Evaluation Team Leader, Senegal MEL Project, Remote

Management Systems International (MSI), a Tetra Tech Company, is a Washington, D.C. metro area management consultancy with a 40-year history of delivering results for our clients. Our expertise is in the fields of monitoring and evaluation; democracy and governance; peace and stability; rule of law and accountability; education; gender and inclusion; strategic communications; and leadership and organizational development. MSI has implemented projects in 90 countries around the world such as Colombia, Indonesia, Jordan, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Syria and Ukraine, and works domestically. We support clients ranging from the U.S. Government (e.g., the U.S. Agency for International Development, U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Departments of State and Labor, and the Millennium Challenge Corporation) to large bilateral and multilateral donors (e.g., the World Bank and the United Nations Development Program). We also work with national and local governments, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), think tanks, foundations and universities. For more information, please visit our website at www.msiworldwide.com.

Project Summary:

MSI is a partner of EnCompass LLC in the execution of the Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) Platform for USAID in Senegal. The objective of the support contract, the Platform, is to support USAID/Senegal in its performance management and contribute to the establishment of a sustainable MEL culture in Senegal through holistic engagement and the strengthening of local actors and institutions. The Platform facilitates evidence-based decision-making to support adaptive mission management, engage USAID partners in their continuous improvement efforts, and provide capacity building for local partners and service providers. The Platform reinforces locally led development by working in a participatory evaluation approach with Platform staff. The Platform is conducting a performance evaluation of the USAID/Senegal Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) activity to assess the performance of program benefits to guide further implementation of the YALI program as well as contribute to the larger body of research and learning on leadership development on the African continent. Specifically, the evaluation team will examine and assess to what extent the Yali program is achieving its high-level objectives and what effects the program has had on immediate leadership attributes and knowledge, longer-term leadership behaviors, and what effects the support networks, including the regional leadership centers and alumni association support, have had on these short and long-term leadership outcomes.

**Please note: Only U.S. nationals are eligible for this position**

Position Summary:

The Evaluation Team Leader will oversee a performance evaluation of the USAID/Senegal Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) program. The Leader will bring expertise in evaluating USAID projects / programs. The Leader will be expected to travel to Dakar as well as travel within Senegal, in the activity zone(s) for a period of 2-3 weeks. This is a Short-Term Technical (STTA) position that will report to the Senior Monitoring & Evaluation Specialist on the Platform. The expected period of performance will run from November 2024 to May 2025, and the level of effort is estimated to around 50 working days.

Responsibilities:

• Guide evaluation workplan development in coordination with team members, including mixed-methods methodology to address evaluation questions, sampling strategy, stakeholders to be interviewed, and data collection tools (surveys, interview guides, and discussion guides).
• Develop an evaluation workplan within two weeks of onboarding, which should be inclusive of data collection tools for the different stakeholders identified.
• Submit a weekly progress report during the field data collection.
• Orient the team, identify the equipment and logistics needed to accomplish the task, organize the distribution of work among the evaluation team members, and coordinate the contributions of the various experts involved in the evaluation, under the supervision of the Platform task manager. 
• Review documents provided by USAID and other stakeholders, present findings, and understand how this information will guide the development of collection tools and be considered in the evaluation of project performance.
• Present a synthesis of the results of the literature review and conclude how this information will contribute to data collection.
• Participate in the enumerator training.
• Develop the codebook for qualitative interview coding.
• Develop overall data analysis plan to include quantitative and qualitative strands.
• Identify and conduct interviews in French with relevant stakeholders and organizations.
• Produce detailed interview notes after each interview and weekly progress reports during data collection phase.
• Develop an approach for how notes will be captured by the evaluation team.
• Supervise the process of exploiting and analyzing the data collected, in collaboration with the other evaluation team members, to produce the evaluation report.
• Guide the development of the findings and conclusions table.
• Present evaluation initial findings to USAID.  
• Coordinate the workshop for the co-creation of recommendations matrix with relevant stakeholders.
• Serve as lead writer for the report, integrating comments as needed, and draft an evaluation report.
• Develop and deliver a team presentation of findings for USAID and respond to USAID questions on the presentation.
• Guide the revisions process in order to finalize the evaluation report with abstract.
• Perform any other tasks or activities necessary for the success of the evaluation.