Director Agricultural Markets

About TechnoServe:

At TechnoServe, we believe that everyone deserves the opportunity to build a better life. For over 50 years, we have given smallholder farmers and entrepreneurs the skills, connections, and confidence to lift themselves out of poverty. We leverage the power of markets and the private sector to create sustainable economic growth to benefit people and the planet. Our unique mix of business solutions, deep knowledge of local contexts, and data-driven insights is helping to fight poverty across Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

TechnoServe staff are local-95% are from the countries in which they work. We put a high premium on collaboration and entrepreneurship. We hold ourselves and each other to the highest standards of integrity and transparency. And we focus on delivering lasting impact for our mission.

Job Summary:

The Director is a hands-on leader who drives the development of agricultural market development approaches and programs. S/he will manage one manager; advise the leaders of TechnoServe's ~25 High Margin Agriculture (HMA) programs around the world; work closely with our global program development team to design impactful programs and produce winning proposals; and produce knowledge content for internal and external audiences that enables project teams to apply best practices and advances TechnoServe's thought leadership in our sector.

Program Overview:

High Margin Agriculture (HMA) is one of TechnoServe's three Areas of Excellence, encompassing programs that seek to increase the incomes of smallholder farmers by accelerating the inclusive and sustainable commercialization of agricultural markets. The purpose of the practice is to lead and support the development of innovative, replicable and scalable solutions that benefit millions of people in low income places.

Primary Functions & Responsibilities:

Strategy

• Develop and deliver on a flexible approach to significantly scale TechnoServe's impact in agricultural markets
• Collaborate with colleagues in other practices and departments to identify and adapt relevant approaches, frameworks and resources that can be applied to agricultural markets (other practices include Coffee, Food Processing, Entrepreneurship, Regenerative Business, Inclusive Investment and Women and Youth Empowerment)
• Develop and manage relationships with priority agriculture funders and partners
• Contribute to TechnoServe's achievement of strategic goals linked to Regenerate 30, Better Jobs and Local Food Systems Transformation.

Business Development

• Provide technical leadership on proposals, leading design and guiding partnerships, supporting recruitment and budgeting, drafting logical frameworks and contributing written components when needed.
• Generate funding leads including leveraging and extending personal network of funders and stakeholders to identify attractive funding and partnership opportunities
• Support colleagues to generate leads with their contacts by providing talking points, communications collateral and in-person support on occasion
• Collaborate with the global MEL team to define meaningful and practical indicators for program monitoring, adaptive management, and impact evaluation.
• Develop and structure analytical models and conduct quantitative analyses that enhance program design and enable target setting

Technical Support

• Provide technical assistance to TechnoServe programs around the world, working with program teams to ensure high quality program execution, development and application of best practices, and gathering and use of evidence for continuous improvement.
• Support leaders of new programs during the mobilization phase to access and apply best practices (e.g. select staff recruitment, diagnostic reviews, development of curriculum, materials and management tools, etc.)
• Monitor and assess program quality across the portfolio, link program leaders to resources that can strengthen program execution and prioritize programs for hands-on technical support
• Deliver in-depth support to high priority programs through, for example, active mentorship and regular meetings with program lead, participation in regular progress assessments, leadership of program adaptation when needed.
• Ensure agricultural programs consistently integrate regenerative practices, digital tools to maximize efficiency, and women.

Thought Leadership and Knowledge Sharing

• Gather, generate, codify and share knowledge that drives an internal enrichment and learning cycle, strengthens our impact and enables TechnoServe to play a thought leadership role in this space
• Develop blog posts, presentations and other communications that put forward a point of view, lessons learned and case studies based on TechnoServe experience
• Establish partnerships with experts and organizations that bring complementary capabilities
• Participate in conferences, networks and relevant events to increase TechnoServe's visibility and contributions in this space
• Develop educational and training programs for colleagues, e.g., curated resource library, webinars, intranet page(s)

Basic Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree with 12 years of professional progressive experience in agricultural markets including significant leadership in agricultural trading, commodity market analysis, agricultural policy development and/or agricultural supply chain management, or similar. Or, 8 years with a Master's degree.
• A minimum of 4 years' experience in agribusiness or agriculture development, preferably in international business
• Demonstrated expertise of best practices and current innovations within market-driven agricultural development.
• Proven analytical skills
• Proven ability to manage through influence

Required Languages: Fluency in English required. Competence in Spanish, Portuguese and/or French is preferred.

Travel: Travel up to 25% domestic and international

Preferred Qualifications:

• Work experience in a developing country preferred
• Experience in designing award winning international development programs in agriculture preferred
• Experience managing a large program or business preferred

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• Passion for TechnoServe's mission of prosperity for all
• Strong command of MS PowerPoint, Excel, and Word
• Excellent written and verbal communication and interpersonal skills
• Demonstrated ability to work independently, flexibility and responsively

Supervisory Responsibilities: Manager, Agricultural Markets

Our preference is for the Director to be based in our Arlington, VA, Headquarters, working from the office twice per week (Tuesdays & Thursdays). However, we will consider applicants from a country where TechnoServe has operations. These applicants would follow the TechnoServe Country Office schedule where they are hired. All applicants must have work authorization at the time of application. TechnoServe will not provide sponsorship for this role.

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 affirmative action employer 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.

If you have a disability that affects your ability to use our online system to apply for a position at TechnoServe please contact the Human Resources at recruitment@tns.org or call +1 202 785 4515.