Posted:Dec 10
By:Hiring Kenya
Company Details
Industry:
Maritime
Description:
We rebuild tropical fisheries with coastal communities Blue Ventures develops transformative approaches for catalysing and sustaining locally led marine conservation. We work in places where the ocean is vital to local cultures and economies, and are committed to protecting marine biodiversity in ways that benefit coastal people. Our story started over a decade ago, surveying coral reefs in the Mozambique channel. Vezo communities in southern Madagascar were concerned about the decline of their fisheries, so we supported one village to experiment with closing off a small section of their octopus gleaning area for a few months, to see whether this might boost productivity. When the closure was re-opened, communities experienced a huge increase in octopus landings and fisher incomes. As news of this remarkable fishery boom spread, neighbouring communities started copying this approach. Crucially, this sparked interest in more ambitious coastal management efforts, leading to the creation of the country’s first Locally Managed Marine Area (LMMA) governed by a small network of fishing villages. Since then, this temporary fishery closure model has gone viral along thousands of kilometres of Madagascar’s coastline, spawning a grassroots marine conservation revolution with 64 more LMMAs established to date. Today, 11% of the island’s seabed is managed by communities, for communities. Our work is about much more than octopus. These experiences have guided our journey searching for new approaches to demonstrate that marine conservation can be in everyone’s interest, and that taking less from our ocean can give us much much more.
Job Description
Leadership and management:
- Create a positive, engaging, creative, and thriving environment for staff, effectively leading through the creation of a shared vision for Blue Ventures in the countries comprising BV’s Strategic region of East Africa, including but not limited to Kenya,
- Tanzania, and Mozambique, and ensuring all colleagues understand their contribution to that vision.
- Oversee the work and line management of Partnership Network Coordinators and
- Managers in each country of BVs East Africa region.
- Develop and nurture a culture of building, strengthening, and sustaining relationships with community-focused organisations working to establish community-based management and locally managed marine areas.
- Promote a culture of high performance and continuous improvement that values learning and a commitment to quality.
- Ensure staff members receive timely and appropriate training and development.
- Mentor and develop staff using a supportive and collaborative approach: assign accountabilities, set objectives, establish priorities, and monitor and evaluate results.
- Uphold and promote BV’s commitment to safeguarding and protecting the vulnerable communities we serve.
- Nurture a positive and productive work environment with zero tolerance for harassment and bullying.
- Ensure that all organisational activities are consistently performed under the principles of equity, fairness, inclusiveness, and respect for diversity.
Strategic Planning, Programme Management and Development:
- Led and facilitated the development and implementation of a comprehensive regional partnership strategy and partner and country engagement plans aligned with organisational goals and identified opportunities for expanding and diversifying the partnership network.
- Lead and facilitate the development and implementation of budgets, grant agreements, and technical assistance, as well as ensure that partnership plans align with BV's strategy.
- Lead engagement with leads of the Technical Knowledge, Advocacy and
- Communications and other Heads of Partnerships in BVs' other four regions to guide the growth, expansion, engagement and execution of our work with partners through priority setting, scoping, capacity assessment, onboarding, and effective engagement of new and existing partners
Required:
- Bachelors or Masters degree (or equivalent) in marine science, environmental conservation, natural resources management, sustainable development or related field.
- Eligible to live and work in Kenya and spend at least 60% of the time-based at Blue Ventures office in Mombasa or Nairobi with time spent in Tanzania and Mozambique.
- Demonstrable practical experience working in community-based conservation or development in a low-income and developing country.
- Experience working with community-based conservation in East African Countries, including Kenya, Tanzania and Mozambique.
- Proven experience in programme and project planning and management, as well as budget preparation and management.
- Exceptional networking, relationship-building and conflict mediation skills
- Excellent verbal and written communication skills, fluency in both Swahili and
- English, exceptional interpersonal skills, ability to convey complex messages clearly in presentations, meetings, and written form, and ability to connect with people of all seniority levels and cultural backgrounds.
- Excellent organisational skills, an ability to marshall resources, and continually improve systems and processes
Education: Degree, Diploma
Employment Type: Full Time
