CI’s Pacific Islands Program (PIP) works in partnership with governments and civil society agencies to conserve the Pacific’s living heritage, demonstrate that Pacific societies rely on the maintenance of ecosystem processes and are able to live harmoniously with nature. The program has offices in Samoa, Fiji, New Caledonia and PNG.
The Executive Director (ED) is responsible for programmatic oversight and leads the design, implementation, and monitoring of CI’s conservation and human well-being strategy in the Pacific (Polynesia, Micronesia and Melanesia). The position ensures well designed, technically sound and effectively managed projects are clearly aligned to institutional and programmatic strategies and will lead due diligence on the technical capacities of all partners contracted through external grants.
A key role is establishing and maintaining relationships and partnerships, both internally, with CI’s technical and fundraising divisions and with the Asia-Pacific Field Division management team, and externally with the donor community, relevant government institutions, academia, the private sector and civil society organizations operating in the Pacific.
The ED will manage a multi-disciplinary team, instilling organizational values and behaviors and creating a work environment that attracts, develops and retains the best human talent.
RESPONSIBILITIES:
- Define and integrate at the Pacific scale conservation and human well-being strategies for terrestrial and marine environments that represent opportunities for improving human well-being through conservation and sustainable use of natural resources.
- Generate a sufficient and sustainable financial resources stream to deliver on the Pacific Islands Program strategy in 1 above.
- Working closely with the Pacific Islands Program Operations Director, ensure the overall administrative, financial and staff management of the Program are conducted in a manner that enables stability, provides a motivating environment and is in compliance with local laws and CI policies.
- Engineer and build CI’s institutional presence in order to deliver on the portfolio of conservation and human well-being outcomes identified in the Pacific Islands Program strategy. Manage all aspects of CI’s presence using institutional tools and systems for defining strategy, monitoring outcomes, evaluating performance and taking action to address areas of opportunity or concern.
- Establish and maintain cooperative partnerships with both internal and external partners including CI business units, multilateral agencies, government bodies, conservation NGOs, private sector partners, and scientific agencies to achieve conservation and human well-being outcomes.
- Participate as an effective member of the Asia-Pacific Field Division’s Executive Committee (APEX).
- Other duties as assigned by supervisor
WORKING CONDITIONS: Requires extensive travel throughout the Pacific and 2 or 3 times per year more widely in Asia, US and Europe.
QUALIFICATIONS:
Required:
- Advanced degree relevant to natural resource management and/or at least 10 years experience with natural resource management work or a relevant related field.
- Complete familiarity with the major natural resource management and biodiversity conservation issues in the Pacific.
- Intellectual leadership and creativity with the ability to support the development of organizational technical capacity.
- Proven ability in project conceptualization, development and fundraising.
- Knowledge and understanding of ecosystem services, climate change, and human well-being linkages with natural resource management and biodiversity conservation.
- Well-developed personnel management skills with significant experience managing a diverse set of staff toward common goals, including the ability to motivate and mentor; manage conflict; problem solve; and manage change.
- Proven capacity to build teams and interact as a constructive team player in multidisciplinary and multicultural environments.
- Excellent skills in partnerships, alliance building and institutional networking.
- Highly developed communication skills, including listening, speaking and writing for a variety of audiences.
- Experience managing at least a US$ 1,000,000 annual organizational budget
