Kenya Innovations Lead

About One Acre Fund

Founded in 2006, One Acre Fund supplies 1 million smallholder farmers with the agricultural services they need to make their farms more productive. Our 8,000+ team is drawn from diverse backgrounds and professions. With operations across six core countries in Africa, we make farmers more prosperous by providing quality farm supplies on credit, delivered within walking distance of farmers' homes, and agricultural training to improve harvests. On average, the farmers we serve harvest 50 percent more food after working with One Acre Fund.

To learn more about our work, take a look at our Why Work Here blog for more information.

About the Role

The Innovation Lab leads the design and field testing of new products and programs to help One Acre Fund Kenya reach more clients and provide more impactful services. The main objective of the Finance Innovations team is to design and test lending products and strategies to deliver financially sustainable impact at scale to an expanding base of farmers. The Finance Associate will manage a pipeline of trials with the goal of improving repayment and farmer experience in our group liability loans.

• As a Program Associate, your role will focus on trial design and execution.
• Over 500,000 farmers take credit with One Acre Fund each year. Your work will ensure that our primary lending models continue to serve our existing client base while improving our value proposition for new clients. This might mean running trials on anything from new loan structures to incentives or management tools.
• You will report to the Finance Manager and will work together to identify goals for your projects and long-term priorities
• You will manage one trial coordinator and a field team of 30 Paygo agents

Responsibilities

• Monitor and report on group loan repayment. You will work with the Field Operations and Duka Operations teams to assess the performance of the group loan product and identify, design, and test potential interventions.
• Manage a pipeline of priority trials, supported by well researched hypotheses. You will use a combination of industry research, sandbox testing, and regular feedback from our farmers to recommend programmatic or operational changes with the potential to improve collections on one of your loan products and aim to test 1-2 of your strongest hypotheses per quarter.

Career Growth and Development

We have a culture of constant learning and we invest in developing our people. You'll have weekly check-ins with your manager, access to mentorship and training programs, and regular feedback on your performance. We hold career reviews every six months, and set aside time to discuss your aspirations and career goals. You'll have the opportunity to shape a growing organization and build a rewarding long-term career.

Qualifications

Across all roles, these are the general qualifications we look for. For this role specifically, you will have:

• You have at least 3 years of experience in an analytical role or project management role.
• You take a structured approach which is practical rather than theoretical.
• You have a customer-centered design approach while managing operationally complex work.
• Bachelor's Degree.
• English required in all locations. Other notable and useful languages are Swahili or regional languages within Kenya.

Start Date

As soon as possible.

Job Location

Kakamega, Kenya

Benefits

Health insurance, housing, and comprehensive benefits

Eligibility

This role is only open to citizens or permanent residents of Kenya.

Application Deadline

31st December 2021

One Acre Fund never asks candidates to pay any money or pay for tests at any stage of the interview process. Official One Acre Fund emails will always arrive from an @oneacrefund.org address. Please report any suspicious communication here (globalhotline@oneacrefund.org), but do not send applications or application materials to this email address.

Diversity, Equity, Inclusion (DEI), and anti-racism are deeply connected to our organization's mission and purpose. One Acre Fund aspires to build a culture where all staff feel consistently valued, represented, and connected – so that our team can thrive as professionals, and achieve exceptional impact for the farmers we serve.

We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, marital status, disability, gender, gender identity or expression. We are proud to be an equal opportunity workplace.

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