A note from One Acre Fund-their upcoming webinar, open positions, and insights into a social entrepreneurship career path
Webinar: Life and Work in the Field at One Acre Fund
One Acre Fund is hosting a webinar on careers in rural East Africa on Thursday, April 24 from 12:00-1:00 PM EDT. Learn about what it’s like to work in the field from two staff members who are doing just that!
The webinar includes:
– A brief overview of One Acre Fund’s model and its impact in Africa
– A discussion about what two of our program staff members in Kenya are currently working on
– Information on what it’s like to live in rural East Africa for One Acre Fund
– Details on how to be a great One Acre Fund candidate and what job opportunities are now available
To register, click here!
Jobs Spotlight: Internship and Development Opportunities
Are you passionate about international development? Do you want to leverage your skills to make a lasting impact on smallholder farm families? One Acre Fund has a recently opened two positions on the Development Team and an internship!
- Business Development Manager
- Location: Nairobi or Kigali (with up to 20-30% travel to rural Africa and international locations)
- Description: Design and implement a strategy to engage bilateral and multilateral organizations in country mission offices and head offices; support identification and engagement with the world’s large family and corporate foundations; serve as a spokesperson for the organization in African capitals while simultaneously shepherding complex, large-scale funding proposals from identification to development to fruition.
- Qualifications: 3 – 10+ years of work experience, a demonstrated long-term career interest in international development, and a track record of securing grants, cooperative agreements and contracts with large, institutional funders.
- Grants Administrator
- Location: Rural Kenya to start (1-2 months for training); then to Nairobi office.
- Description: Manage the financial and administrative aspects of reporting and compliance with our top foundation and bilateral grants/contracts; work alongside our program and operations staff to ensure full compliance with these awards. Key job responsibilities include grant fiscal and compliance management; monitoring, evaluation, and reporting; foundation grant reporting; and representation and diplomacy.
- Qualifications: 2 to 5+ years of progressive experience working with bilateral or large foundations; demonstrated success in programs management, donor compliance, and reporting; effective verbal and written communication, multi-tasking, organizational, prioritization skills are necessary; history of working effectively and respectfully with host country government, private sector, INGO and NGO partners in complex environments; prior work experience in Africa strongly preferred.
One Acre Fund currently has over 35 open positions. For more information and job descriptions, please visit our website.
In addition to these new roles, we also have an internship position available. To see the full job description, please click here.
- People Operations Intern
- Location: New York, NY
- Description: Work in a professional setting for a growing social enterprise. This position will primarily focus on the systems and structures that need to be in place to support a global field team.
- Qualification: At least 3 years of university coursework completed.
Forward to a Friend
Do you know of any graduate students or early career professionals who already have an undergraduate degree and are looking for a job? If so, please forward this e-newsletter to them.
If you or someone you know would like to be added to this careers newsletter, please email us at careers@oneacrefund.org with the subject line: “add me to the careers newsletter” and let us know how you heard about the newsletter. If you are a current student, please also mention your school.
How to Break into the Social Entrepreneurship Career Path
A rapidly-growing sector of new NGOs is shaking up the international development field. Here are some examples of ways to get started in this new sector.
Work Directly with Innovative NGOs
Many entrepreneurial NGOs offer positions with significant responsibility for early career professionals. These NGOs are often funded by foundations such as Draper Richards, Echoing Green, Mulago and Skoll Foundations. These NGOs are often easier to network into early on in your career.
Work in an Entrepreneurial Role That Offers Independence
Programs that offer this type of experience include Peace Corps and Fulbright, or you can design your own project. These roles offer a high degree of independence and are great ways to get into the field to learn directly from customers.
Apply For a Fellowship
Several of One Acre Fund’s leaders have started regular jobs (e.g. entrepreneurial company, operations consulting) and then spent at least one year afterwards working in a developing nation.
Fellowships provide a great opportunity to gain experience in development. Examples include:
Work in the Private Sector
Private sector experience can be complemented with developing country experience later through one of many fellowship/volunteer-type programs. A path like this shows a commitment to gaining hard skills in a professional setting and applying those skills abroad in developing countries.
