteria; is untied; meets UK government transparency commitments on ODA spend; and complies with HMG audit requirements.

-        Are effectively identifying and managing risks to successful programme implementation.

You will lead on:

-        Keeping abreast of education policy developments at post, and regionally (for example World Bank and Asian Development Bank policy and operational reviews), using this knowledge to spot opportunities for sharing lessons and best practice with other ASEAN and prosperity fund priority countries.

-        Build links across the Embassy, chairing an Education Virtual Team consisting of programme, policy and commercial colleagues.

-        Deepen the Embassy’s education engagement beyond the capital cities, to sub-national levels.

-        Maintain a strong network with your colleagues in the UK, and counterparts in ASEAN and other priority Education Prosperity Fund countries, adapting the programme on the basis of lessons learnt.

-        Support the wider Prosperity team, and take on Embassy corporate roles.

Resources managed (staff and expenditure):

-        Support the in-country implementing entity with policy and technical advice (which will spend between £5 and £7 million in each country).

-        There may be opportunities to bid for and manage other Non ODA funds related to education, skills and TVET.

We are looking for a proactive, creative self-starter who can prioritise to operate in a fast-paced environment, largely unsupervised, delivering to deadlines.  S/he will need excellent interpersonal and communications skills to build strong relations within the Embassy, in the regional and with stakeholders in the UK. 

Essential on arrival:

-        Qualified to degree level (ideally but not limited to economics or development economics or education or sociology or political science or business studies).

-        Knowledge of the higher education and skills sector from having worked in the public/private sectors.

-        At least 6 to 10 years work experience in the public or private sectors.

-        Passion for education, TVET and skills, and a desire to improve education.

-        Experience in developing policy advice/analysis; delivering successful programmes and managing budgets

-        A strong understanding of poverty, inequality and gender issues

-        Good programme, contract and financial management skills and experience.

-        Computer literate, working with Microsoft Windows and able to manage information effectively with available computer systems

-       Language: Excellent working levels in English and Bahasa Indonesia, both written and spoken.  Level of language required: Operational.

The successful candidate will be expected to embody the UK civil service’s values and FCO’s mission objectives.