Job Description

Grants And Reports Manager

Spark MicroGrants believes in a world where everyone lives with dignity and determines their own positive future. Spark has worked in 1000+ villages in 6 countries and has pioneered a community-driven development model in sub-Saharan Africa. Spark works with NGO and Government partners to scale the model's adoption and impact on rural communities - on their own terms. Our model combines facilitated community meetings with a small, discretionary grant to catalyze local action and institution building.

Spark is seeking a dynamic and experienced Grants and Reports Manager to join our team to steward Spark's funding partnerships. This role will be instrumental in sustaining and growing Spark's impact by developing high-quality donor reports, engaging with funders as advisors and thought partners, and ensuring compliant management and oversight of grants. The position will work closely with our country teams to ensure effective resource utilization and documentation of program highlights, learnings and opportunities.

The Grants and Reports Manager should have experience working with teams across geographies and the professionalism to represent Spark externally with donors both virtually and in-person. The Grants and Reports Manager will report to the Growth Director and work closely with the growth and leadership teams to effectively manage and expand relationships with our existing funding partners. The ideal candidate will be an excellent communicator, with exceptional writing, presentation, and organizational skills, and have experience working with private philanthropic funders.

Responsibilities

Donor Stewardship and Reporting

Goal: Achieve 100% on-time reporting and deliverable submission

• Build strong relationships with Spark's existing donor partners and actively seek opportunities for thought partnership as Spark continues to learn, iterate and scale its model.
• Ensure responsive and accurate communication with all existing funders.
• Produce high-quality donor reports that showcase Spark's impact through both data and storytelling, liaising across teams to gather inputs.
• Coordinate with Spark's finance team to complete clear and accurate financial reporting
• Maintain and manage all grant reporting tools, templates, and guidelines.
• Represent the organization with external stakeholders (funders, key partners, etc.) and support event planning and logistics when necessary.

Funding Renewals

Goal: Sustain an annual 80%+ funder renewal rate and average increase in renewal funding of 20%+.

• Track funding renewal timelines and ensure proactive kick-off of renewal processes.
• Oversee the drafting and submission of grant renewal applications, facilitating discussion on strategic objectives and gathering inputs from program, impact, and finance team members.
• Ensure all renewal applications are appropriately customized to the needs and interests of each funding partner and that they are actively engaged as valued thought partners throughout the renewal processes.

Grants Management

Goal: Achieve 100% compliance with all grant terms and conditions

• Track all donor deliverables, reporting deadlines and payment schedules.
• Manage Spark's Salesforce database, inputting grant receivables, funder notes and ensuring data is clean and updated.
• Coordinate with finance and program staff to monitor grant budgets, timelines and ensure compliance with all grant terms and conditions.
• Oversee the receipt of donor funds including sending funding acknowledgement letters.
• Regularly review and update confirmed cash flow projections.

Requirements:

• 5+ years of experience with nonprofit grants and reports management, communications, or development, including at least 3 years of progressive experience with grants management, reporting, and donor relations.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with experience crafting compelling narratives.
• Strong project management skills and ability to manage multiple deadlines while working with internationally dispersed colleagues.
• Ability to be flexible and collaborative; to assess capacities and priorities and work with colleagues to meet both immediate needs and mature the growth function.
• Experience with CRM systems, preferably Salesforce.
• Experience working in sub-Saharan Africa and knowledge of the East African context preferred.
• Experience with international development and/or community-driven development preferred.
• Fluency in English, both written and spoken.

Other Information

Job Location: Flexible, East Coast USA preferred. Occasional travel to East Africa

Reporting to: Growth Director

Start Date: As soon as possible

Salary: Salary is based on geographic location and commensurate with experience

Probation period: Three months probation period with learning and performance objectives

How to Apply:

Safeguarding: Our safeguarding follows a do no harm principle. All Spark staff are expected to respect and uphold the safeguarding procedures and principles to minimize harm to stakeholders, program participants, and the environment, in compliance with the World Bank Environmental and Social Framework and national legislation in the countries where we operate.

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