Job Opportunity for Program Director- Banyan Impact Fellowship at American India Foundation in Delhi

Position: Program Director- Banyan Impact Fellowship

Program: Banyan Impact Fellowship for Service in India and US

Reporting: Country Director India, dotted to CEO (AIF)

Location: Okhla (New Delhi) with travels as required

Working hours: requires working across US-India time zones

Type & Tenure: Payroll staff, Full time, Open contract

ABOUT AMERICAN INDIA FOUNDATION

The American India Foundation Trust is committed to improving the lives of India’s underprivileged, with a special focus on women, children, and youth. The Foundation does this through high-impact interventions in education, health, and livelihoods because poverty is multidimensional. Through its unique value proposition, working closely with local communities, the Foundation partners with NGOs to develop and test innovative solutions and with governments to create and scale sustainable impact. Founded over two decades ago, in the aftermath of the devastating Gujarat earthquake, as a humanitarian initiative by Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ji and Bill Clinton, AIFT has impacted the lives of 16.51 million of India’s poor across 36 States and Union Territories of India.

Registered as a Trust in India, with an independent Board of Trustees, AIFT adheres to strict financial and governance standards, ensuring transparency, accountability, and responsible management of resources. As per statutory mandates, AIFT is also registered under FCRA, CSR, 80G, and 12A. These registrations and certifications stand as tangible evidence of the organization’s existence, credibility, and compliance with the applicable legal and regulatory frameworks, while demonstrating a commitment to organization’s vision and mission. As one of our largest donors since inception, we have a contractual agreement with AIF to share the logo and brand identity.

ABOUT BANYAN IMPACT FELLOWSHIP

The AIF Banyan Impact Fellowship Fellowship for Service in India and US builds the next generation of service leadership committed to lasting change for underprivileged communities across India, while strengthening the civil sector landscape to be more efficient and effective through facilitating exchange and collaboration between young professionals from India and the US.

The AIF Fellowship Program, formerly known as the William J. Clinton Fellowship, is now in its 3rd decade and continues to build and expand on the success of the previous decades and is fully financially funded for growth at-scale for the coming decade.

The Program has so far shaped over 500 fellows with partnership across 200+ organizations and 25+ Indian states.

Starting 2022, in addition to supporting service opportunities for Indians and Americans across Indian civil society organizations, the Fellowship Program has added a segment to send social change professionals from India to serve across organizations in the US for capacity building and leadership development, thereby furthering the program’s mission of creating lasting ties between India and the US.

ROLES & RESPONSIBILITIES

We are seeking a dynamic and experienced professional to lead and direct AIF’s Banyan Impact Fellowship Program. The incumbent shall be responsible to manage end to end operations (recruitment, selection, and deployment), branding and management of the Banyan Impact Fellowship for Service in India at AIF.

Additionally, the incumbent will also be a member of the India leadership Team at AIFT and contribute to strategy at the Organizational level.

Program Design & Delivery:

• Strategize and optimize the program design for larger purpose and greater impact as well as outreach.
• Direct and lead the operations of the program, including but not limited to the logistics, content, and delivery of the Fellowship conferences Orientation, Midpoint, and Endpoint.
• Lead the team in India & US to host conferences that are relevant and engaging to the Fellowship class. Implement all aspects of the conferences including the strategy, content, delivery, and wrap-up.
• Direct and optimize the recruitment process of selecting a bi-national class of Fellows from the US and India.
• Lead the marketing, recruitment, application, and selection of the host organizations.
• Lead a due diligence process to ensure that organizations are in alignment with required laws, and are able to host Fellows. Conduct site visits to new partners.
• Actively oversee the management, mentorship, governance and engagement of the current Fellowship cohort in the field.
• Design BIF & AIF internal response mechanisms and build internal capacity for proactive support & prompt troubleshooting towards challenges, including professional, behavioural, cultural, statutory and workplace aspects.
• Revamp Fellow support system including partner-organizational alignment of benefits & governance practices for fellows.
• Conduct site visits, including surprise visits, to the Fellows and Host Organizations in the field to provide in-person support to ensure success in project implementation and output.
• Design and implement a robust Fellow governance practice including, but not limited to, performance and engagement of fellows, submission of a Project Proposal and Pre-Wrap Up Report, the submission of two Professional Growth and Development Cycles.

Partner Management:

• Enhance existing and cultivate new partnerships with other Fellowships, professional associations, and universities to find suitable candidates. Oversee effective implementation of all parts of the recruitment process of fellows including the application, interview, and matching process.
• Enhance existing and cultivate new host organization recruitment & engagement practices.
• Actively engage with ongoing partnerships and seek new partnership opportunities.

Branding & Communications:

• Enhance the Program legacy in the US-India diaspora.
• Design and implement practices to collaborate with the Fellows and internal BIF Team for publications across existing & new mediums, throughout the year. Act as the lead of the Fellowship publications, including yearbook, blog, impact posters, and any other collaterals as needed.

Donor relations & strategic partnerships:

• Manage & build donor communication & reporting for engagement & retention.
• Manage any donors or partnerships associated with the programs, including writing reports as and when needed.
• Support Strategic Partnerships and development staff in any funding proposal for BIF, including but not limited to grant and proposal writing.

Financial management & Compliance:

• Financial planning, management and control of investments & expenditures throughout the Fellowship year, budgeting and proposals for upcoming years.
• Act as the Budget Head for all expenditures within the program (US and India). Ensure effective contracting and delivery as per the contractual requirements.

People Management:

• Lead, manage and coach the BIF team members in India & US.
• Identify support needs and execute capacity building in alignment with AIF’s internal practices, policies. Expand support resources where required for effective Programmatic delivery and team development.
• Lead all people management practices including goal setting, reporting, appraisals, professional development, team engagement.
• Enhance US-India team collaboration.

Lead and enhance Fellow Alumni Engagement practices in India & US.

KEY SKILLS AND COMPETENCIES:

• Master’s degree, with at least 10-15 years of work experience.
• Minimum 10 years’ experience working with young adults as a facilitator, team leader, teacher, or coach.
• Minimum 10 years’ experience working with an experiential travel or study abroad program.
• Professional experience with international groups is required.
• Ability to lead a team for effective results.
• Willingness to travel as incumbent may need to travel for Approx. 60-80 days in a year
• Experience handling medical or personal crises for groups or individuals.
• Strong attention to detail
• Ability to work in fast-paced, evolving and high-pressure work environments.
• Previous experience working with the development sector in India; abreast with current issues and trends in the field. Passionate about social change.
• Adaptable and supportive attitude; optimistic demeanour.
• Global citizen. Demonstrates experience in working with people from different cultural and national backgrounds. Sensitive to different cultural interpretations of experiences and events.
• Proactive, positive communicator. Detailed listener, and able to objectively handle interpersonal situations.
• Strong writer. Should be able to quickly and adeptly develop written collateral with no guidance.
• Fluent with Excel.
• Strong spoken and written English communication.

Other: Salary shall be commensurate with experience.