Water Programs Manager

Role Description

As Water Programs Manager, you'll own the grant lifecycle and partnership relationship for a set of global WASH partners. Your core focus is grants management and partner relationship management, building the kind of trusted relationships that make accountability productive rather than punitive. You’ll leverage your experience and technical knowledge of on-the-ground program implementation to support our partners and ensure that effective strategies are being evaluated and utilized while helping to build, adapt and apply a clear performance framework.

You will report to the Associate Director of Program Partnerships, who is responsible for overall guidance on partnership strategy, portfolio-level budgeting, and final grant approval. You may manage at least one Water Programs Associate or coordinate closely with other Associates on your team to support administrative processes for the partnerships within your purview.

You’ll also work closely with members of the Program Finance sub-team to oversee financial management for each partnership as well as representatives of a Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning cross-cutting sub-team. Within this integrated team, you will make sure that charity: water's funds are invested in effective WASH programs and you will manage great partner relationships to enable this work, and you will bring a continuous-improvement mindset to both how we work internally and how the work we fund through implementing partners gets stronger over time.

Responsibilities

• Managing the multi-year grant lifecycle for a portfolio of global implementation partners, including soliciting and reviewing grant proposals, approving progress reports, monitoring implementation milestones, and managing project timelines.
• Managing program performance against a defined performance framework by setting expectations up front, tracking progress against agreed objectives and indicators, reviewing progress reporting, and monitoring work through field visits to inform grant and program decisions.
• Optimizing partner program implementation through the incorporation of M&E findings and by sharing effective WASH strategies and innovations with partners where relevant.
• Regularly identifying opportunities for strengthening technical and operational areas relating to program implementation, which may include management of various external technical consultants as needed.
• Building and maintaining strong partner relationships characterized by trust, candor, mutual accountability and a shared commitment to quality by navigating difficult conversations across cultures and languages when needed.
• Aiding the execution of portfolio or department goals and special initiatives as needed.
• Driving ongoing improvements both internally (our systems, processes, and ways of working) and externally (the quality, sustainability, and cost-effectiveness of the partners’ work), all with the aim of strengthening systems that increase the efficiency, transparency, and impact of our programs over time.
• Supporting the team’s AI transition by piloting and adopting AI tools that increase the efficiency, consistency, and quality of partnerships with appropriate human judgement and oversight.
• Supporting the identification, vetting, and onboarding of new global WASH partnerships as needed.
• Working collaboratively across the organization with each charity: water department to make sure their involvement in our water programs is maximized and efficient.
• Working closely with the Associate Director of Program Partnerships as well as other members of the leadership team to establish long-term partnership plans that incorporate lessons from monitoring efforts and M&E data collected for the partnerships you manage.
• Managing a Water Programs Associate or coordinating closely with other Associates on your team, guiding them to be successful in their administrative roles and mentoring their growth on the team.
• Managing various consultants hired for programmatic evaluations or technical initiatives and then support the interpretation and integration of findings or results into partnership strategies.
• Managing requests for information and impact stories from across the organization to share with the organization and greater charity: water community.
• Providing program-specific content for customized donor reports and presentations and engaging with donor audiences as needed.
• Spending up to 20% of your time traveling to the field.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience managing a WASH funding portfolio at a grantmaking organization or developing WASH programs in international contexts.
• A bachelor degree’s in a related field.
• Demonstrated ability to manage partnerships or programs against a defined performance framework, including defining objectives, tracking progress, and supporting action on the results.
• Experience engaging external technical resources to complement in-house capacity.
• A desire to manage and develop a team in knowledge and capacity.

Requirements

• A Master’s degree in a related field, including public health, environmental engineering, or water science.
• Managed sustainable rural WASH grant portfolios or partnerships.
• Experience capacity-building with international NGO partners, especially in West Africa.
• Fluency in French.
• Direct international experience implementing WASH programs, including experience with monitoring and evaluation, budget analysis, and data collection platforms.

Benefits

• Unlimited PTO.
• Summer Fridays.
• 6-week paid sabbatical leave after 5 years of employment.
• Annual bonus potential through The Pool.
• 401k plan + employer match.
• Medical covered at 85% + Dental/Vision contributions.
• FSA + dependent day care FSA.
• Employer-paid life insurance, STD, LTD.
• 16-week paid maternity and paternity leave for new parents.
• Stipends for Home office, Professional Development, and a You-do-You Perk.
• TSA Pre-check reimbursement.
• Flexible working hours; team members are expected to be online 10am - 4pm ET regardless of location, plus three hours per day asynchronously, which factors in an hour for lunch.
• 2-4 annual travel requirements that foster team alignment, connection and in-person collaboration.