Job Opportunity for Associate Head – Monitoring & Evaluation at Wadhwani Foundation in Bengaluru

About Stir Education

We are an international NGO that is addressing the moral and economic imperative that every child, everywhere, should have a teacher who cultivates the joy of lifelong learning. At a practical level, that means we support governments to reignite intrinsic motivation in teachers and local officials, through teacher networks. Our vision is a world where teachers love teaching and children love learning. In our sixth full year of operations, we are working with 200,000 teachers and 6 million children across 70 districts in India and Uganda.

OUR MODEL

We achieve this through a five-year learning partnership with an education system, where we align all levels of the education system (officials, teachers and children) around the goal of increasing intrinsic motivation.

Practically, this means that teachers undergo monthly network meetings with about 20 to 30 local peers. Through these meetings they’re supported to develop their practice in areas ranging from effective questioning to creating warm but orderly classroom routines – all designed to create a more effective relationship between the teacher and child. In doing so they develop a sense of autonomy (the sense they can change things), mastery (sense of getting better as a professionals) and purpose (reconnecting emotionally with their peers and students) – the key drivers of intrinsic motivation.

District officials undergo a training and coaching programme that motivates and supports them to prioritise, run and monitor the teacher networks and a close partnership with the state or national government enables the government to align this intrinsic motivation approach within their priorities, structures and systems.

The approach is run by the government from day one and after about five years of partnering with an education system we hope to have embedded a culture of improvement at all levels for the system to continue to strengthen itself. We typically allocate one member of our own staff per district to train, energise and coach the district officials running the approach, and a small team at the national or state level.

OUR VALUES

How we approach our work is as important as what we do and our core values guide the way:

Humility – We don’t have all the answers upfront.

Ownership – We empower each other with high expectations & support.

Openness – We will listen, learn and improve, and lead through obstacles.

Purpose – We’re united by a shared vision we’ll build & achieve together.

THE OPPORTUNITY

The Associate Head, M&E, will be responsible for managing the Research Manager M&E and lead the implementation of the impact and research studies in India, Uganda and Indonesia, strengthening the culture of improvement across the organization through cross-functional collaboration, and overseeing general management of M&E systems across programme geographies. The Associate Head will work closely with the Head, M&E, to support the design of our third-party driven impact studies, learning framework, communication, internal research, and process evaluations.

Reporting, Roles And Responsibilities

The Associate Head, M&E role can be based in either India or Uganda. There will be regular travel within India, Uganda, Indonesia, and other STiR programme geographies to ensure close collaboration with our various programme teams and evaluation partners, and to ensure a strong culture of cross-functional collaboration between STiR teams. The post will report to the Head, M&E.

Lead on operationalising specific aspects of M&E strategy by

• Managing the implementation of impact studies and research collaborations to inform our efforts to deepen relationships and realize sustainability
• Provide hands-on strategic support toward our core programme priorities: deepening relationships, equity, and sustainability to nudge actioning of the findings
• Ensure regular checks on the effectiveness of the data processes & systems and review them as necessary with the M&E team
• Identifies the needs for scalable M&E strategies for each programme geography and leads the efforts in the M&E team to develop solutions, working closely with the Head
• Use of M&E data by programme teams for generating yearly impact reports
• Support the Head, M&E in championing STiR M&E strategy with external stakeholders to promote cultures of ownership and sustainability among government partners.

Strengthen the culture of improvement across the organization through effective cross-functional collaboration

• Work closely with DPR and programme leads to support internal teams by building capacity and providing easy to understand insights from their monitoring data and the qualitative studies to inform programmatic decisions, including case studies, data visuals, and other materials
• Work closely with Head, M&E to generate learnings that are easy and clear to communicate and actionable to improve our internal approach and external positioning
• Ensures cohesion between core M&E products and the organisational narrative and theory of change.

Role model effective leadership within the team and as part of the leadership team in line with the STIR values

• Line manages the Research Manager and work collaboratively with the M&E team and cross-functional team members
• Contribute to the leadership discussions through strategic inputs and suggestions and participate in national/global conversations
• Work closely with the Head, M&E to ensure implementation of the M&E strategy as envisaged and continuous professional development and mastery of skills within the M&E team

Required Skills And Experience

• 7+ years of experience in M&E
• Experience in oversight of rigorous evaluations and research projects, preferably including education programmes
• Expertise in operationalizing strategies through effective project planning, foreseeing challenges, raising them in time and working collaboratively on mitigating them
• Experience managing partnerships with individuals and agencies across various contexts to ensure projects are implemented as planned, on time and at high quality
• Skilled in line managing people by providing necessary opportunities and supporting team members with a focus on ensuring their autonomy, mastery and purpose
• Expertise in working collaboratively across multiple geographies with people from diverse contexts and backgrounds
• Ability to balance questioning with empathetic listening and understanding when dealing with ambiguity, changes and complex decision making
• Role models STiR values of Humility, Openness, Ownership and Purpose

Remuneration And Benefits

A gross salary of INR 200,468/- (inclusive of all taxes but not limited to GST) per month in India, UGX 91,02,962/- per month in Uganda, or IDR 30,417,188/- per month in Indonesia will be paid for your service (subject to relevant taxes at source), along with medical insurance for yourself, spouse and up to two children.