Вакансія: USAID Economics Resilence Activity looking for SME Financing / Access to Finance / Investments Specialist

Job Overview

Despite the wartime, ERA has tools, instruments, ongoing and planned activities to help MSMEs to improve the Access to Finance through coordination and partnerships with relevant stakeholder that lead to unlocking external financing for MSMEs.

The SME Financing / Access to Finance / Investments Specialist contributes to the design and implementation of the Investment sector activities related to Access to Finance (A2F) for MSMEs. The SME Financing / Access to Finance / Investments Specialist coordinates the efforts of different instruments such as (including but not limited to), subcontracts, direct procurement, grants and consultancies achieve the goals set for Investment sector and A2F activities in particular. The SME Financing / Access to Finance / Investments Specialist reports to Investments and Private Sector Engagement Lead and is based in Kyiv (remote mode, until further notice).

Responsibilities

Technical Tasks:  

• Design and implementation of the Investment sector activities related to Access to Finance (A2F) for MSMES:
  - Building the pipeline of funding opportunities for MSMEs available on the domestic market (lenders, grant opportunities backed by Government of Ukraine, IFIs and other institutional sources).
  - Financial / Transaction Advisory Services Program to accelerate investments for targeted MSMEs.
  - Advisory services, technical assistance, improving quality of applications to banks and other financial institutions of SMEs.
  - Leveraging foreign credit guarantees to unlock banking financing for MSMEs.
  - Support innovative investment vehicles entering Ukraine (catalytic funds, impact investment, blended finance etc.).
  - Post-war Export and Investment acceleration program development.
  - Offer its own Investment sector activities ideas and contribute to other activities appeared in the future.
• Engage existent and potential beneficiaries and partners to design and implement activities aimed to provide potential for growth, financial performance, inclusion and positive impact on vulnerable populations, women and youth in the areas hardly affected by the Russia`s aggression.
• Provide technical assistance to expand lending, co-financing or co-investment opportunities, de-risking and blended finance.
• Identify expertise required for the specific MSMEs development needs and coordinate hiring independent consultant or procurement of the expert firm services to meet the MSMEs needs.
• Coordinate a consultant work and evaluate his/her technical assistance efforts by ensuring monitoring the consultant’s work results and deliverables submitted.
• Design partnerships that leverage investment through a combination of performance-based grants, technical assistance, de-risking mechanism (e.g. guarantees, first loss facilities) and innovative finance approaches.
• Design scopes of work and performance-based partnership agreements for technical assistance delivered through business advisory firms (transaction advisory support, market research, operational and management capacity building, human resource management).
• Connect and collaborate with banks, other financial institutions, lenders, investors, development finance institutions (DFIs) and complementary donor projects to increase available investment opportunities MSMEs.
• Support increased leadership opportunities for women in business, women’s access to capital, workplace equity and women’s employment and participation in value chains.
• Travel as needed to conduct interviews and collaboration with stakeholders in Ukraine and abroad (upon internal safety regulations).
• Perform other tasks assigned by the supervisor and SMT.

Grants Management: in coordination with the grant management team,

• works with grant recipients and the ERA technical staff to develop new grant proposals and ensure that they are aligned with the USAID ERA objectives and performance indicators;
• provides technical assistance to grant recipients to support the implementation of their grant agreements;
• coordinates with procurement personnel purchases approved under grant contracts.

Monitoring & Evaluation:  in coordination with the M&E team,

• supports data collection during the implementation of the technical tasks;
• monitors the implementation of direct interventions and grant activities according to the ERA M&E plan;
• provides information and data to the M&E team in a required format.

Communication: in coordination with the communication team,

• represents ERA in a professional manner to relevant stakeholders;
• fosters ongoing positive cooperation with the stakeholders and ERA staff;
• ensures that the correct USAID ERA branding and marking are utilized during the performance of the technical tasks.

Reporting:

• maintains records of all activities using existed reporting tools on Investment sector and ERA levels;
• prepares accurate and timely progress reports on a quarterly basis and contribute to preparation of annual reports;
• compiles technical reports for the Investment sector and ERA Senior Management Team (SMT) upon request.

Job Expectations

In this position, you are expected to share the DAI four core values:

• Integrity: commit to civil and ethical behavior, play by the rules, and do the right thing;
• Responsibility: be accountable to clients, partners, grant recipients, beneficiaries, colleagues, and communities where we work. If you fall short, you own up, fix the problem, and get it right the next time;
• Excellence: adhere to the highest technical and professional standards in innovation, learning, and service;
• Global Citizenship: respect the cultural diversity and treat everyone everywhere with professionalism and dignity to make the world a better place.

. Qualifications:

• Minimum of 3 years of experience in access to finance environment with focus on MSMEs segment.
• Master’s degree in finance, business management, economics, or similar; may consider bachelor’s degree with 5 years of directly applicable experience.
• Demonstrated knowledge and understanding of business services needed by SMEs to raise investment and target new markets.
• Experience supporting SMEs with business strategies, pre-investment support, financial models and other types of technical assistance. Preference for experience working in A2F on a “client side” (advisors, counselors, finance managers etc.).
• Preference for experience working for or in collaboration with donor funded or development finance initiatives, Big4 companies, financial advisory, investment banking.
• Strong Microsoft Excel skills
• Ukrainian language fluency required; strong preference for English fluency.

WE OFFER

Contract length: 12-months employment agreement with a possibility of extension until August 2024.

Salary Level: We offer competitive market-based salary level for candidates with relevant experience.

Duty station: Ukraine

Benefits: all benefits envisaged by Labor Code of Ukraine, corporate medical insurance for employees and immediate family members.

Start date: September  2022

Application process

All applicants must send a cover letter and updated CV (no longer than four pages) in English to [email protected], please mention in the subject SME Financing / Access to Finance / Investments Specialist

Closing date for applications: August 21, 2022