ADD International is a disability rights organisation with 35 years of experience. We fight for independence, equality and opportunity for disabled people living in poverty in Africa and Asia.
We are looking for a Chief Transformation Officer to lead us for 9 months through a time of re-imagination and change. Someone with leadership experience and intrapreneurial drive to help define and build an INGO of the future.
This is a very exciting opportunity, and we are seeking an individual of outstanding quality with a respected track record and someone who shares our drive to shift power in the international development sector and reimagine the role of UK organisations within the system.
The successful candidate will need to be an inspirational leader with strong strategic vision and creativity, combined with the experience and practical leadership skills to run the organisation and implement changes that will be needed.
You must demonstrate a passion for ADD’s mission and have a deeply nuanced understanding of the lives of disabled people in the countries we work and a demonstrable commitment to the Social and Human Rights Models of Disability.
WHAT WILL WE WANT ACHIEVED?
This will be a 9-month post and during that time you will lead the organisation through a time of re-imagination and change, running of the organisation and overseeing the senior management team. We see the nine months achieving the following:
● Month One – Get to know the organisation; our teams, staff and partners. Agree clear performance objectives for the Senior Management Team over the 9 months you will be in post
● Month Two, Three and Four – Re-imagining the organisation.
You will get to work mapping out what ADD International can and should be in the future and the clear path we need to take to get there. By the end of month four you will have developed a credible new organisational model with the resourcing mechanisms, ways of working, staffing structures and partners required to bring this to life.
We envisage the following steps would be taken to get to this point.
- Listen and Learn. We would expect you to digest all the past work that has been done on the future transformation of ADD. This includes our strategic plan, work on a new business model and the extensive consultation documents that were used in that process.
You will talk to and engage with staff across the organisation to learn from them about their views, visions and ideas of what a transformed ADD would look like, and how it would work and fund itself. You will also want to go back to some of the people we consulted last year, in particular connecting with disabled activists and DPOs we work with. They must be included and listened to help define what the shift to the south means and looks like for ADD International.
We would also want you to learn from the best ideas, pilots and practice going on elsewhere in the international development sector and disability organisations that have worked to increase the power and leadership of disabled people and/or the global south. So will expect you to know where these are, learn from them and talk to people with the brightest ideas and practical examples. These include the Re-imagination of the INGO project, BONDs Sector Catalyst Programme and many others. - Create. WIth all this information you will develop some prototype organisational models, including the business models that would sustain them and the people we would partner with to bring it to life. We want you to use creative design methodologies to do these and want them to be bold and provocative; covering a spectrum of opportunities of what we could become. These will be written up in easily digestible and shareable form.
- Test and iterate. You can then re-engage with staff, partners and Trustees to share these concepts and to get them to iterate and improve these. Trustees and staff will kick the tyres on the concepts, improve and develop them and validate the more promising options.
- Finalise. Taking on board everything you gather from the previous stage you will then work with SLT and Trustees to develop a final proposal for which organisational model we will pursue. This will include more detailed work on the staffing structures required and the resourcing mechanisms we would need to pursue, the ways of working we would need to put in place and the partners we would need to work with to bring this to life. This will be presented to the Board of Trustees for approval.
Our Director of Policy and Influencing will coordinate the first three stages of the transformation work with you, helping you to set up interviews, workshops and ensuring you have access to the internal documents, consultations, strategies and best practices inputs you will need.
We will ask you to set up a clear project plan that divides up roles and responsibilities between yourself, the Director of Policy and Influencing as project coordinator, the SLT, and the Trustees at the beginning of this work. This plan will use bi-monthly Trustee meetings as decision points and decision-making fora.
● Month Five, Six, Seven, Eight and Nine – Bringing it to life.
Once our new model is agreed you will lead the staffing restructure required in partnership with Trustees, external HR consultancy support and in line with best practice.
You will begin some pilot activities to bring our new model to life and put clear plans in place for how we continue to do this and measure its success.
You will start to establish new partnerships with potential allies to accelerate our transformation and set up new funding relationships to resource our work in the future.
