Senior MEL Specialist - USAID/DR MEL Activity

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About Us:Bixal is a consulting company based in Fairfax, VA, working alongside governments and organizations to help them deliver better services and experiences to the communities they serve. Using evidence-based knowledge and technology, Bixal empowers clients to deliver on their missions more effectively by fostering a culture of learning and continuous improvement.

Location:

This role will be based in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic

What Will You Do?Bixal seeks a Senior MEL Specialist for the upcoming USAID Dominican Republic (DR) Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning Platform (MEL) activity. The activity will provide technical, administrative, and programmatic support services to the USAID/DR Mission in the development, implementation, and evaluation of strategies and programs related to Mission priorities. Specifically, this contract will provide USAID DR, implementing partners (IPs), and local country stakeholders with: Monitoring; Performance and Impact Evaluations; Research and Assessments; and Collaboration, Learning and Adapting (CLA) support services. The Senior MEL Specialist will be responsible for leading and managing the technical work related to performance monitoring, evaluation, research and assessments. They will be responsible for strengthening USAID/DR’s and USAID Implementing Partner’s monitoring and reporting systems, overseeing evaluability assessments, and leading data quality assessments under this contract. They will oversee the portfolio of performance and other evaluations issues under this contract, and will manage evaluation teams, consultants, and subcontracts to conduct high quality and innovative evaluations.

Important noteThis is a full-time proposal position contingent on contract award.

Responsibilities:

• Supports the COP to deliver high-quality performance monitoring, evaluation, research, and capacity building services.
• Represents the company to the client and represents Bixal in the absence of the COP
• Works with team to strategically deploy staff and consultants and may serve as a team member to deliver specific assignments as required.
• Provides senior-level technical and managerial support on projects, such as designing and implementing activity verification and monitoring systems, performance monitoring and evaluation activities, data quality assessments, research and assessments.
• Oversee the development of data analysis plans and reporting templates and collaborate on the development of presentations to disseminate findings and conclusions to a wide audience, including high-level forums.
• Oversee capacity building efforts to promote local capacity to monitor, evaluate and learn.
• Provide technical leadership to the Mission to strengthen its monitoring and reporting systems.
• Lead the development of effective monitoring tools, including the adoption of digital and virtual tools, AI approaches, and geographic information system (GIS) technologies for monitoring performance at the project and activity levels.
• Oversee and participate in evaluations, analyses, and assessments throughout the life of the activity, including scope of work development, data collection, design of methodologies and protocols, data analysis and reporting writing.
• Assists with trouble shooting and problem-solving when needs arises, including delivering services to the client when required.

Qualifications:

• Master's degree preferred in monitoring and evaluation, public administration, political science, international relations, or related field.
• At least 8 years of progressively responsible experience in monitoring, evaluation, learning and management consulting in international development programs, preferably in the Dominican Republic.
• At least 3 years of experience managing teams delivering MEL services.
• Proficiency with quantitative, qualitative, and geospatial data collection and analysis methodologies and monitoring best practices.
• Demonstrated experience designing and conducting evaluations, with experience as an USAID evaluation team lead preferred.
• Demonstrated experience developing performance monitoring systems on USAID-funded programs.
• Demonstrated ability in management, analysis, and processing of data to inform project planning and MEL.
• Experience providing capacity building on monitoring, evaluation, learning, and adaptive management.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills in English and Spanish.