Sanitation Senior Advisor

Sanitation Senior Advisor

Contract: 12 - month fixed term contract, Full-time, Maternity Cover

Location: WaterAid is a global and equal opportunities employer.  For practical and legal reasons, the successful candidate must be based in and legally able to work in a WaterAid country - subject to cost and communication with the majority of WaterAid countries being practical.   

For UK-based applicants, WaterAid is located 20 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5NN and this will be your location and contract base. We support and enjoy a hybrid working environment. A minimum of 40% of working time is spent face to face, either in London office, for coordination, collaboration and connectivity across the team, or as a result of external engagement or travel for WaterAid. 

Salary & Benefits:
Salaries and benefits for different countries will vary in line with the location of the successful candidate and depending on experience. See further details below:

• UK: £48,314 - £50,729 with excellent benefits
• Nigeria: 18,397,645 -23,445,232 NGN with benefits
• Nepal: 2,683,878 - 3,882,926 NPR with benefits
• Ethiopia: 18,353 - 31,435 USD with benefits
• Rwanda: 26,700,728 - 36,196,712 RWF with benefits
• South Africa: 827,550 - 1,034,437 ZAR with benefits
• Uganda: 123,026,016 - 163,009,471 UGX with benefits
• Zambia: 461,019 - 645, 426 ZMW with benefits

About WaterAid:
Want to use your skills in sanitation programming to play a vital role in making clean water, decent toilets and good hygiene normal for everyone everywhere?

We need passionate, creative and dedicated people. In return, you will be encouraged and empowered to be yourself at your very best. Together, we will make a bigger difference.

Join WaterAid as a Sanitation Senior Advisor to change normal for millions of people so they can unlock their potential, break free from poverty and change their lives for good. 

About the Team:
The Sanitation Senior Advisor is a senior position in the WASH Technical Effectiveness team, reporting to the Sanitation Lead. WASH Technical Effectiveness is part of the Programme Support & Knowledge team (PSK), a key unit of the WaterAid UK International Programmes Department (IPD) operating in 17 African and Asian countries.  PSK is a diverse and motivated group of 20+ technical specialists and advisors, passionate about bringing sustainable WASH to the world’s poorest and most marginalised people. PSK leads and supports organisation-wide programme learning and knowledge management, collating and disseminating programme knowledge and facilitating knowledge exchange. The team provides technical advisory expertise and fosters and supports internal and external programme and technical partnerships and networks. The team also leads on developing normative programme documents and standards and advise and support the delivery of a programme capacity enhancement strategy. PSK collaborates with many functions across the organisation including policy, advocacy, campaigns, fundraising, communications, as well as with WaterAid partners and collaborators.  

About the Role:
The Sanitation Senior Advisor is a senior position in the WASH Technical Effectiveness team, reporting to the Sanitation Lead.  Together with the Sanitation Lead, the Senior Advisor co-leads the delivery of core team responsibilities regarding the thematic areas of sanitation and other closely associated topics.  Applying a people-centred, systems strengthening approach to WASH, she/he provides high quality specialist technical analysis, advisory, and support services to the design, inception, implementation, troubleshooting, monitoring, and/or assessments of WaterAid’s programming worldwide, at both strategic and operational levels.   

In collaboration with country, regional and global colleagues, she/he co-leads the facilitation of effective learning and management of technical and programme knowledge across the organisation, and co-leads the development of relevant standards and guidance.  She/he also provides strategic and technical input to fundraising, communications, and external engagements.   

The Senior advisor has a high degree of independent and professional responsibility within own specialist areas, and discusses with her/his line manager to agree on how objectives are delivered.  She/he is seen as a thematic authority and is able to handle highly challenging technical assignments.  With a good understanding of organisational dynamics and ways of working, she/he is expected to effectively collaborate widely across WaterAid, facilitating joined-up and comprehensive efforts to advance WaterAid’s programming globally.  

About You:

• Strong technical experience in developing, and implementing sanitation approaches, services delivery and management models, resilience and sustainability of services, environmental sanitation, sanitary engineering, wastewater and drainage, and/or other inter-related topics across different settings, demonstrated through a progressive career record. 
• A relevant post-Graduate degree or equivalent work experience. 
• Strong experience in offering technical assistance, consulting, and/or advisory services to empower and to develop capacities of sanitation service providers, operators, local and national governments as well as INGO/CSO partners.  
• Ability to handle highly specialized, unusual, and challenging technical assignments, resolve complex issues in practical and imaginative ways. 
• Strong writing and communication ability in English. Experienced in producing practical knowledge products targeting needs of diverse audiences and effective peer-learning and sharing of good practices and lessons. 
• Organised and efficient. Demonstrated ability to drive tasks forward to completion in a timely manner while maintaining high quality.  
• A team player, able to work responsibly, under pressure, and collaboratively across diverse groups and culture. 
• Working style that reflects WaterAid’s values of Respect, Accountability, Courage, Collaboration, Integrity and Innovation.  
• Solid IT skills, particularly with core Microsoft Office software. 
• Ability to travel internationally up to 30%. 

Although not essential, we also prefer you to have:

• Relevant technical experience in systems strengthening, urban planning, behaviour change, private sector engagement, sector financing, gender, inclusion, environment and/or other WASH-related topics. 
• Working knowledge in French, Portuguese, Spanish, and/or any language widely spoken in the countries where WaterAid has programming. 

Closing date: Applications will close at 23:59 on 24th October 2024. Interviews are expected to be held between 18 to 22 November 2024 via Microsoft Teams.

How to Apply: To see the full job pack, please click 'here'. Submit the following 3 items into one document in either Word Document or PDF format:

• Item 1: Your Cover Letter, including your preferred location and right to work eligibility.
• Item 2: Your CV
• Item 3: Short answers to the following three questions on a separate page. Please limit each answer to no more than 200 words.
• Q1. What are your top 3 skills / areas of experience that you feel meet the requirements of the role?  
• Q2. What is the biggest lesson you have learnt in providing technical advisory support on the topic of integrating systems strengthening towards safely managed sanitation. 
• Q3. Describe briefly your experience when you led the organizational-wide knowledge sharing and learning, particularly related to sanitation. What did you do and what were the outcomes?

Pre-employment screening: Please note that we are unable to provide sponsorship for this post. In order to apply for this post, you must be able to demonstrate your right to work eligibility in the country to which you wish to work. All our vacancies require a basic Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check to comply with our Safer Recruitment policy.

Our Commitment

Our People Promise:
We will work with passion and focus to ensure safe and sustainable water, toilets and hygiene are available to everyone, everywhere. WaterAid is a place of purpose – where people have a real commitment and shared responsibility for the impact we have.  We are a global community with diverse backgrounds and perspectives, motivated by inspiring, stimulating work. We are determined to put the wellbeing of our people first, to be a place where people feel safe and able to contribute their voice and truly live our values.     

Equal opportunities:
We are an equal opportunity, disability-confident employer and are dedicated to achieving the highest standards of diversity, equity and inclusion. We welcome applications from people of all backgrounds, beliefs, customs, traditions and ways of life. This includes, but is not limited to, race, gender, disability, age, sexual orientation, religion, national or social origin, health status, and economic or social situation.

Safeguarding:
We are also committed to protecting everyone we come into contact with. We have a zero-tolerance approach to abuse of power, privilege or trust across our global work, and any form of inappropriate behaviour, discrimination, abuse, bullying, harassment, or exploitation. Safeguarding the people and communities we work with, our staff, volunteers and anyone working on our behalf is our top priority, and we take our responsibilities extremely seriously.