Description
Valar seeks an exceptionally qualified individual to serve as an East Africa Analyst in support of a numerous Valar projects across the region. The successful applicant will possess advanced analytical skills and demonstrate a comprehensive understanding of the political, security, cultural, and economic environments across greater East Africa to produce high-quality written and oral analysis from a number of open and closed sources. This position will brief Valar senior leadership and, at times, executives of current clients. The East Africa Regional Analyst will report to the Senior Analyst under the Department of Information and Analysis in Nairobi.
Role Overview
The East Africa Regional Analyst will serve in an analytical role, responsible for developing information products that cover local, regional, and international dynamics and their assessed impact on the client’s ability to operate in-country and to implement development projects. The Analyst will help create, update, fact-check, and maintain extensive information databases, systems, and mechanisms for sharing relevant information to support field research projects and ongoing training programs. The candidate will provide local and regional tactical, operational, and strategic situational awareness and enhanced understanding through sound, collaborative analytical assessments on political, clan, terrorism, and economic-related issues. The Analyst will also be responsible for growing a region-wide information network, consisting of key subject matter experts who will provide Valar with granular insight into daily political, economic, or other trends that may affect our projects.
Responsibilities
- Use traditional research methodologies to understand relationships (leadership, affiliations, aliases, etc.), temporal and spatial interdependencies, and conceptual scenarios which yield draft and finished analytical products, including threat assessments, situation reports, and geospatial analysis.
- Perform appropriate methods of social network analysis to meet specific project needs. Methods may include classification, pattern analysis, and link analysis based on analysis of transaction data, message (phone, e-mail, blog) traffic, and other data sources in collaboration with other I&A team members.
- Expand Valar’s network across southern Somalia, and across the region, by forming relationships between key leaders and elders with the Valar team.
- Monitor aspects of clan and tribal networks from various qualitative data sets, making elements of it actionable by focusing on the geospatial aspects of sub-clan, religious, occupational, and other social groups from diverse communities.
- Provide security and development programmatic recommendations to clients as part of written deliverables of field research projects that the Analyst leads.
- Support the Information & Analysis department in the delivery of tailored client reports; work closely with management to prioritize information needs; brief senior managers and executives via written and oral presentations. This will include helping craft information products that span our programs in Somalia and the region to create timely information products for our clients, including requests for information.
- Help manage our teams of field research enumerators to ensure data quality, timeliness, and depth and breadth of sources. This support to field research assignments will include using individual networked relationships to add data to these research efforts, as well as data validity testing.
- Help the Valar team to expand, update, fact-check, and maintain extensive information databases, systems, and mechanisms for sharing relevant information to support field research projects and ongoing training programs. This will include regular updates to leadership rolodexes and engagements.
- Support to quick-turn and long-term request-for-information assignments or field research contracts from our clients. This will include leveraging relationships for same-day answers, as well as data validity testing. This will include writing 1 to 40-page reports for these products with little to no advanced warning, in order to meeting the time-sensitive requirements of our clients.
- Countries of field research will include Somalia (including Puntland), Somaliland, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Sudan, South Sudan, Kenya, Mozambique, and Tanzania.
- Recognize and articulate critical information gaps; assist customers in identifying collection requirements; and close collection holes by broadening Valar’s human network in-country and leveraging existing or new contacts to provide the client with the most refined, accurate, and near real-time information on all matters pertaining to the client’s project.
- Be confident and willing to engage in presentations and public speaking from day one; be adept at meeting, conversing and engaging with a wide variety of people, including armed forces or government personnel, academics, the media, and private sector clients.
- Exercise discretion and maintain confidentiality.
Qualifications
Minimum
- Three (3) to five years (5) of experience in a role with significant research and analytical writing components.
- Bachelor’s Degree in a relevant discipline (International Relations, International Business, Politics, Security Studies, Journalism).
- Proficiency in Open Source information collection and analytical tools; familiarity with establishing human networks.
- Advanced knowledge of Microsoft Office applications (Word, PowerPoint, Excel); familiarity with geospatial technology (CARTO, ArcGIS, Google Earth).
- Impeccable written and spoken English.
- Highly effective organizational and prioritization skills, including the ability to stay on task and maintain focus in a fast-paced environment; attention to detail; keen understanding of time-sensitive requirements.
- Existing relationships across clan family senior leaders, youth advocates, journalists, and NGO sectors.
- Prior experience working and living in East Africa. Strong understanding of political, economic, cultural, and security dynamics within the region, especially within Somalia and Ethiopia, including an understanding of clan dynamics.
Preferred
- Master’s Degree in a relevant discipline – international relations, international business, politics, security studies, journalism.
- Prior experience in fields such as intelligence, military, law enforcement, government, development, NGO or other relevant sectors (e.g., oil and gas, donor programs, and media) in Somalia and Ethiopia.
- Demonstrable all-source written production capability and experience in building, maintaining, and leveraging human networks; ability to liaise with security sector officials, including police, military, and national-level security services.
- Experience in data analytics, data collection, and data visualization tools and techniques, such as Fulcrum, CARTO, ArcGIS, SPSS, and STATA.