Job description
Must be based in Africa (preference for Nairobi or West Africa-based) with significant travel; Preference for French Speaker
About the Team
The GSMA’s mAgri Programme works closely with Mobile Network Operators, the development community and agricultural organizations to catalyze scalable, commercial mobile services that improve the productivity and incomes of smallholder farmers and benefit the agriculture sector in emerging markets. We do this by improving their access to information, financial services and supply chain solutions, delivered via mobile through sustainable business models.
We provide challenge fund grants, technical assistance, sharing of best practices and support on monitoring and evaluation to selected mobile agriculture projects and services. By working with mobile service providers, agricultural organisations and the development community, we are able to provide supporting tools and share best practices in developing and taking mobile agriculture solutions to market. We help practitioners to identify partners and broker relationship between service owners, mobile operators, content providers and agricultural organisations.
About the Role
The GSMA mAgri Programme seeks an accomplished Market Engagement Manager experienced in VAS, mobile enterprise/B2B services and mobile financial services (MFS) to work closely with the Senior mAgri Market Engagement Manager, local teams and programme partners to support the implementation of cutting-edge MNO-lead mAgri projects portfolio in line with MNO and GSMA strategy. While working across a number of projects and project teams with multiple priorities, this particular market engagement manager will need to support the evolution of mAgri services to include enterprise/B2B and MFS components. It will be a complex and continuously changing environment across many cultures. The incumbent must possess a unique blend of business acumen with an understanding of the mobile, MFS and enterprise/B2B markets that they’ll be working in, a big-picture vision, and the drive to make that vision a reality. They should enjoy spending time in the market to understand needs and work proactively to find innovative solutions and own drive their implementation.
The role will encompass:
Project Consultancy Support (70%) – Work directly with operators who have received commitment of support from the mAgri Programme and support them as their chief consultant to both strengthen any existing mAgri content service while supporting service evolution to include MFS and key enterprise components/B2B and implement pilots with agribusiness enterprise clients. Your role as their consultant is to advise them on development and implementation of their service strategy, robust business and operational plans, share lessons learned in other markets, and troubleshoot key challenges. Ensure the agricultural service is designed and implemented to provide a high-quality of service and impact to farmers and agribusiness clients; and can be scalable and sustainable. Develop and manage key stakeholders relationships critical for the programme’s success, including mobile phone operators, potential agribusiness clients, value added service providers, agriculture institutes and donor agencies. Key to this role is providing actionable recommendations to operators based on deep analysis of consumer insights and supporting them with implementing the recommendations resulting in continuous service evolution and improvements.Best practice and knowledge sharing (15%) – Extract key learnings and analytics from each mAgri project deployment and raise advocacy for mobile agricultural services more broadly within the industry, by ensuring that key industry developments, learnings and best practices are appropriately packaged and shared. This could be in the form of writing case studies and online reports and conducting knowledge sharing sessions via working groups, webinars and workshops (in collaboration with the other mAgri team members).Programme and project monitoring (15%) – Define project plans, milestones and success measures; prepare timely and comprehensive analysis of progress against metrics and milestones. Prepare progress and financial reports, as required. Manage third party monitoring and evaluation services. Liaise with a third party grant management organisation to contract grants and ensure contractual obligations are met.
About You
Skills:
Demonstrable consultancy and business development expertise
Outstanding general and project management skills coupled with analytical acumen
Excellent interpersonal, communication and presentation skills
Proven track record of achievement under a range of challenging situations (ideally in multiple countries, especially developing countries)
Experienced in telecom sector in emerging markets
Experience in digital financial services and mobile enterprise (B2B) services
Awareness of agricultural value chains and the agribusiness / farmer relationships
Able to engage effectively in both a CEO board room and a village of rural smallholder farmers
Experience executing monitoring, evaluation and learning plans
Personal
Should be able to work from the GSMA Nairobi office and have the right to work in Kenya
Excellent cultural awareness and a desire to work with teams around the world while showing respect for all colleagues and stakeholders. Enjoys international travel and learning about new markets
Able to quickly grasp new concepts and ideas (given the level of innovation in our sector and the wider industry) and proactively communicate and work as part of a global team.
Naturally curious, able to think beyond business-as-usual scenarios, and dream big.
Process-oriented individual, that takes ownership and responsibly without unnecessary management from above
Qualifications:
Degree level qualification
Masters of Business Administration
Fluent in French and familiar with West Africa a plus
What We Offer
Working at the GSMA offers you unparalleled access to the mobile industry. We offer a chance to truly shape the direction of mobile, whatever your role. By joining the GSMA, you will be exposed to a fast-paced rapidly evolving environment, working on global solutions, genuinely fascinating and industry-changing projects and a stimulating and dynamic environment designed to enable you to flourish.
In addition to architect-designed offices and competitive compensation, our benefits include fantastic learning & development opportunities, generous holiday allowances, four additional days off for professional development and many others.
We offer a working environment that reflects our organisational values. We also hire in line with our values and recruit candidates who demonstrate a strong affinity with these 7 principles:
DREAM BIG – Demonstrate vision and insight to lead the industry forwardBE BOLD – Have the courage to take risks and make tough decisionsOWN IT – Take full accountability for your decisions and actionsWORK AS A TEAM – Collaborate to deliver impactful resultsDO THE RIGHT THING – Conduct yourself with honesty and integrity at all timesSHOW RESPECT – Treat others as you would expect to be treatedLOVE WHAT YOU DO – Bring passion and pride to your work
To learn more about the GSMA, visit our careers site, our LinkedIn page and our Twitter page.
