CIFOR-ICRAF
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Drylands are among the most important landscapes on Earth. They face real challenges – scarce water, degraded soils, rising climate extremes – yet they provide nearly half of the world’s food, store vast carbon, and are home to one in three people. Far from barren, drylands are landscapes of resilience, innovation and rich cultural heritage. They are places of untapped economic potential, where investment in sustainable land use can generate new business opportunities and strengthen local and global economies.
Through Thrivelands – the Global Drylands and Livelihoods Initiative, we are leading a bold global effort to turn these landscapes into engines of resilience and opportunity. By restoring degraded land, strengthening local economies, and catalyzing policy and finance shifts, we aim to ensure that communities not only adapt, but thrive.
We are looking for a Programme Coordinator to sit at the heart of this initiative, someone who is not only organized and detail-oriented, but also excited to connect people, ideas and solutions across sectors and geographies.
As Programme Coordinator, you will:
•Turn big ideas into action: design and drive workplans that translate strategy into results across regions and partners.
•Keep the engine running: coordinate teams, track progress, and make sure deliverables, budgets, and timelines stay on course.
•Connect people and ideas: bridge between scientists, policymakers, communities, and investors to create a shared vision of thriving landscapes.
•Build trust with partners: shape relationships with governments, donors, NGOs, and grassroots leaders to ensure momentum and shared ownership.
•Fuel learning and creativity: facilitate reflection processes, distill lessons, and ensure insights flow back into strategy and action.
•Elevate voices that matter: help surface stories and evidence from landscapes and local partners so they can shape global agendas.
•Shape global conversations: contribute to policy briefs and synthesis products that influence debates on peace, subsidy reform, nature finance, and resilience.
•Spot opportunities: support fundraising and partnerships that unlock finance and expand impact.
Duties and responsibilities
Programme Development, Coordination and Delivery
- Support the Program Lead in designing, coordinating, and adapting programme components, objectives and outputs.
- Manage and update an overarching workplan and lead cross-team coordination across regions.
- Translate strategy into implementable action plans with clear roles, sequencing and delivery timelines.
- Facilitate workstream integration and run regular internal team meetings to track progress and foster ownership of deliverables
- Support workstream leads in translating high-level objectives into actionable work plans and deliverables.
- Support the development and dissemination of learning and knowledge products, including synthesis briefs, reports, and partner case studies.
Strategic Planning, Monitoring & Learning
- Monitor delivery progress and prepare internal tracking systems, KPIs and briefing materials.
- Coordinate annual and quarterly work planning processes across all outputs in close collaboration with Programme Lead.
- Support adaptive learning across the programme including internal reflection, after-action reviews, and documentation of lessons learned in close collaboration with the M&E Officer and our Quality 4 Impact Team.
- Ensure cross-team coherence between strategic plans and documentation across knowledge generation, advocacy, and field implementation.
- Align internal planning cycles with donor reporting timelines and strategic milestones.
- Lead preparation of documentation including annual narrative reporting and Steering Committee Documentation and minutes.
Budgeting and Financial Oversight
- Monitor programme budget and lead regular budget tracking, in close collaboration with CIFOR-ICRAF Finance staff and the Admin Officer.
- Facilitate semi-annual budgeting processes for the overall programme in close coordination with Programme Lead.
- Preparing for engagement of audit reviews and quality assurance procedures.
- Assist in identifying new resource mobilization opportunities with the Programme Lead and key partners.
Strategic Partner Management and Donor Reporting.
- Lead Thrivelands’ stakeholder mapping and relationship management with government bodies, DFIs, donors, NGOs and private-sector allies to secure technical, in-kind and financial support and stewarding ongoing engagement.
- Draft and manage LOAs, subcontracts, and scopes of work with implementing partners.
- Identify and assess new and non-traditional implementation partners with strong local roots or unique scaling potential, evaluating their strategic fit, credibility, and alignment with Program objectives.
- Coordinate partner deliverables, timelines, and check-ins.
- Ensure partner reporting aligns with log frame outputs, internal progress tracking tools and donor expectations.
- Support strategic convenings, outreach activities, and learning exchanges with implementing partners.
Requirements
- A strong academic foundation -a Master’s degree in environmental science, natural resource management, agriculture, development, humanitarian studies, economics or a similar field.
- At least 4 years of experience in programme or project coordination in a non-profit, development, or private sector context.
- Proven ability to manage work plans, complex project timelines and deliverables across distributed teams.
- Strong organizational and problem-solving skills, with a proactive approach to managing competing priorities.
- High attention to detail, excellent written and verbal communication skills.
- Comfort with remote collaboration, project management and communication tools.
- Additional language skills (French, Spanish, Swahili, Portuguese) a plus.
Education, knowledge and experience
•A strong academic foundation -a Master’s degree in environmental science, natural resource management, agriculture, development, humanitarian studies, economics or a similar field.
•At least 4 years of experience in programme or project coordination in a non-profit, development, or private sector context.
Terms and conditions
•This is a Globally Recruited Staff (GRS) position. CIFOR-ICRAF offers competitive remuneration in USD, commensurate with skills and experience.
•The appointment will be for two (2) year period, inclusive of a six-month probationary period, with the possibility of extension contingent upon performance, continued relevance of the position and available resources.
•The duty station will be in Kenya, Nairobi.