Communication and Advocacy Coordinator

Job Description

The International Rescue Committee (IRC) has implemented programs in Afghanistan for over 20 years and has reached over 5 million beneficiaries in Afghanistan and Pakistan through education, protection, community-driven reconstruction, health, economic recovery, and emergency response programs.

Scope of work

Reporting to the Senior Grants and Accountability Coordinator, this role will focus on developing and implementing IRC Afghanistan’s communications and advocacy strategy, ensuring consistent messaging to support high-quality external relations and to enable every staff member to be an effective ambassador for the mission. This role will hold responsibility for the development of content and materials suitable for dissemination to donors, stakeholders, potential partners, and sharing via IRC’s website and other channels, in the context of the broader strategy. The post-holder will also coordinate closely with the Programmes, MEAL, and Grants Units and the SMT in order to inform and advance advocacy messaging to donors, within the humanitarian architecture in-country and within IRC’s global advocacy framework.

Responsibilities

Communications

• Develop an initial strategy for IRC Afghanistan’s mission communications, including core and sector-specific messaging.

• In coordination with relevant HQ staff, develop a content calendar for the year to highlight IRC Afghanistan’s successes on IRC’s social media

• Develop a draft budget outlining different scenarios, and the associated costs, for potential iterations of the communications strategy (basic outputs, medium-level outputs, and a large-scale strategy).

• Develop factsheets (Dari/Pashto/English) suitable for external dissemination, and for sharing on IRC’s website, outlining the mission aims and sectors of intervention (Integrated Protection, Economic Recovery and Development, WASH and Emergency Response). Factsheets should outline intervention locations, intervention strategy, key activities, and ideally a human interest or success story.

• Develop a core body of communications materials (Dari/Pashto/English) suitable for use with donors and other external stakeholders to demonstrate the history and impact of IRC’s mission in Afghanistan

• As required, develop situation reports (sitreps) to demonstrate the progress and impact of IRC’s emergency interventions.

• Collect and develop human interest and success stories related to IRC’s interventions in Afghanistan for use in donor reports, social media posts, and other communications materials.

• Identify appropriate stories, or, as relevant, IRC staff and/or clients for inclusion in external communications by third parties (such as donors or journalists). As needed, accompany donor or press visits for this purpose.

• Develop a photo library for use in communications material and project teams.

• Develop project communications strategies, if required.

• Support the design and layout of other visual materials required within the mission, such as IEC or safeguarding materials.

• Build the capacity of the programme teams in topics related to effective communications, such as identifying appropriate success stories and informed consent for visual content collection.

Advocacy

• In coordination with the SMT and global teams, elaborate IRC’s top-level advocacy messaging and ensure that it is contextualized to Afghanistan

• Maintain a sound understanding of changes to the Afghan, regional and global political context, and adjust messaging as necessary

• Maintain a sound understanding of changes to IRC’s operating environment, and adjust messaging as necessary

• Regularly gather information from programmes and MEAL teams to ensure that messaging is supported by relevant, recent evidence from IRC’s work

• Act in an advisory role to senior staff participating in external events, ensuring that they are well-briefed on IRC’s mission and relevant messages to be shared

• Draft or edit, as required, advocacy documents such as press releases, reports, position papers and contributions to external advocacy actions

• Identify strategic opportunities to advance IRC’s messaging, both on a regular and issue-specific basis

• Ensure strong coordination of advocacy messages throughout communications content

Requirements

• At least four (5) years of international work experience in relief or development programs, including playing a significant role in external communications production

• Excellent written and spoken English is required

• Demonstrated experience designing and implementing similar strategies within the Afghanistan context is required

• Demonstrated understanding of the Afghanistan operating context and its opportunities and challenges

• Familiarity with international standards for key program areas (Sphere standards, health, WASH, protection, and gender-based violence)

• Familiarity with the humanitarian and cluster system, including advocacy and accountability mechanisms

• Familiarity with graphic design software such as InDesign will be an advantage

• Ability to support in development of visual (photo/video) content will be an advantage

Personal specifications

• Excellent organizational skills and ability to determine priorities and meet multiple deadlines

• Willingness to travel to potentially insecure implementation sites

• Detail-oriented with good multi-tasking abilities and communication skills, both oral and written

• Able to work well both within a team and independently, in a challenging and fast-moving multicultural environment

• Ability to work under pressure, long work hours, and high workload

• Ability to independently organize work and prioritize tasks

• Self-motivated, honest, highly responsible, and punctual

Professional Standards: The IRC and IRC workers must adhere to the values and principles outlined in IRC Way - Standards for Professional Conduct. These are Integrity, Service, Accountability and Equality. In accordance with these values, the IRC operates and enforces policies on Beneficiary Protection from Exploitation and Abuse, Child Safeguarding, Anti Workplace Harassment, Fiscal Integrity Anti-Retaliation and Combating Trafficking in Persons

#LI-GR2

Qualifications