Senior Technical Advisor

Position: Senior Technical Advisor (full-time or part-time)
Organisation: Institute for Strategic Dialogue’s Strong Cities Network
Location: Beirut, Lebanon
Salary: Daily rate (all inclusive) dependant on experience
Duration: 4 months (possibility of extension)
Start date:  As soon as possible

ISD is a global counter-extremism organisation dedicated to powering new generations against hate and extremism. ISD is London-based with a presence in Beirut and Amman.
 
We seek 1-2 Senior Technical Advisor(s) (part-time) with significant experience of capacity building work and P/CVE knowledge in the Middle East to assist with an ongoing Strong Cities Network project in Lebanon and Jordan supported by the Government of Denmark’s Peace & Stabilisation Fund. The Strong Cities Network is the only global network of cities and municipalities working together to build resilience against violent extremism (www.strongcitiesnetwork.org).
 
This project is a three-year exchange project (commenced January 2016) working with six municipalities in Lebanon and Jordan, focusing on practitioner exchanges and municipal capacity building in the fields of social cohesion and conflict prevention methodologies with the overall objective to strengthen the role of municipality-level actors in prevention of violent extremism. Six Prevention Networks have been established across the two countries which include approximately a dozen local professionals and practitioners in each municipality who are currently being trained to lead on local violence prevention.
 
The Senior Technical Advisor(s) is based in Beirut , but with frequent travel in Lebanon (Saida, Tripoli, Majdal Anjar.) The Senior Technical Advisor will work under the guidance and report directly to the Senior Regional Project Manager, who is based in Beirut.
 
Key responsibilities
Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

Based on completed/ongoing work as well as the findings of a recently conducted mid-term review of the project, support the design and delivery of capacity building activities and training sessions for Prevention Network and municipalities
Create tailored capacity building work-plans for each Prevention  Network that take into account local realities and baselines, and are based on a sound capacity-building methodology designed to achieve objectives that are relevant to CVE
Work closely with Prevention Network Focal Points (municipality staff) to strengthen their ability to lead/run the networks
Strengthen the Prevention Networks by developing local PVE strategies and/or action plans
Advise on setting-up Prevention Network Units within municipalities
Work closely with Prevention Networks (CSOs, religious leaders, schools, police etc.) to consolidate and institute the networks locally
Assist the Prevention Networks in co-creating small-scale PVE-activities to be funded by the project.
Link municipality level efforts with the national level by providing inputs to ongoing formulation of national PVE strategies and their implementation as well as supporting the preparation and execution of workshops including drafting discussion papers, meeting reports etc.
Support the effective delivery of the project and work on other key objectives as required

Essential requirements:

Bachelor’s degree (Master’s degree is preferable) in social sciences, development, political science, international relations, management, or a related field
At least 5 years professional experience in capacity building in the Middle East working with government/municipalities, civil society and/or international organisations
Demonstrable experience working directly with beneficiaries at the sub-national level (developing and running interactive training programmes, mentoring etc) and providing high-quality advice on programme formulation (including theory of change, results frameworks and general M&E)
Ability to work both independently and as part of a dynamic team in a challenging and fast-paced environment
Flexible and available at short notice if required.
Excellent verbal and written language skills in Arabic and English