Who we are
Bixal is a mission-driven, woman-owned small business determined to improve people's lives through human-centered strategies and transformative technologies, with a firm belief that everyone has the right to an effective government.
We deliver on this belief by partnering with leading Federal agencies to design, develop, and deliver powerful customer experiences through holistic digital product solutions and strategic communications initiatives––bringing a high standard and unique creative energy to our clients––and our wonderfully diverse culture is what makes it all possible.
Bixal unites different people with different perspectives from all over the world! We provide our team with an open and empowered environment where collaboration thrives and solutions flourish.
Location
Bridgetown, Barbados.
What will you do?
The Senior Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) Specialist is a key personnel position on the USAID Eastern and Southern Caribbean Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning Services Activity (MELSA). The Senior MEL Specialist will need to reside in, or relocate to, Bridgetown, Barbados, for the remainder of the four-year MELSA contract.
The Senior MEL Specialist is responsible for supporting the overall management and functioning of all evaluation, assessment, survey, and special study activities, as well as related cross-cutting learning activities. The selected candidate will provide knowledge and understanding of USAID’s Collaborating, Learning and Adapting (CLA) framework into all MEL activities under the contract. The Senior MEL Specialist will support the Chief of Party and work with other MELSA staff and USAID to provide guidance, technical leadership, and technical oversight for teams supporting MEL and CLA assignments for USAID and their partners. The Senior MEL Specialist will provide expert level support and advice on how projects could work together more effectively, how to better use data to learn, and ultimately adapt programming. This position reports to the Chief of Party.
Responsibilities
- Support the Chief of Party to deliver timely and high-quality MEL services required by USAID
- Support USAID technical staff in the development of evaluation statements of work, including developing evaluation questions and designing methodologies
- Contribute to the design and field testing of evaluation methodology, participatory data collection methods and protocols, data verification techniques, and other technical evaluation and analytical tasks conducted under this Task Order
- Serve on evaluation or assessment teams, as Team Leader or Team Member, if appropriate, in line with relevant subject matter expertise, and pending availability with other ongoing MELSA tasks
- Support the recruitment of evaluation, assessment and performance monitoring teams, ensuring that short-term technical experts and evaluation team members are of a high caliber and possess commensurate technical expertise
- Manage technical aspects of MELSA subcontractors, relating to evaluations and assessments
- Provide technical and managerial support on projects, such as monitoring, learning events, workshops, training, analysis or other tasks as assigned
- Provide technical oversight on all types of CLA deliverables (such as learning events, pause-and-reflect sessions, meta-analysis, adaptation plans and scenario planning)
- Serve as a technical team member on performance evaluations, including instrument development, qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis, survey management, data cleaning, report writing, and results dissemination
- Oversee and provide quality assurance to data collection subcontractors and/or technical consultants
- Lead trainings and capacity building sessions related to MEL and CLA for USAID and its partners
- Assist with trouble shooting and problem-solving when the need arises, including delivering services to the client when required
- Represent Bixal to USAID technical officers and implementing partners
- Perform other technical duties as required
Qualifications
- Master’s degree in relevant field or Ph.D. in the social sciences
- Minimum of 5-7 years of experience in monitoring, evaluation and management consulting in international development programs
- Experience working on USAID-funded projects
- Experience working in the Eastern and Southern Caribbean region (including Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago)
- Recognized mid- or senior-level expert in the monitoring, evaluation, and learning sector with strong management and people skills
- Strong quantitative and qualitative data analysis skills blended with expert writing and verbal communication skills in English
- Comfortable with monitoring, evaluation, and learning assignments
- Excellent trainer and committed to capacity building approaches
- Solution-oriented and a nice person to work with
- Loves to learn and willing to experiment with new technology and new ways of working
- Ability to work in a fast-paced business environment
- Fluency in English
Nice to haves
- Citizenship or work authorization in one of the Eastern and Southern Caribbean countries
- Technical expertise in one or more thematic sectors (such as health, governance/security, humanitarian response, environment, etc.) a strong plus
- Conference presentation and/or publication record preferred
Bixal is an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer. It ensures equal employment opportunity without discrimination or harassment based on race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, disability, national origin, marital or domestic/civil partnership status, genetic information, citizenship status, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.
