Mama Cash is looking for a Learning, Monitoring and Evaluation Consultant

INTRODUCTION 

Mama Cash (www.mamacash.org) is the oldest international women's fund – established in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, in 1983. Our vision is that every woman, girl, and trans and intersex person has the power and resources to participate fully and equally in creating a peaceful, just and sustainable world. Mama Cash's support to feminist activism and movements has shifted and changed over the last forty years. What has remained consistent, however, is our continued commitment to supporting feminist actors. These actors include activists, leaders of movements, self-led groups and women’s funds. To realise our vision, Mama Cash has been focused on channelling resources to feminist movements around the world through core grant making to support feminist, self-led groups and women’s funds and accompaniment to support them to be stronger movement actors. To date, Mama Cash has awarded more than €92 million to feminist activists, self-led groups, women’s funds and movements that are working to secure justice, democracy and human rights, around the world. Mama Cash, like most women’s funds, emerges from and is accountable to women’s rights and feminist movements.  

To gain insights into whether we are doing what is needed to catalyse change, Mama Cash aims to take a feminist, participatory and adaptive approach to learning, monitoring and evaluation (LME). We do LME to remain accountable to our grantee partners and donors, but also to learn with peer funders to inform or shift their practice from a place of knowledge and experience. This work is guided by our Theory of Change (ToC), Results and Learning Framework (RALF), and an evaluation strategy.   

PURPOSE OF THE POSITION 

This is a consultancy role that supports Mama Cash’s Officer for LME to undertake key areas of Mama Cash’s LME work that are specific to 2024, specifically our annual reporting requirements.  

2024 is an exciting year for Mama Cash as we manage to review and to revise Mama Cash’s ToC, prepare for our midterm review in 2025, and complete a study of Mama Cash’s impact. In addition to these areas of work, we will continue to maintain ongoing LME activities such as donor reporting, fundraising, communicating results and learnings, improving and modifying our LME tools and systems, strengthening our database and responding to Mama Cash’s teams evolving LME needs.  

The LME team at Mama Cash requires support in order to undertake these 2024-specific LME activities and to complete our ongoing work to remain accountable to our donors and grantee partners. The individual hired for this project support will work closely with, take direction from, and report to the Officer LME, and work closely with the Senior Officer for L&E, as well as colleagues in Mama Cash as a whole.  

The ideal candidate will have specific technical expertise working with monitoring tools, such as results frameworks and/or logframes, and experience with data analysis and databases such as Salesforce and Excel. The individual will also be skilled at developing cross-organisational processes for tracking and reporting on results efficiently and in coordination with other teams and individuals. In addition to these skill areas, the person hired for this consultancy should have a strong understanding of feminist LME and/or LME that is in the service of social justice initiatives at a global scale.  

BACKGROUND INFORMATION 

Since 2021, Mama Cash’s staff have been organised into three main teams- The Movements, Money, and People and Purpose teams. In addition to these teams, we have a management team, composed of team directors and Mama Cash’s two co-executive directors. LME staff at Mama Cash also work closely with the secretariats of our strategic partnerships with the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs. These partnerships are Global Alliance for Green and Gender Action (GAGGA) and Count Me In! (CMI!).  

This consultancy role sits within the People and Purpose team, specifically the LME sub team. This sub team is composed of three staff: one Senior Officer for Learning and Evaluation (L&E), an Officer for Learning, Monitoring and Evaluation (LME) and the Deputy Director of People and Purpose. The Senior L&E and Officer for LME have been working to implement Mama Cash’s LME commitments that are communicated in the strategic guide but require additional support with monitoring and reporting on our results. The candidate will be guided by Officer for LME but will also work closely with the Senior L&E officer.   

 SPECIFIC TASKS 

• Maintain accountability mechanisms with donors by managing annual reporting requirements. This will involve aggregating, analysing, reporting and clearly communicating qualitative and quantitative data. The consultant will be responsible for ensuring that the indicators in the RALF are filled in by March 2024. In addition to this work, the consultant will manage our reporting requirements to the MFA for CMI! and GAGGA as needed and in coordination with staff. 
• Supporting funding applications. In addition to donor reporting, the consultant will support the Philanthropic Partnership team and Secretariats for CMI! And GAGGA with applications for funding by providing LME data and other input. The consultant will ensure the alignment of results frameworks, logframes and other monitoring tools presented by donors to Mama Cash as part of their reporting requirements.  
• Support Mama Cash’s ongoing LME processes and projects. The consultant will be responsible for supporting planned LME projects for 2024 and for contributing to cross-organisational processes scheduled for 2024 as an LME representative. This work will involve supporting the LME team with data requests and providing LME insights on Mama Cash’s efforts to strengthen our database.  

KNOWLEDGE, LIVED EXPERIENCE, SKILLS, AND ABILITIES 

• Strong commitment to Mama Cash’s vision, mission and values including intersectional feminism, JEDI (justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion) principles, environmental justice, and the rights of intersex people, trans people, girls, and women.  
• Five years work experience and a university-level degree or equivalent knowledge in social sciences with expertise preferred in gender studies and/or social sciences (anthropology, sociology); or relevant.  
• Technically skilled and experienced in creating LME monitoring tools and processes to track and capture complex processes.   
• Knowledge of how to collect, analyse and communicate relevant and valid qualitative and quantitative data for donor reporting, advocacy, and learning.  
• Strong organisational and coordination skills, including an attention to detail and the ability to manage tasks across teams to meet deadlines and motivate others to do the same. 
• Strong skills in Salesforce and Excel are needed for this role. 
• Excellent communications and interpersonal skills with the ability to interact with people from a wide diversity of backgrounds and cultures.  
• Language skills in one or more of Mama Cash’s official languages, in addition to full written proficiency in English, is desirable (Dutch, Spanish, Russian, French). 
• Knowledge of international development, human rights, social justice, environmental justice and/or (funding) feminist movements.  
• Lived experience of resisting injustice and different forms of systemic oppression including but not limited to sexism, racism, homo-antagonism, trans-antagonism, classism and/or disablism, and their intersections. 

TIME-FRACTION AND SCHEDULE 

Mama Cash anticipates the consultancy to be two to four days per week between December 2023 and June 2024. We envision an onboarding process occurring between December 15th and January 15th. After this period of time, the consultant will become engaged in Mama Cash’s reporting processes to meet key deadlines, both internal and external. These deadlines are March 1st, April 15th, and May 5th approximately. As such, between mid-February and mid-May we envision a heavier workflow and time-commitment. Mama Cash provides a flexible and hybrid working environment. As such, the individual can be based anywhere in the world, but office space is available in Amsterdam.  

BILLING CYCLE  

The consultant can bill in three installments and according to the following timeline based on invoices, with deliverables attached or short progress reports (max. one page).  

• Jan. 10th, 2024 – 10, 000 Euros 
• May 1st,  2024  - 7,000 Euros  
• June 15th, 2024 – 10,000 Euros 

HOW TO APPLY      

Interested parties should submit a one-page cover letter and a two-page resume that highlight their areas of experiences that are relevant to this consultancy to Julia Bailey (j.bailey@mamacash.org), the Senior Officer for Learning and Evaluation, with Jeske Ruigrok cc’d: (j.ruigrok@mamacash.org), the Officer for Learning, Monitoring and Evaluation. The subject line in the email should read: Application for LME Consultancy. Any clarifications on this TOR should be directed to Julia Bailey with Jeske Ruigrok cc’d. 

This TOR represents the requirements for an open and competitive process. Applications will be accepted up to Nov. 28th, 2023 (COB). Contract terms and conditions will be negotiated upon the selection of the consultant after interviews. We expect to make a decision by mid-December, and only selected applicants will be contacted.