Media Development Advisor, BBC Media Action

Media Development Advisor, BBC Media Action

Band: D

Location: The role will be based in one of BBC Media Action’s offices in Africa or Asia. Current BBC Media Action offices are in the following cities, and the role could be based in any of these, subject to the prevailing security situation at the time of appointment: Abuja, Addis Ababa, Dar Es Salaam, Delhi, Dhaka, Freetown, Hargeisa, Jakarta, Juba, Kabul, Kathmandu, Lusaka, Nairobi, Phnom Penh, Tunis, Yangon. Applications are welcome from anyone with the existing right to work in any of those countries.

Salary: The successful applicant will be employed and based in their home country, with salary set according to BBC Media Action’s local pay scales in that country.

Contract type: 18 Month Fixed Term Contract / Attachment – Extension possible

We’re happy to discuss flexible working. Please indicate your choice under the flexible working question in the application. There is no obligation to raise this at the application stage but if you wish to do so, you are welcome to. Flexible working will be part of the discussion at offer stage.

This role may involve working with groups of vulnerable children, youth, and adults. For the successful candidate, mandatory training will be provided on BBC Media Action’s safeguarding policy and staff code of conduct. BBC Media Action operates a zero-tolerance policy concerning all forms of abuse and exploitation of vulnerable people. A police background check may form part of the recruitment process.

If you need to discuss adjustments or access requirements for the interview process please contact the [email protected]. For any general queries, please contact: [email protected].

BBC Media Action

BBC Media Action is the BBC’s international development organisation, and we believe in the power of media and communication for good. We work in more than 20 countries around the world, supporting the independent media essential to democracy and development. Each year our projects and programmes reach over 100 million people facing poverty, inequality and insecurity with information they can trust, helping to improve health, bridge divides, challenge prejudice, and save and change lives. We follow the editorial standards and values of the BBC, but we rely on funding from donors and partners to carry out our work.

With new funding from the UK government and the European Union, we are launching two linked projects aiming to better improve the resilience of media ecosystems worldwide, contributing to protecting and promoting democracy, human rights and fundamental freedoms and counter mis- and disinformation. The projects will operate across around twenty countries and involve more than a dozen global, regional and local media development partners as well as dozens of national and local media organisations.

Job Introduction

The Media Development Advisor will provide technical leadership to BBC Media Action’s two multi-country media development projects, as well as providing expert input to the organisation’s wider strategies and support on the area of media development.

Reporting to the programme director, s/he will work closely with BBC Media Action’s project teams around the world, as well as with multiple regional and national delivery partners, to ensure consistency and maximise impact across project design and capacity strengthening approaches. S/he will also play a key role in ensuring that the projects link to relevant global networks, feeding learning and evidence generated by the projects into policy discussions globally.

This role will be mapped to the CPF Job title Senior Thematic Advisor (Charity)

Main Responsibilities

• Convene and commission technical expertise to ensure that project teams and partners have access to the best learning, research and technical advice.
• Advise project teams and partners on the design and delivery of capacity strengthening and related activities.
• Support the development and delivery of an evidence generation strategy for the projects.
• Working closely with the programme director, ensure that project results are used to support external policy engagement, including maintaining key technical networks and representing the project and organisation externally.
• Support the maintenance and development of donor relationships and contribute to the design and development of new media development programming across the organisation.
• Work with partners and country teams to design and develop project tools such as Theories of Change and logical frameworks.
• Work with research teams to coordinate project monitoring and ensure this is feeding into project learning.

Are you the right candidate?

• World-class knowledge and expertise of what influences healthy media ecosystems and how to achieve impact.
• Senior level experience in journalism, current affairs or a closely related area.
• Well-developed ability to work with colleagues and partners across a range of different cultural and professional contexts. Experience of supporting professionals working in low-resource settings is highly desirable.
• Experience of technical design for donor-funded media development programmes.
• Extensive contacts and high-level networking ability within the field of media development. Proven ability to form and maintain external institutional and professional relationships with others in the field.
• Excellent communication and writing skills.
• Ability and willingness to travel as required to deliver the job.
• Good contextual understanding of one or more of the anticipated focus geographies for the portfolio (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Zambia) (desirable).
• Arabic, French and/or Spanish language skills (desirable).