Everyone deserves the opportunity to build a better future. This simple idea has been at the heart of work around the world for over 50 years. TechnoServe is a pioneer in leveraging the power of business and markets to create sustainable pathways out of poverty.
The low-income communities in which we work are full of enterprising people. Their small-scale farms and businesses are the keys to economic development. But they face many challenges: low literacy, lack of access to jobs and markets, unpredictable political dynamics and, increasingly, the effects of climate change. For many women and young people, the challenges are even more daunting. Working with TechnoServe staff, people around the world are lifting themselves out of poverty. The results are amazing...when incomes increase and living conditions for families get better, they are able to access health care and education previously out of reach. Communities and even whole countries are better off.Â
Title: Market Development Facility Lead
Program: HortiMAP DUTCH004-01
Reports to: Program Director
Location: Kampala
Travel: Remote rural locations
Grade: 10
Job Summary:
The Market Development Facility Lead Provides strategic leadership on the Markets Systems Development, oversees the recruitment of agribusiness supply chain clients, farmer organizations, vendor associations, individual entrepreneurial farmers, and co-develops and supports the funded partnerships under the HortiMAP Market Development Facility. For the program, 43 businesses, 60 producer organizations, 42 vendor associations, 30 entrepreneurial farmers will partner with HortiMAP through the MDF. The Market Development Facility Lead will assist clients in delivering their partnership road-maps and using bespoke technical assistance and financial solutions that address firm-specific constraints while demonstrating new models for replication and scale by other businesses. In particular, the MDF Lead will technically back-stop the Partnership Manager, Partners (Bid-Capital & PUM) to support the clients to adopt and scale more inclusive business models that prioritize economic opportunity for women and youth and adopt climate-smart technologies. In addition, the position will coordinate closely with BiD Capital Partners to build an SME pipeline and PUM Netherlands to provide world-class consultancy services and leverage an additional €3M in mobilized private capital to complement the MDF.
Program Overview:
Through the four-year Hortimap program funded by the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Technoserve and partners BID Capital, Wageningen University and Research, and Pum Experts jointly implement to transform the horticulture industry in Uganda. The program combines catalytic funding through a Market Development Facility and Technical Assistance fund to leverage private sector and local resources and expertise to strengthen SMEs and local supply chains while delivering world-class entrepreneurship training to farmers and retailers to realize their potential. These interventions are expected to increase incomes for more than 25,000 horticulture farmers, create 8,000 jobs, improve access to healthy, safe food for 250,000 Ugandan consumers, contribute to sector modernization.
Primary Functions & Responsibilities:
Principal Responsibilities:
Oversee MDF client performance and off-boarding strategies. Review monthly reports and SME dash boards Develop strategies to fix gaps between agreed deliverables vs actual partner performance. Support the project team to plug-in partner (SME) resources to support attainment of strategic objectives. Oversee planning & coordination of meetings, site visits, and collaboration opportunities with partners Oversee execution of partnership roadmaps Lead HortiMAP networks to link SHF/FOs/FAs with buyers Lead relationship development with commercial finance providers to leverage additional finance that complements catalytic grants Ensure private-sector match commitments
MDF Results and Quality Management:
Deliverables: The MDF Lead will coordinate and monitor deliverables implementation particular emphasis on participation of women, youth and job creation. Tracking key measurable indicators (e.g., revenues, sales, jobs created, etc.), guided by a budget, and an M&E section.
Reviewing reports: Responsible reviewing partner reports, designing quality review mechanisms, follow up and ensuring that activity reports are aligned with the financial accountability submitted.
Partnership Management: The MDF Lead will support partners in implementation of their road maps, provide technical support to managers and directors, engage regularly on critical operational, market and regulatory issues to support business operations.
Linkages: Ensures beneficial linkages to services and products across sector actors like farmers to inputs, finance, markets and informationÂ
Horticulture credit line : Ensures the SACCOs develop the capacity to access funds from DHCL, they build capacity to implement the HCL and grow membership.
Technical Assistance Mechanism:
Develop a closeout strategy for all pipeline of Technical Assistance for SME clients and coordinate with PUM Netherlands and Bid-capital to achieve this. Work with PCP to ensure the participating SACCOs, gain the technical capacity to implement HCL, access the finance and grow membership The MDF Lead will work to ensure the consultants perform as expected and support the Finance and Operations, and country procurement teams to provide statement of works. Support PMs and Business Advisors to provide sector-wide events to small businesses like deal-making activities. Prioritize identifying and support SACCOs to whom SHF can be linked for access to finance. Ensure external service provider contracts (consultants) include a clear scope of work, and disbursement of payments will be tied to satisfactory outputs. Monitor execution of technical assistance to ensure the quality of delivery and alignment with Partnership Roadmaps
Partnership & Client Management:
Anticipate client and partner’s needs and capabilities, develop standards for vetting them and ROI proposition (the program framework) to replicate them in the follow-on project. Coordinate with the Horticulture Value Chain team to integrate program participants in client value chains and vice-versa; Together with the M&E team, operationalize the framework for supervision and tracking of MDF client performance and compliance with the obligations under the partnership roadmaps signed Make regular visits to the partners & clients to track their performance and provide regular updates/reports on their progress
Program Coordination and Implementation:
Build and maintain strong working relationships with partners and relevant stakeholders in the agribusiness investment space by leading coordination meetings Review the narrative reports of MDF project partners and write the comprehensive annual report. Actively participate in regular team meetings to track implementation progress and share relevant program and administrative data Ensure the delivery of Sector-wide entrepreneurship training packages is of high quality, is appropriate to the local context, and is effectively reaching participants Support the Program Director in all aspects to ensure proper closeout of the project Share best practices and lessons learned with team members Contribute to design of the follow-on project
Basic Qualifications:
Bachelor’s degree in business administration, economics, agricultural economics, or related course plus at least five years hands-on facilitating growth for Micro, Small, medium, and large companies at various stages, including start-up and growth phases in Uganda. An MBA plus indicated experience will be considered an added advantage Training and experience in implementing market systems development approach agriculture sector with clarity of the idea on linking enterprise support to agro-market growth. Strong practical skills in financial modeling, business strategy design, growth planning, financial analysis, and project management Practical experience in building SME pipelines for impact investments Experience managing impact investment fund within a project setting is an added advantage. Track record of building solid relationships with business and other stakeholders, including central government Experience working with food aggregation and processing, supply chain development, out-grower networks Excellent interpersonal and oral, and written communication skills are a must Ability to develop well-written, cohesive analyses and reports Ability to generate innovative solutions in work situations Proven ability and experience working with teams will be an added advantage
Supervisory Responsibilities: The candidate will supervisor 2 staff
Success Factors: Competency is a combination of knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) directly related to successful performance on the job.
Core Competencies include:
Integrity and honesty: Is widely trusted; seen as a direct, truthful individual; presents truthful information appropriately and helpfully; keeps confidences; admits mistakes; does not misrepresent themselves for personal gain. Team Work/ Relationships: Works cooperatively and flexibly with other team members with a complete understanding of the role to be played as a team member and leader to achieve a common goal. Ability to build and maintain effective relationships and networks. Learning attitude: Proactively takes advantage of opportunities to learn. Actively identifies new areas for learning; applies and shares new knowledge and skill appropriately. Diversity/Inclusiveness: Demonstrates an understanding and appreciation for diversity and supports diversity efforts. Interacts inclusively with people of all races, cultures, ethnicities, backgrounds, religions, ages, and genders. Communication: Expresses ideas effectively in individual and group situations. Listens effectively; shares information, ideas, and arguments; adjusts terminology, language, and communication modes to the needs of the audience; ensures accurate understanding; acts in a way that facilitates an open exchange of ideas and information; use appropriate non-verbal communication. Decision making/Problem Solving: Can analyze situations, diagnose problems, identify the key issues, establish and evaluate alternative courses of action and produce a logical, practical, and acceptable solution. Can make effective decisions daily, take ownership of decisions, and demonstrate sound judgment in escalating issues where necessary. Results-Oriented/High-Quality Deliverables: Stays focused on the efforts necessary to achieve quality results consistent with programmatic or departmental goals. Demonstrates the ability to achieve effective results; works persistently to overcome obstacles to goal achievement. Accomplishes tasks by considering all areas involved, no matter how small; showing concern for all aspects of the job; accurately checking processes and tasks. Planning & Time Management: Establishes a course of action for self and others to accomplish a specific goal. Effectively plans, schedules, prioritizes, and controls activities; identifies, integrates, and orchestrates resources (people, material, information, budget, and time) to accomplish goals. Prioritizes work according to the program or department’s goals, not just own job responsibilities; manages own time effectively. Business Acumen: The ability to use information, ask the right questions, and make decisions that impact the overall business performance.
Job Specific/Technical Competencies include:
Financial & Resource Management: The ability to estimate, justify, and manage appropriate funding levels to support goal accomplishment. Managing Resources is about understanding human, financial, and operational resource issues to make decisions to build and plan efficient project workflows and improve overall organizational performance. Donor/Partnership Management: Identifying opportunities and taking action to build strategic relationships between one’s area and other areas, teams, departments, or organizations to help achieve business goals. Analysis, Research, Report Writing: Experience in business planning and analysis, modeling for feasibility and execution. Able to analyze and express oneself clearly in business writing. Innovative Mindset: Curious inquiries, asks questions and seeks out information from multiple sources, learns from mistakes, sees change as an opportunity.
Managerial Competencies:
Emotional Intelligence: The act of knowing, understanding, and responding to emotions, overcoming stress at the moment, and being aware of how your words and actions affect others. Emotional intelligence consists of 4 attributes: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management. Strategic Thinking: Managers should recognize key actions underlying problems, make connections and patterns, see consequences and implications. Anticipates obstacles realistically and plans ways to deal with them. Staff Development: managers are required to work with employees to plan on developing skills and abilities so that they can fulfill current or future job/role responsibilities more effectively. Trust to Delegate: managers should have trust and willingness to assign responsibilities to direct reports and give them discretion and authority to carry them out. Feedback/Coaching (mentoring): managers should give instructions, suggestions, explanations, and feedback to subordinates. (SPI+R)
Career Pathways:
The position that may be a next career opportunity for employees in this job title include Senior MDFL or Regional MDFLÂ
We encourage all qualified individuals who share TechnoServe's vision of improving the lives of others through proven business solutions to apply.
With our commitment to diversity, we are proud to be an equal opportunity employer and and do not discriminate on the basis of gender, race, color, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, HIV/AIDS status, protected veteran status, disability and all other protected classes.
We are also proud of our commitment to protecting staff, partners, and beneficiaries from abuse and exploitation and thoroughly vet all final candidates through rigorous background and reference checks.