Scale Manager, Wildlife Trafficking Technology Challenge

DAI is an employee-owned global development company. For 40 years, we have worked on the frontlines of international development, tackling fundamental social and economic development problems caused by inefficient markets, ineffective governments, and instability. Currently, DAI is delivering results that matter in some 60 countries. Our integrated development solutions turn ideas into impact by bringing together fresh combinations of expertise and innovation across multiple disciplines—crisis mitigation and stability operations, democratic governance and public sector management, agriculture and agribusiness, private sector development and financial services, economics and trade, HIV/AIDS and disease control, water and natural resources management, and energy and climate change. Our clients include international development agencies, international lending institutions, private corporations and philanthropies, and national governments.

Description

DAI seeks expressions of interest for the Scaling Manager position on the US Agency for International Development (USAID) Wildlife Trafficking Technology Challenge (WTTC) program opportunity.

The overall goal of the WTTC program, currently being tendered, is to design and launch a variety of technology challenges to combat wildlife trafficking and support the acceleration and scaling up of promising solutions. This will be accomplished through two major tasks:

• Task 1: Design, launch and manage an international program of innovation competitions for wildlife trafficking to generate solutions to challenges provided by USAID, for use by USAID and its partners.
• Task 2: Support the acceleration to scale and scaling up of promising ideas and technologies (expediting the transition of a concept or prototype to a viable product for the marketplace, and expanding the number of users).

In support of Task 2, the Scaling Manager will be an integral part of the project team and report to the Senior Prize Manager.  This position will assist innovators that have been sourced by the Wildlife Trafficking Technology Challenge by delivering acceleration services and facilitating connections to potential stakeholders, investors and resources for growth.

Duties will include, but will not necessarily be limited to:

• Working with the Senior Prize Manager, ensure that the competition and program design integrates success criteria that incentivizes acceleration and scale-up;
• Working with the Senior Prize Manager, ensure that the competition design integrates a sense of end-user activities, needs, and demand;
• Conduct ongoing needs assessments for semi-finalist and finalist innovators to identify the right combination of services;
• Engage external partners to identify the most appropriate ‘pathway to scale’ and broker relationships between those external partners and innovators;
• Provide opportunities for technologies to be introduced to potential target users, investors and donors;
• Working with the Communications Specialist and innovators, prepare collateral that highlights technologies and innovators to potential target users, investors and donors; and
• Build winner/participant/user opportunities for peer-to-peer learning and communities through events, online engagement, etc.