About Catholic Relief Services: Catholic Relief Services (CRS) is an international non-governmental organization (NGO) supporting relief and development work in over 100 countries around the world. CRS carries out the commitment of the Bishops of the United States to assist the poor and vulnerable overseas. CRS’ Catholic identity is at the heart of our mission and operations, serving people on the basis of need, regardless of creed, ethnicity or nationality. CRS works through local church and non-church partners to implement its programs.
CRS has worked in Uganda since 1965, initially providing emergency assistance to Sudanese refugees living in the north. Over the years, CRS has expanded its programming to also address development needs in western, central, and eastern Uganda. CRS’ projects in Uganda currently include agriculture, health, microfinance, peacebuilding, and youth. CRS Uganda implements its programs through partnerships with local organizations, including the Catholic Church, other faith-based organizations and community entities for maximum impact and sustainability. CRS Uganda employs around 180 staff and has its main office in Kampala, with sub-offices in Moroto, Yumbe, and Kikuube. With our more than 30 partners, we served over 1.2m Ugandans in 2020.

Background CRS has over 75 years of experience managing complex, high-value and multi-year programs and has consistently met the terms and conditions of its bilateral and multilateral program agreements in an efficient and cost-effective manner. Working in Uganda since 1965 has allowed CRS to establish strong relationships with government health, agriculture and gender, labour and social services ministries as well as individual communities, volunteers, community-based organizations (CBOs) and faith-based organizations (FBOs) that support them. CRS implements health and social services programs in partnership with a wide range of actors including national and sub-national government agencies, civil society (including FBOs), networks, universities, research institutions, and the private sector. One of the priority action areas within the CRS Uganda Country Strategy is Health and Social Services Systems Strengthening. This builds on the long-standing experience CRS has had implementing a wide range of health and social services projects at national and sub-national level in over 47 districts and reaching 552,299 program participants. These programs have been valued at over $68M. CRS Uganda is building on these experiences and aligning with the Government of Uganda’s systems strengthening approach towards more accessible, equitable, high quality and sustainable health and social outcomes for all Ugandans, especially the most vulnerable. Job Summary: As Business Development (BD) Specialist II you will support the production of high-quality applications for funding in support of CRS’ engagement with institutional donors and initiatives involved in international development to serve the poor and vulnerable. Your knowledge and skills will allow you to provide specialized assistance in all dimensions of the BD cycle to cross-disciplines and cross-functional teams.

Job Roles and Responsibilities:
• Support positioning, capture planning and proposal preparation for specific opportunities with institutional donors (government and inter-governmental award issuing organizations, as well as foundations, corporations, and other awarding non-governmental organizations).
• Coordinate proposal development processes to ensure timely submission of high-quality proposals that are responsive to donor requirements, applicable regulations, and CRS’ technical and cost standards. Lead and support proposal budget processes and propose recommendations to develop a competitive proposal.
As appropriate, serve as proposal coordinator or other lead role in proposal team, and participate in bid analysis and proposal review panels. Serve as a support writer on proposals, contributing non-technical content and integrating inputs from staff and partners into a responsive, coherent proposal with a compelling vision and clear win themes.
• Support and guide identification of partners and negotiation of CRS’ role on proposal consortia, ensuring a competitive position for CRS that adheres to the agency’s partnership principles and strategic directions.
• With the business development team and others, refine or create appropriate staff development materials (training, distance learning, self-study) to support building of capacity in resource acquisition, such as assessment and proposal development skills, basic elements of donor compliance, intelligence-gathering, etc.
• Research, track and analyze new opportunities and CRS’ competitive position within the marketplace.
• Track and report on proposal submissions; assist with analysis of successes and failures and dissemination of lessons learned. Assist in developing analytical reports for internal and external use, including portfolio trends and growth.
• Work with appropriate staff to maintain data on past performance and corporate capacity, in order to provide timely information for proposal submissions.

Typical Background, Experience & Requirements:
Education and Experience:
• Bachelor’s degree in international development, international relations, or related field. Master’s degree preferred.
• Minimum five years of international development experience, with at least three years’ experience in a developing country. Preferred Qualifications:
• Demonstrated experience utilizing diverse, proactive strategies to competitively position his/her organization for new funding and productive institutional relationships.
• Exceptional writer with expert command of English grammar and AP style.
• Demonstrated experience leading and producing competitive proposals in programming contexts similar to CRS.
• Comprehensive familiarity with a broad range of institutional donor technical and cost requirements.
• Experience with both USAID RFP and RFA funding mechanisms highly desirable.
• Familiarity with relevant institutional donor regulations, policies, procedures, and priorities.
• Demonstrated experience managing teams and processes, leading teams to produce deliverables under tight deadlines and at exceptional quality.
• Knowledge of CRS programs, justice agenda and Catholic Social Teaching principles a plus.
• Experience using MS Windows and MS Office packages (Excel, Word, PowerPoint), Web Conferencing Applications, information management systems.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:
• Strong strategic, analytical, systems thinking, and problem-solving skills, with capacity to see the big picture.
• Strong relations management abilities. Ability to relate to people at all levels internally and externally. Strategic in how you approach each relationship.
• Excellent negotiation skills.
• Strong communications and presentation skills.
• Proactive, resourceful, solutions-oriented, and results-oriented.
Required/Desired Foreign Language: Strong written English for a variety of donors.
Travel Required: Must be willing and able to travel up to 25%.

Key Working Relationships: Supervisory: None
Internal: BDS II (telecommuter); Head of Programming; Head of Operations; Finance Manager; Country Representative; Country Program Technical Advisors and Program Managers External: Other agency business development staff, Partner proposal development technical staff, donors (as appropriate)
Agency-Wide Competencies (for all CRS staff) These are rooted in the mission, values, and guiding principles of CRS and used by each staff member to fulfill his or her responsibilities and achieve the desired results.
• Integrity
• Continuous Improvement & Innovation
• Builds Relationships
• Develops Talent
• Strategic Mindset
• Accountability & Stewardship

DISCLAIMER CLAUSE: This job description is not an exhaustive list of skills, effort, duties and responsibilities associated with the position. Our Catholic identity is at the heart of our mission and operations. Catholic Relief Services carries out the commitment of the Bishops of the United States to assist the poor and vulnerable overseas. We welcome as a part of our staff people of all faiths and secular traditions who share our values and our commitment to serving those in need.
CRS’ processes and policies reflect our commitment to protecting children and vulnerable adults from abuse and exploitation By applying to this job, I understand and acknowledge that CRS requires its staff to treat all people with dignity and respect and to actively prevent harassment, abuse, exploitation, and human trafficking. Further, I understand that if I am a successful candidate, I will be subject to a comprehensive background check, and my personal/professional references will be asked to evaluate my behaviors related to the above safeguarding-related topics.
CRS is an Equal Opportunity Employer

NOTE: To apply, please follow these instructions exactly otherwise your application will NOT be considered:

• Email a cover letter and CV only to ug_recruitment@crs.org

• Large files and/or scans of documents will lead to rejection of your application, in the subject line of the email, copy and paste – BUSINESSDEVELOPMENTSPECIALISTII only
• All applications that do not contain this exact subject line will be rejected and not read ONLY SELECTED CANDIDATES THAT MEET THE REQUIREMENTS WILL BE NOTIFIED. EOE/M/F/D/V