USAID Small & Medium Enterprise Activity project
Required: Sector Specialist
PROJECT & POSITION DESCRIPTION
USAID Small and Medium Enterprise Activity (SMEA)’s development hypothesis is that SME-led economic growth will result in poverty reduction, job creation, and entrepreneurship development contributing to increased GDP. SMEA is working to increase incomes and employment in project-assisted economic sectors and improve the enabling environment for private sector led growth in Pakistan. This activity will contribute to achieving USAID/Pakistan’s “Development Objective: “Improving economic status of focus populations.” SMEA will achieve the following objectives and sub-objectives:
Objective 1: Improved Business Enabling Environment (BEE)
- Improved Government of Pakistan (GOP) ability to develop and implement reforms of policies, laws and regulations
- Strengthened private sector and civil society engagement in policy-making
Objective 2: Improved economic performance of focus enterprises
- Improved economic performance in select sectors
- Improved technological readiness and innovation
- Increased access to markets
- Increased access to finance
- Enabled women SMEs run profitable business
Sub-objective 3.2.2 B: Improved technological readiness and innovations (Pakistan
Challenge Fund for Technology and Innovation)
- Technical assistance to ICT firms to develop and market new technologies to enhance competitiveness in selected sectors
- Creation and diffusion of innovative, sustainable, and scalable ICT and business solutions to improve the competitiveness of Pakistani SMEs
- Collaboration between industry and academia addressing supply side constraints in terms of trained labor
- Commercialization of ICT research
- Increased technology literacy
SMEA will focus on the following manufacturing, industrial and service sectors:
i) Information, communication and technology (ICT)
ii) Light engineering
iii) Textile (minus spinning)
iv) Agri-business and processing
v) Logistics
vi) Hospitality
I. Position Title: Sector Specialist
The Sector Specialist will work on improving the economic performance of SMEs in various sectors across Pakistan, through SMEA’s project activities. The person will work closely with SMEs and other sector stakeholders to identify key bottlenecks hampering the growth of the sector and design interventions that can help increase the sales, jobs or exports for target SMEs. The Specialist will also work on implementing project initiatives by inducting both SMEs on the demand side and service providers on the supply side. The Specialist will be assigned to manage a specific sector, as well as to assist the team on other sector activities. This will require the Specialist to work closely with all project departments to ensure documentation and compliance requirements are met while keeping the focus on the potential benefit for SMEs. Knowledge of and experience in key concepts of private sector and value chain development are crucial to design and deliver those interventions which have the highest impact potential.
II. Objective and specific tasks:
The specialist will be responsible to manage the assigned sector(s) by designing and executing a comprehensive assistance strategy, business model with technical and financial analysis of value chain/segment(s) of the target sector to identify and address the key factors contributing to the low productivity and profitability of SMEs. The sector specialist will be responsible to support the team lead and his/her project colleagues in the successful implementation of all aspects of the project’s work plan and achievement of the project objective.
Specific tasks: As directed by the Team Lead, the Chief of Party, or the Chief of Party‘s designee, the Sector Specialist shall perform and support the performance of the following specific tasks:
- Design and develop development hypothesis and focus, business model with financials, implementation work plan and budget for the assigned sector(s). The work plan, budget and strategy should reflects the overall requirements of anticipated assistance activities/interventions.
- Design and develop sector and sub-sector operational and financial analysis to assess the return on investment (ROI) and analyze the opportunity cost of sector based investments.
- Conduct Business Development Services (BDS) gap analysis through a consultative process to identify a set of BD services which can help the sector grow. All projects interventions are meant to result in increase in sales, jobs and exports for target SMEs.
- Conduct value chain mapping exercise to identify the most appropriate areas of intervention, players, sub-sector(s) and develop a comparative analysis matrix for each value chain to select SMEs having financial and operation capacities to benefit from BDS support.
- Develop, coordinate and record day-to-day field work activities: e.g. marketing and promotional activities, liaison with sector stakeholders, individual meetings, presentation, and potential areas of working within the sector to achieve target results.
- Raise awareness, knowledge and compatibility of potential SME clients and BDS providers (BDSPs) to strengthen the outreach and to achieve the project targets.
- Improve access to BDS support in assigned sector(s) through advising, assisting and promoting services among SMEs and work closely with selected BDSPs to provide required services within a sector.
- Assist the women-led businesses specialist to design and develop a separate working methodology for women-owned enterprises in the assigned sector(s) and support them through matchmaking with relevant BDSP(s).
- Assist the training specialist through identifying the potential areas of capacity building and trainings needed to strengthen the capacity of SMEs (clients) to become more competent and efficient in business practices.
- Assist the access to finance specialist through identifying the potential opportunities related to financial needs in the sector and work with program beneficiaries to identify and facilitate access to finance opportunities.
- Establish strong relationships and work closely with the network partners, e.g. academia, associations, business chambers and clubs, community clubs and government to strengthen the business development and programmatic activities within the assigned sector.
- Assist BDS specialist to identify and collaborate with potential BDSPs, consultants and training institutes at the national and international level to increase the program outreach and to link these service providers with SMEs.
- The specialist is responsible to achieve monthly, quarterly and annual targets in the areas below for their assigned sector(s) to achieve and accomplish project’s goals and objectives:
- No. of SME support cases
- Identification of BDSPs and TSPs
- Management of approved SME support cases for timely completion
- Project marketing event(s)
- Training events/seminars/workshops
- MoUs, Strategic alliances, collaborations with stakeholders.
- Drafting and finalizing biweekly, quarters and annual reports along with any other reporting requirements
- Support cross cutting project activities related to competitive enhancement fund, challenge fund and business enabling environment work plans.
- Assist the BEE Component in outreach activities to identify sector specific constraints on the business enabling environment side.
- To support the BEE team in proposing and designing interventions for policy, regulatory and institutional reforms in light of market demand.
- Regularly liaison with the BEE team to identify private sector stakeholders for advocacy of policy reforms.
- Develop Scope of Work (SOW), Request for Proposal (RFQ), and Request for Proposal (RFP) and Technical Purchase Action Request (TPAR) for specific work plan activities.
- Ensure close inter-component and inter-office communication, coordination and cooperation with other project components and sub-components.
- Supervise the technical work of all local and expatriate consultants fielded under the assigned sector(s) and ensure that all end-of-assignment deliverables and other consultant and subcontractor performance results are a) consistent with and compliant with the consultant’s scope of work, b) are of high technical quality and good overall readability, and c) are acceptable to USAID and other component counterparts and beneficiaries
- Ensure the ethical and professional transparency of activities and ensure fair and clean competition and selection of the BDSPs and SMEs.
- Develop exit strategy for the assigned sector and identify the appropriate stakeholders to hand over the project technical assets, publications, success stories and database after project closure.
- Any other special assignments/ tasks assigned by the COP/Team lead or his designee.
III. Position Classification:
Long-Term Local Professional Staff, located in Islamabad, Pakistan
IV. Estimated Duration of Assignment:
Duration of SMEA contract. Till September 2021.
Ultimate Authority and Chain of Command:
Ultimate day to day field supervision and authority for all project personnel and all aspects of project activities rests with the Chief of Party or his designee, and in the Chemonics home office, with the project management unit (PMU) Director. The individual holding this position shall take no managerial or technical direction from any individual who is not formally employed in the chain of command between the individual and the Chief of Party, the Chief of Party’s designee, or the PMU Director.
VI. Reporting Responsibilities:
For all routine responsibilities and duties, either directly or indirectly related to this position description, the individual holding this position shall report directly to, and be supervised by, the CE Component Lead, or his designee.
VII. Candidate Profile:
The ideal candidate for the position will have the following:
- Master’s degree in business, economics, development or a related field
- At least 5 to 7 years of experience working in the development sector; preferably with USAID funded economic growth projects
- Experience of working directly with SMEs in any industrial or service sectors is necessary with an understanding of their challenges and the sector ecosystem
- Experience of working in Logistics, Agri-business & Processing, or Light Engineering sector preferred
- Prior knowledge of women-owned SMEs in the sector is preferred
- Excellent report writing and communication skills in English are mandatory for this position since report writing and developing technical briefs and write-ups will be a regular feature of this position.
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