Careers

Work in Africa for an innovative, start-up non-profit organization!
Excellent career-development opportunity mixing private-sector management skill-set with non-profit service

Industry:          Nonprofit/International Development
Function:         Operations Innovation
Employer:        One Acre Fund
Job Title:          Program Associate
Job Location:   Western Kenya (English required) or Southwest Rwanda (French required)

Organization Description

One Acre Fund is a start-up initiative in Kenya which works with persistently hungry farm families. Instead of giving handouts to families, One Acre invests in farm families to generate a permanent gain in farm income. Our "investment bundle" includes education, financing, inputs, and export market access. Our program is designed to be usable by the extreme poor, and generates a permanent, 100%+ gain in farm income.

We have been operating since January 2006, and we currently serve 12,000 farm families (48,000 children). Our target is to change the lives of 40,000 families (160,000 children) within two more years, scaling at a 50-100% growth rate thereafter. One Acre Fund is one of the most externally-validated social start-ups of 2006, winning grants from the highly competitive Echoing Green and Draper Richards Foundations, and first place wins at the Stanford and Yale social venture competitions. Website: www.oneacrefund.org

Job Description
We are seeking an exceptional recent university graduate with 2-5 years work experience, and a career interest in international development. They will serve in a position that combines both field and management experience in Africa. As a young organization, we are ready to hand over large responsibility for specific, well-defined work modules, with similar structure to an operations consulting role.

Projects will be focused on improvements to One Acre Fund’s program model – as opposed to day-to-day operations, which are operated by our country staff. The typical program associate leads three major projects, and several smaller ones. Example projects include:

• Operations projects. We recently started large-scale purchase and sale of bean seed. The program associate devised a protocol for purchasing seed from farmers, worked through field staff to enroll hundreds of farmers in the program, created financial protocols for payment processing, and set up a warehouse receiving / processing operation.
• New model configuration experiments. One Acre Fund is currently experimenting with four different program model configurations, led by a program associate. He is setting up the infrastructure to set up a fertilizer savings program with a bank, and field-trialing the program with 200 farmers in two sites, in cooperation with two of our managers.
• Financial processes. We have a program associate who is leading up an effort to rationalize our financial processes. As a result of his work, we will now have monthly data on actual expenses vs. budget across all budget line items and three different districts. He will gradually hand this off to two office staff that he is managing. Having this data will lead us into the next phase of the work, which is to design and implement a wide variety of cost-cutting programs.

Qualifications

We are looking for somebody truly extraordinary for the program associate role. This is an extremely competitive posting for a business/ management-style position. Only 10% make of applicants make it to a phone screen. Therefore, please do NOT respond unless you fit these criteria:

• Top-performing undergraduate background (include GPA and test scores on your resume)
• Strong work experiences. Examples include professional work experience, or some kind of successful entrepreneurial experience (e.g. starting a field program in a developing country, leading a conference, starting a business, peace corps)
• Leadership experience at work, or outside of work
• No ego or drama. We are all stable people who are fun to be around. We are looking for others that combine strong leadership skills with a humble approach to service
• A willingness to commit to living in rural Africa for at least one year, two+ years preferred
• Nice to have: Kiswahili a plus, Kinyrwandan or French a plus. English required.
• Ability to cook / laugh / extraordinary patience – all desirable

Preferred Start Date: Flexible

Compensation: Modest, but enough to save some money after living expenses

Benefits: Health cover, immunizations, flight, room and board. 1 annual home flight provided – home trips include some speaking and fundraising duties

Career development: Quarterly management consulting-style career reviews, and significant investment in career development. Although the post does not pay very well, your manager will invest significant time in your career development, and assist top performers with future placements in either the private sector or throughout the developing world.

Sponsor International Candidates: Yes

To Apply

In your cover letter, please address the following question:

Numerous NGOs operate in a similar space as One Acre Fund. What attracts you to One Acre Fund in particular?

Email cover letter and resume to jobs@oneacrefund.org (Subject line: "Program Associate Search" + name of the site that referred you).

Post: Technical Associate

Career track role for a self-managing person interested in management and business. A strong interest in software and technology required.

Organization Description

One Acre Fund is a start-up initiative in Kenya which works with persistently hungry farm families. Instead of giving handouts to families, One Acre invests in farm families to generate a permanent gain in farm income. Our "investment bundle" includes education, financing, inputs, and export market access. Our program is designed to be usable by the extreme poor, and generates a permanent, 100%+ gain in farm income.

We have been operating since January 2006, and we currently serve 23,000 farm families (96,000 children). Our target is to change the lives of 50,000 farm families (200,000 children) within two more years, scaling at a 50% - 100% growth rate thereafter. One Acre Fund is one of the most externally-validated social start-ups, winning grants from the highly competitive Skoll, Echoing Green and Draper Richards Foundations, and first place wins at the Stanford and Yale social venture competitions. Website: www.oneacrefund.org.

Job Description

One Acre Fund relies on several key home-grown software systems to help us manage a lot of information. As we grow our organization to 50,000 farm families, with 500+ staff, across 2 (soon to be more) countries, we need to continually improve the features of these software systems. We have three key systems in Microsoft Access – client roster, books, and payroll – that help us to manage a wide variety of operations. Our roster tool for example handles the enrollment of clients, taking farm supply orders from them, tracking hundreds of thousands of payments, creating a wide variety of business intelligence reports, etc. As we are growing, we are also looking to scale our existing tools to a distributed database in the form of occasionally connected applications (OCA) using SQL server, with runtime Access as a front end.

The Technical Associate will initially be based in Western Kenya, with an opportunity to relocate to Rwanda as Technology Lead in the Rwandan country office. They will:

• Africa-facing mission-critical databases: Lead the continued development of mission-critical, custom databases that touch every aspect of operations. Assist with streamlining the databases between the Rwandan and Kenyan offices, and facilitate communication about IT issues between both countries.
• IT:Manage one Kenyan IT staff for routine computer maintenance and purchase, with potential for growth in number of staff managed. Assist Kenyan IT staff with Network Management using MS Server 2008 and Forefront Threat Management Server.
• Technology experimentation: Experiment with a variety of technologies (e.g. Frontline SMS, mobile phone reporting) to improve operations. Investigate appropriate solutions for database scaling.
• Mentor Kenyan staff: Work closely with the Kenyan Database Programmer and assist with their professional development.
• Other: There is lots of "Other" in a startup

Qualifications

A successful candidate will have these traits:

• Good programming skills
• Knowledge of database concepts and SQL, experience with SQL server a plus
• Very strong self-manager, very well-organized. After an initial six-month period of heavy mentorship, supervision will consist of 1 weekly check-in. We need someone who is very well-organized and can manage their work independently
• Top-performing undergraduate background (include GPA and test scores on your resume)
• Work experience, or internship, in some professional environment - ideally 2+ years of work experience
• Willingness to commit to the position for at least 2 years, with ideally some experience living in a developing country
• Mentorship ability: this post will likely involve training and mentorship of local staff
• No ego or drama. We are looking for others that combine strong leadership skills with a humble approach to service. Our expatriate team lives in rural Kenya together in a group of houses, and so we are looking for emotionally stable and happy people
• Cooking skills, high propensity to laugh and be happy: always desired!

Preferred Start Date: August 1, 2010 or earlier - as soon as possible
Compensation: Entry-level nonprofit position
Benefits: Modest health cover, 1-2 annual home trips to US
Career Development: Quarterly management consulting-style career reviews, and significant investment in career development. This post reports to the Technology Lead, who will spend significant time in your career development, and assist top performers with future placements in either the private sector or in the developing world.

To apply:

Email cover letter and resume to Itjobs@oneacrefund.org (Subject line: "Technical Associate" + name of the site that referred you)

Organization Description

One Acre Fund is a start-up initiative in Kenya which works with persistently hungry farm families. Instead of giving handouts to families, One Acre invests in farm families to generate a permanent gain in farm income. Our "investment bundle" includes education, financing, inputs, and export market access. Our program is designed to be usable by the extreme poor, and generates a permanent, 100%+ gain in farm income.

We have been operating since January 2006, and we currently serve 12,000 farm families (48,000 children). Our target is to change the lives of 40,000 families (160,000 children) within two more years, scaling at a 50% - 100% growth rate thereafter. One Acre Fund is one of the most externally-validated social start-ups of 2006, winning grants from the highly competitive Echoing Green and Draper Richards Foundations, and first place wins at the Stanford and Yale social venture competitions. Website: www.oneacrefund.org.

Job Description

One Acre Fund relies on several key home-grown software systems to help us manage a lot of information. As we grow our organization to 40,000 farm families, with 500+ staff, across 2 (soon to be more) countries, we need to continually improve the features of these software systems. We have three key systems in Microsoft Access – client roster, books, and payroll – that help us to manage a wide variety of operations. Our roster tool for example handles the enrollment of clients, taking farm supply orders from them, tracking hundreds of thousands of payments, creating a wide variety of business intelligence reports, etc. We will also be building new computer systems, such as logistics management, in the future.

We are not necessarily seeking someone with a lot of programming experience, although that is a plus. We are more focused on finding somebody with long-term management ability who can understand the real business needs of our organization. We can train the software and technology side of things. They will start off doing heavy amounts of software development, but over time will hopefully transition into managing local staff in this task.

The Technical Lead will be based in Western Kenya. They will:

• Africa-facing mission-critical databases: Lead the continued development of mission-critical, custom MS Access databases that touch every aspect of operations. These include books, client roster, monitoring and evaluation, payroll – and kick-off development on new data tools such as logistics and inventory management. These systems touch many different field departments, and this is a great opportunity to build exposure to a wide variety of business processes
• IT:Manage one Kenyan IT staff for routine computer maintenance and purchase, with potential for growth in number of staff managed. The Technical Associate will be managing the IT staff, and will hopefully do as little actual IT work as possible.
• Technology experimentation: Experiment with a variety of technologies (e.g. Frontline SMS, mobile phone reporting) to improve operations
• Build a software team: Over time, there is a possibility of building a broader, local software team for One Acre Fund
• Other: There is lots of "Other" in a startup

Qualifications

A successful candidate will have these traits:

• Very strong self-manager, very well-organized. After an initial six-month period of heavy mentorship, supervision will consist of 1 or 2 weekly check-ins. We need someone who is very well-organized and can manage their work independently
• Top-performing undergraduate background (include GPA and test scores on your resume)
• Work experience, or internship, in some professional environment - ideally 2+ years of work experience
• Willingness to commit to the position for at least 2 years, with ideally some experience living in a developing country
• Mentorship ability: this post will likely involve training and mentorship of Kenyan staff
• No ego or drama. We are looking for others that combine strong leadership skills with a humble approach to service. Our expatriate team lives in rural Kenya together in a group of houses, and so we are looking for emotionally stable and happy people
• Cooking skills, high propensity to laugh and be happy: always desired!

Preferred Start Date: January 1, 2010 or earlier - as soon as possible
Compensation: Entry-level nonprofit position
Benefits: Modest health cover, 1-2 annual home trips to US
Career Development: Quarterly management consulting-style career reviews, and significant investment in career development. This post reports to the executive director, who will spend significant time in your career development, and assist top performers with future placements in either the private sector or in the developing world.

To apply:

Email cover letter and resume to paul.youn@oneacrefund.org (Subject line: "Technical Lead" + name of the site that referred you)

Organization Description

One Acre Fund is a start-up initiative in Kenya which works with persistently hungry farm families. Instead of giving handouts to families, One Acre invests in farm families to generate a permanent gain in farm income. Our "investment bundle" includes education, financing, inputs, and export market access. Our program is designed to be usable by the extreme poor, and generates a permanent, 100%+ gain in farm income.

We have been operating since January 2006, and we currently serve 8,000 farm families (32,000 children). Our target is to change the lives of 40,000 families (160,000 children) within two more years, scaling at a 50% - 100% growth rate thereafter. One Acre Fund is one of the most externally-validated social start-ups of 2006, winning grants from the highly competitive Echoing Green and Draper Richards Foundations, and first place wins at the Stanford and Yale social venture competitions. Website: www.oneacrefund.org.

Job Description

We are seeking someone with great writing skills, good self-management ability, a positive and cheerful attitude, and excitement about living and working in Africa.

Prior experience at donor development and communications is not necessary. This is a career-track role, with special attention paid to long-term career and leadership development. A successful candidate will be generally intelligent, a strong writer, and able to manage their own work. We will develop specific skills.

The associate will:

• Development: Write grant proposals, targeted at meaningful, high-probability grants. The associate will annually expect to win $50,000 in grants totally independently, and $200,000+ in grants in conjunction with the executive director
• Development: Act as a "customer service advocate" for One Acre Fund's top 25 existing donors, making sure that all donors feel constantly well-informed about our activities primarily via mail and email
• Development: Prepare brief research reports on selected fundraising potentials
• Communications: Draft many of One Acre Fund's regular materials, such as our six-month reports, monthly newsletters, client profiles, etc.
• Communications: Create innovative and catchy new communications materials such as short videos, podcasts, brochures – the sky is the limit.
• Communications: Maintain and upgrade website, and respond to donor questions submitted through the website
• Research: Prepare selected research reports for Kenyan operations, and summarize into short briefs on selected topics
• Research: Prepare research reports on various aspects of US operations, including donation, media, advertising, and website traffic trends
• Project Management: Manage one field project in Kenya, such as our child health program, paired together with our Kenyan managers
• Project Management: Occasionally manage volunteers or consultants in significant US Operations projects
• Marketing: Supervise Internet advertising and marketing campaigns, including social media presence
• Administration: Approximately five hours per week of printing, mailing, email forwarding, paying invoices, taking minutes, other. There is lots of "Other" in a startup. Self-organization is critical

Qualifications

A successful candidate will have these traits:

• Very strong self-manager, very well-organized. After an initial three-month period of heavy mentorship, supervision will consist of 1 or 2 weekly check-ins. We need someone who is very well-organized and can manage their work independently
• Top-performing undergraduate background (include GPA and test scores on your resume)
• Work experience, or internship, in some professional environment
• Willingness to commit to the position for at least 2 years
• No ego or drama. We are looking for others that combine strong leadership skills with a humble approach to service. Our expatriate team lives in rural Kenya together in a group of houses, and so we are looking for emotionally stable and happy people
• Cooking skills, high propensity to laugh and be happy: always desired!

Preferred Start Date: August 1, 2009 or earlier – as soon as possible
Compensation: Entry-level nonprofit position
Benefits: Modest health cover, 1-2 annual home trips to US
Career Development: Quarterly management consulting-style career reviews, and significant investment in career development. This post reports to the executive director, who will spend significant time in your career development, and assist top performers with future placements in either the private sector or in the developing world. You will learn about the inner workings of a successful, global, startup nonprofit through participation in quarterly board meetings and interactions with the founder. You will become well-versed in fundraising, donor management, measurement & evaluation, strategic planning, and many other important dimensions of running a nonprofit.

To apply:

Email cover letter and resume to jobs@oneacrefund.org (Subject line: "Development / Communications Associate Search" + name of the site that referred you)

Development Director > Managing Director

- Wanted: Development Professional to lead fundraising efforts for rapidly-growing non-profit organization
- Location: Flexible within the US. New York or San Francisco preferred.

Organization Description

One Acre Fund is an award-winning, rapidly growing organization that eradicates hunger in East Africa. Instead of giving handouts to some of the poorest families in the world, One Acre invests in farm families to help them harvest more food for themselves. Our "investment bundle" includes education, financing, seed/ fertilizer, and export market access. Our program is designed to be usable by the extreme poor, and generates a 100%+ gain in farm income on every planted acre. 

In three years, we have grown to serve 8,000 farm families (32,000 children). Our target is to serve 40,000 families (160,000 children) within two more years, scaling at a 50 - 100% growth rate thereafter. One Acre Fund is one of the most externally-validated recent social start-ups, winning grants from the highly competitive Echoing Green and Draper Richards Foundations, and first place wins at the Stanford and Yale social venture competitions.  Website: http://www.oneacrefund.org/

One Acre Fund has a $1.8m-$2.0m annual budget in 2009. Most of our support comes from family foundations. We are seeking a development professional to support the Executive Director in growing and stewarding this current fundraising base, as well as work with the board to independently raise at least $0.5m+ in 2010, and $1.0m+ 2011.

Position Overview

One Acre Fund is an organization that can turn $120 into a life-changing loan that provides some of the poorest farm families in the world to grow their own way out of poverty. Although we earn substantial earned income from operations, our desired rate of growth requires us to aggressively grow fundraising.

We are seeking someone that will:

1. Support the Executive Director in continuing to grow and steward our current funding base. The development director will play the lead role in stewarding our middle-sized gifts
2. *Generate independent fundraising of at least $0.5m in 2010, and $1.0m in 2011
   1. Identify and independently win grants in the $10,000-$100,000+ range.
   2. Work with the Executive Director and board to provide some support on generating leads. We expect that the executive director and board will be able to help generate leads of roughly $0.2m per year, but it will be the primary responsibility of the development director to generate new leads independently.
   3. The development director will have overall responsibility for initial contact, first and second meetings, meeting follow-up, proposal writing, and reporting stewardship
   4. Limited support from a grant-writer posted in Kenya
3. Develop over time into a “Managing Director” role, which implies a greater degree of autonomy and importance to the organization. From mid-2010 onward, all of One Acre Fund’s US operations will be solely a fundraising organization that we build. We are ideally looking for a person that can lead the long-term expansion of our US operations.

Qualifications:

• *Demonstrated ability and experience to generate new fundraising leads for international causes
• *Demonstrated ability and experience to independently land grants in the $10,000-$100,000 range for international causes
• At least one year experience as a development professional independently landing grants for international causes
• An ability to credibly discuss business concepts, performance indicators, etc with fluency – One Acre Fund is a results-oriented organization that primarily raises funds from savvy business people – we do not rely too heavily on the “bleeding-heart sell”
• Proven experience working independently, with minimum direction
• First year requirement: trip to East Africa for 2-10 weeks, to improve program fluency
• Strong writing ability and fluency in Microsoft Word, Excel, and Powerpoint
• Strength and promptness in email communication
• 24-hour responsiveness to donors
• Willingness to travel around the US 20%-40% of time
• Ability to self-manage
• A sincere and real dedication to our mission

Preferred Start Date: August 2009 or earlier

Compensation: Competitive

Benefits: Health cover, 401k, vacation time

Career development: Quarterly management consulting-style career reviews, and significant investment in career development. This post reports directly to the executive director, but requires a fair amount of autonomy and independence.

To Apply

In your cover letter, please address the following question: Numerous NGOs operate in a similar space as One Acre Fund. What attracts you to One Acre Fund in particular?

Email cover letter and resume to jobs@oneacrefund.org (Subject line: Development Director + name of the site that referred you)

Post: Manager of US Operations

Wanted: Early-career (2-5 years post-undergrad experience), business professional to handle US operations of a young, international NGO

Industry: Nonprofit/International Development
Employer: One Acre Fund
Job Title: Manager, US Operations
Job Location: Anywhere in the US 

Organization Description

One Acre Fund is a start-up initiative in Kenya that works with persistently hungry farm families. Instead of giving handouts to families, One Acre invests in farm families to generate a permanent gain in farm income. Our "investment bundle" includes education, financing, inputs, and export market access. Our program is designed to be usable by the extreme poor, and generates a permanent, 100%+ gain in farm income.

We have been operating since January 2006, and we currently serve 12,000 farm families (58,000 children). Our target is to change the lives of 40,000 families (160,000 children) within two more years, scaling at a 50 - 100% growth rate thereafter. One Acre Fund is one of the most externally-validated recent social start-ups, winning grants from the highly competitive Echoing Green and Draper Richards Foundations, and first place wins at the Stanford and Yale social venture competitions. Website: www.oneacrefund.org

Job Description
One Acre Fund program staff all live in Africa. So, we are seeking one person in the US to essentially manage all of our US operations. Prior experience is not required – we are seeking someone with general leadership and management ability.

We are seeking an exceptionally talented recent university graduate with very strong independent problem-solving skills, an ability to self-manage, and strong overall judgment. Successful candidates should also have strong technical abilities – e.g. the ability to write and learn simple programming in PHP, JavaScript, HTML / CSS and other Internet languages / platforms.

This person will be responsible for the smooth daily operation of One Acre Fund in the US, evenly split between technology operations and other duties such as research, marketing, and administration. This is a career-track role, with special attention paid to long-term career and leadership development.

This role is important to the continued growth of One Acre Fund, as it involves the management of critical US operations such as donor management, payment processing, marketing, and Internet presence. The role combines general operations and project management responsibilities with software development and maintenance duties.

The Manager of US Operations will:

• Resource Development: Respond to donor questions submitted through the website, as well as requests for tax documentation, technical questions, etc.
• Resource Development: Prepare brief research reports on selected fundraising potentials
• Resource Development: Manage a relatively advanced salesforce.com database, and maintain functionality to ensure donors receive timely reports, renewal emails, tax receipts, etc.
• Resource Development: Maintain, and perform occasional upgrades to, credit card charging system
• Finance: Maintain master set of accounting books, pay out reimbursements, payroll, etc
• Finance: Run monthly credit card transactions, with critical attention to security and detail
• Finance: Pay bills, make interest payments, etc, with critical attention to detail
• Finance: Send annual tax receipts to donors, via automated system
• Finance: Put together our annual audit and financial statements, in coordination with our in-country CFO
• Program Research: Prepare selected research reports for Kenyan operations, and summarize into short briefs on selected topics
• Program Research: Prepare research reports on various aspects of US operations, including donation, media, advertising, and website traffic trends
• Project Management: Manage volunteers or consultants in significant US Operations projects
• Marketing: Supervise Internet advertising and marketing campaigns, including social media presence
• Marketing: Write content for, maintain, and update website
• Legal: Work with pro-bono lawyers to obtain short legal briefs on certain subjects
• Other: printing, mailing, email forwarding, writing letters, paying invoices, taking minutes, etc. There is lots of "Other" in a startup – however, we make a conscious effort to minimize low-level work. 

Qualifications

A successful candidate will have these traits: 

• Very strong self-manager. As this position has no fixed work hours or in-person supervision (your “boss” lives in Africa), you must be able to reliably manage projects and deadlines with high independence on a day-to-day basis
• Very strong leadership and creative problem-solving skills, including ability to motivate others
• A willingness to learn PHP, JavaScript, jQuery, HTML / CSS, Drupal and Salesforce.com over time – your interview will include teaching you some of these basic languages, to see how quickly you pick up.
• Top-performing undergraduate background (include GPA and test scores on your resume)
• Work experience in a professional environment
• Willingness to commit to the position for 2 years
• No ego or drama. We are looking for others that combine strong leadership skills with a humble approach to service.
  

Preferred Start Date: As soon as possible
Compensation: Competitive with other entry-level nonprofit positions
Benefits: Modest health cover, home internet. 1 annual trip to Kenya provided, if desired
Career development: Quarterly management consulting-style career reviews, and significant investment in career development. The founder and current Chairman of the Board will invest significant time in your career development, and assist top performers with future placements in either the private sector or in the developing world.
Sponsor International Candidates: Yes 

To Apply

Email cover letter and resume to justinb@oneacrefund.org (Subject line: Manager of US Operations + name of the site that referred you)

Post: New Country Scout (English and French-speaker required)

Wanted: Early-career high-performing professional with at least 2 years of work experience

*** Fluent French-speaker is required ***

Industry:          Nonprofit/International Development 
Employer:        One Acre Fund
Job Title:          New Country Scout
Job Location:   Anticipate 300 days of international travel per year + 60 days of home leave 

Organization Description

One Acre Fund is a start-up initiative in Kenya that works with persistently hungry farm families. Instead of giving handouts to families, One Acre invests in farm families to generate a permanent gain in farm income. Our "investment bundle" includes education, financing, inputs, and export market access. Our program is designed to be usable by the extreme poor, and generates a permanent, 100%+ gain in farm income.

We have been operating since January 2006, and we currently serve 22,000 farm families (88,000 children). Our target is to change the lives of 50,000 families (200,000 children) within 18 more months, scaling at a 50 - 100% growth rate thereafter. One Acre Fund is one of the most externally-validated recent social start-ups, winning grants from the highly competitive Echoing Green and Draper Richards Foundations, and first place wins at the Stanford and Yale social venture competitions.  Website: www.oneacrefund.org

Job Description

As One Acre Fund expands, a key part of our long-term goal to reach 1,000,000 farm families is to launch up to one new country per year, starting in 2011. It is also important that we understand the landscape of potential countries as soon as possible – so that we know how we may need to change our program model to fit new areas.

We are seeking an exceptionally talented professional with very strong independent problem-solving skills, an ability to self-manage, and strong overall judgment. This person should also have strong networking ability, and general stability / ability to deal with traveling alone for a long stretch of time. The minimum commitment to this job is 2 years.

The New Country Scout will:

• Phase 1 Light Field Visit: Do short, four-week initial visits to countries.
  • Fill out desk research by requesting data from government statistics agencies
  • Make contact with a few targeted NGOs in the country
  • Do quick field visits to 3 rural areas in different regions, to interview farmers
• Phase 2 Early Horticultural Trials: Kick off initial trial work, during a three-month-long period
  • Launch a horticultural trial with 50+ farmers, while we search for a full-time manager
  • Hire initial field staff
  • Secure and furnish an office, suitable home for manager, begin legal registration, etc.
• Potential countries: Burundi, Mozambique, much of West Africa, S and SE Asia.

Qualifications
A successful candidate will have these traits. This is a serious, full-time job – PLEASE do NOT apply if you are having a mid-life crisis and just want to travel the world. You will have zero flexibility in choosing countries – this is a full-time job with defined deliverables, and you will travel to rural areas with very few exciting things to see. Minimum commitment is 2 years.

• *Must speak both English and French, with complete fluency.
• *Serious, legitimate, long-term interest in international development work. At least one year of experience living in a developing nation.
• Very strong self-manager. As this position has no fixed work hours or in-person supervision, you must be able to reliably manage projects and deadlines with high independence on a day-to-day basis. We are looking for someone with a demonstrated ability to work independently. This is a professional role, and we are looking for a professional-caliber person
• Top-performing undergraduate background (include GPA and test scores on your resume)
• Work experience in a professional environment
• Emotional stability, and an ability to travel alone, with little predictability, for long stretches
• No ego or drama. We are looking for others that combine strong leadership skills with a humble approach to service

Preferred Start Date: As soon as possible
Compensation: $15,000 annual salary + health benefits + $50 travel per-diem, plus all transportation, including two flights home for personal leave
Sponsor International Candidates: Yes 

To Apply

Email cover letter and resume to jobs@oneacrefund.org (Subject line: New Country Scout + name of the site that referred you)

Work in Africa for an innovative, start-up non-profit organization!

Excellent career-track opportunity mixing private-sector management skill-set with non-profit service.

Industry: Nonprofit / International Development
Function: Finance

Employer: One Acre Fund
Job Title: Finance Director
Job Location: Western Kenya (English required) or Southwest Rwanda (French required)

Organization Description
One Acre Fund is a start-up initiative in Kenya and Rwanda which works with persistently hungry farm families. Instead of giving handouts to families, One Acre invests in farm families to generate a permanent gain in farm income. Our "investment bundle" includes education, financing, inputs, and export market access. Our program is designed to be usable by the extreme poor, and generates a permanent, 100%+ gain in farm income.

We have been operating since January 2006, and we currently serve 22,000 farm families (88,000 children). Our target is to change the lives of 50,000 families (200,000 children) within two more years, scaling at a 50-100% growth rate thereafter. One Acre Fund is one of the most externally-validated social start-ups of 2006, winning grants from the highly competitive Echoing Green and Draper Richards Foundations, and first place wins at the Stanford and Yale social venture competitions. Website: www.oneacrefund.org

Job Description
We are seeking an exceptional professional with 2-4 years work experience, and a career interest in international development. They will serve in a career-track position that combines both management experience in Africa and in-depth financial analysis and strategy. As a young organization, we are ready to hand over large responsibility for specific, well-defined work modules.

Projects will be focused on generating financial and business intelligence for One Acre Fund’s key leadership as well as contributing to the organization’s strategic vision and goal of financial sustainability. The Finance Director will lead our entire US and Africa-based financial team, with the following major responsibilities:
 

• Strategy and Budgeting: Help chart One Acre Fund’s path to financial sustainability by preparing our annual budget for all African and US operations, identifying cost drivers, and leading cost-savings initiatives. The Finance Director will also be responsible for determining the combination of initiatives and program model variations that will lead to financial sustainability. An example of recent innovations coming from our finance team include a new program modeling tool that allows users to view a One Acre Fund “model” district with 2009 actual figures, 2010 budgeted figures, and at-scale sustainability assumptions.
• Reporting and Analysis: As we grow, One Acre Fund has increasing need for a dedicated individual to take over our financial reporting and analysis roles on behalf of organization leadership. This includes preparing monthly, quarterly, and yearly budget vs. actual reports; specified reports for major donors or grant applications; and guiding our annual financial audits by US and African firms. The finance director will also take responsibility for creating simplified, regular financial reports for our site leaders and helping them to identify and implement cost-cutting projects.
• Team Management: Good financial analysis requires good raw data. The Finance Director will be in charge of leading a growing team of bookkeepers scattered all over the world, designing trainings, and ensuring the accurate, timely entry and collection of all financial transactions. The Finance Director will also need to consolidate and add to our training curriculum for new bookkeepers as we begin a period of rapid expansion. We need an individual committed to laying the groundwork for a successful, efficient finance department across a diverse array of geographies, rural technological conditions, and skill sets.

Qualifications
We are looking for somebody truly extraordinary for the Finance Director role. This is an extremely competitive posting for a business / management-style position. Only 10% make of applicants make it to a phone screen. Therefore, please do NOT respond unless you fit these criteria:

• *At least 2 years of experience in finance or consulting is required (e.g., analyst at an investment bank or consultancy)
• Analytical skill-set. While we will provide training, experience and total mastery of Microsoft Excel is required. Microsoft Access is a strong plus.
• Top-performing undergraduate background (include GPA and test scores on your resume)
• Strong quality of work experiences. Examples include professional work experience, or some kind of successful entrepreneurial experience
• Leadership experience at work, or outside of work. (e.g. starting a field program in a developing country, leading a conference, starting a business, peace corps)
• No ego or drama. We are all stable people who are fun to be around. We are looking for others that combine strong leadership skills with a humble approach to service
• A willingness to commit to living in rural areas of East Africa for at least two years, and ideally demonstrated experience working in the developing world
• Nice to have: Kiswahili a plus, Kinyrwandan or French a plus. English required
• Ability to cook / laugh / extraordinary patience – all desirable

Preferred Start Date: Flexible
Compensation: Modest, but enough to cover living expenses.
Benefits: Health cover, immunizations, flight, and housing. 2 annual home flights provided – home trips include some speaking and fundraising duties
Career development: Quarterly management consulting-style career reviews, and significant investment in career development. Although the post does not pay very well, your manager will invest significant time in your career development, and assist top performers with future placements in either the private sector or throughout the developing world.
Sponsor International Candidates: Yes

To Apply
Email cover letter and resume to jobs@oneacrefund.org (Subject line: Finance Director Search + name of the site that referred you)

Mr. Paul Youn
One Acre Fund
330 Myrtle Street, Redwood City, CA 94062

Lead up HR for an innovative, start-up non-profit organization!
Excellent career-track opportunity mixing private-sector management skill-set with non-profit service

Industry:    Nonprofit/International Development
Employer:    One Acre Fund
Job Title:    Global HR Officer
Job Location:    Anywhere in the US (major city preferred, e.g. San Francisco)

Organization Description
One Acre Fund is a start-up initiative in Kenya and Rwanda which works with persistently hungry farm families. Instead of giving handouts to families, One Acre invests in farm families to generate a permanent gain in farm income. Our "investment bundle" includes education, financing, inputs, and export market access. Our program is designed to be usable by the extreme poor, and generates a lasting, 100%+ gain in farm income on every planted acre.

We have been operating since January 2006, and we currently serve 22,000 farm families (88,000 children). Our target is to change the lives of 50,000 families (200,000 children) within 18 more months, scaling at a 50-100% annual growth rate thereafter. One Acre Fund is one of the most externally-validated social start-ups of 2006, winning grants from the highly competitive Echoing Green and Draper Richards Foundations, and first place wins at the Stanford and Yale social venture competitions.  Website: www.oneacrefund.org

Job Description
We are seeking an exceptional professional with 2-4 years work experience, and a demonstrated long-term career interest in international development. They will serve in a career-track position in a rapidly-growing organization. As a young organization, we are ready to hand over large responsibility for specific, well-defined work modules. We want to hire someone to last for a long time, and the minimum commitment is 2 years.

The Global HR Officer will be responsible for leading recruitment of “acceleration team” staff, and also work to serve the needs of 20 existing “acceleration team” professionals. Duties will include:

• Search: Keeping a targeted group of 15-25 job postings active
• Search: Speaking at targeted venues in the US, Europe, and Africa
• Search: Meeting regularly with a trusted group of “referrers”
• Search: Innovating new ways to search for candidates, particularly within Africa
• Screening: Screening out the bottom 50% of applicants through daily resume review, plus handling all “decline” correspondence in a professional manner
• Screening: Handling Q&A, correspondence with the roughly 15 candidates that are in the pipeline at any given time
• New hires: Arranging for new hire paperwork and onboarding materials
• New hires: Handling correspondence and logistics of in-country arrival
• Talent retention: Administering a smoothly-functioning payroll system including proactive communication with staff
• Talent retention: Administering a smoothly-functioning 401k, benefits, and tax system
• Talent retention: Innovating new ways to retain talent
• Administration: 5-10 hours per week of general administration work (e.g. setting up conference calls, quick research projects, etc)

Significant travel is required. The HR officer should expect to spend approximately 1-2 months per year traveling internationally (Europe and Africa), and an additional 1-2 months per year traveling throughout the US.

Qualifications
This is our lead HR role, and we are looking for somebody truly extraordinary who also has a long-term career interest in growing together with a fast-paced organization. Our job postings are extremely competitive, and only 3% of applicants make it to a phone screen. Therefore, please do NOT respond unless you fit these criteria:

• Strong work experiences. Examples include a high-level professional work experience, or some kind of successful entrepreneurial experience (e.g. starting a field program in a developing country, leading a conference, starting a business, solid peace corps accomplishments)
• Leadership experience at work, or outside of work
• Top-performing undergraduate background (include GPA and test scores on your resume)
• No ego or drama – we are looking for someone very stable
• A long-term interest in a career-track role
• Nice to have: French-speaker
• Minimum two year commitment, ideally longer

Preferred Start Date: Flexible
Compensation: Starts at $32k per year. However, this is a career-track role – our organization is growing very fast, and responsibilities can increase quickly, together with increases in salary.
Benefits: Basic health cover, immunizations, 401k, 4 weeks of holiday per year.
Career development: 3x annual management consulting-style career reviews, and significant investment in career development.
Sponsor International Candidates: Probably

To Apply
Email cover letter and resume to justinb@oneacrefund.org (Subject line: Global HR Officer Search + name of the site that referred you)

Mr. Paul Youn
One Acre Fund
330 Myrtle Street, Redwood City, CA 94062
Email: justinb@oneacrefund.org (Subject line: Global HR Officer Search + name of the site that referred you)