Global Lead, Women's Protection and Empowerment Systems Transformation

Overview

The Global Lead, Women's Protection and Empowerment Systems Transformation is responsible for leading the transformation of IRC's WPE practice, acting as the organizational leader on GBV prevention and response, women's and girls' empowerment, and WPE systems strengthening.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the transformation of IRC's WPE practice, acting as the organizational reference point on GBV prevention and response, women's empowerment, and WPE systems strengthening.
• Lead strategic direction for WPE in line with S100 and the Safety Strategy.
• Lead global business development for WPE, bringing a clear distinction between financing for portfolio growth and financing for the quality, continuity, and sustainability of services.
• Advocate for funding architectures that cover the workforce, systems, referral infrastructure, and community relationships.
• Steer the adaptation of the WPE operating model to current conditions without compromising service integrity.
• Collaborate with Global Practice Leads and Regional Leads to promote programmatic synergies within WPE and across IRC sectors.
• Line manage global practice area and strategic project staff.
• Accountable for evidence-based technical oversight of WPE standards, methodologies, and tools.
• Support Regional Leads, Technical Advisors, and Technical Coordinators with thorny technical problems, capacity strengthening, mentorship, and career planning.
• Bring intellectual credibility to debates about evidence standards.
• Guide research and evidence use with a genuine intelligence orientation.
• Establish and maintain relevant Communities of Practice; provide technical inputs to WPE-specific MEAL tools.
• Exercise entrepreneurial judgment in external representation.
• Build thought leadership presence across forums, publications, and cross-sector platforms.
• Act as key strategic advisor to Policy and Advocacy, Research and Innovation, and External Relations on WPE-related advocacy campaigns and policy shifts.
• Develop and maintain strategic relationships and partnerships with a wide range of actors.
• Lead the WPE global team through transition with integrity and care.
• Hold serious work with humanity: sustain analytical rigor without clinical detachment, and support staff wellbeing.
• Invest in the relationship between global technical leadership and field practitioners.
• Contribute actively to VPRU unit culture, shared leadership, cross-team learning, and the collective responsibility of the senior management team for unit cohesion.

Required Experience

• 12+ years of progressive experience designing, leading, and implementing programs, including 7+ years in GBV/WPE is required.
• Additional experience in social work, social welfare systems, or case management practice would be an asset.
• Strong track record of driving uptake of evidence-based practice.
• Demonstrated experience in sectoral strategy design and planning; experience with policy and advocacy efforts and campaigns for change.
• Demonstrated interest in social work systems, case management practice, or integrated protection service delivery models.
• Intellectual engagement with the financing of protection and prevention programming.
• Experience working across sectoral boundaries (both programmatically and with different datasets)— GBV and child protection, health, livelihoods, social protection — is a strong asset; familiarity with, and curiosity in, data and financing architectures in systems adjacent to humanitarian protection is a meaningful additional asset.
• Energized by building something as well as consolidating what works; thrives in strategic inflection moments; brings diagnostic clarity to distinguish core mandate from what can be adapted.
• An active thought leadership presence and a demonstrated ability to hold a clear directional view in ambiguous or transitional contexts.
• Ability to shape the transformative vision and agenda, complemented with excellent and an ability to identify and convert business development opportunities and the necessary communication, influencing, and storytelling skills to turn this vision into action.
• Demonstrated capacity to lead, grow and sustain high performing teams, including through transition.
• Demonstrated for self and staff; to influence across a wide range of diverse stakeholders; and to within the domain area.
• Demonstrated comfort engaging non-transactionally across donors, civil society, social justice movements, financing organizations, and academic communities: building and sustaining relationships as a basis for influence and trust over time.
• An understanding of innovation that transcends technology, behavior change and comfort with disruptive thinking.

Qualifications

• Master's/post-graduate degree in Social Work, Social Policy, Gender Studies, International Law, Human Rights Law, International Development, Public Administration, or a related field required, or an equivalent combination of education and work experience demonstrating comparable depth.
• Candidates whose academic formation is in fields concerned with how social services are planned, governed, and financed — public administration, social policy, health systems, domestic social welfare architecture — are strongly encouraged to apply and will be weighted favorably alongside conventional humanitarian backgrounds.
• Sound training and/or demonstrated experience in the use of data and research evidence for programmatic decisions; rigorous analytic skills are an advantage.

Other Details