General Description of the Programme:

GOAL is an international Humanitarian Organisation that has been working in Northwest Syria (NWS) since 2013, responding to the acute needs of conflict-affected communities. GOAL is working in Idleb and Northern Aleppo Governorate, both through direct implementation and through partners, delivering food assistance and nutrition services to highly vulnerable populations, provision of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) through support to Water units, as well as emergency support to recently displaced households.

GOAL has coordination offices in Jordan and Türkiye, which includes programme, programme quality and support functions (HR, finance, safety and access and the grants unit). The departments in Jordan and Türkiye are working closely with the field-based teams in NWS to coordinate the response and oversee the implementation of activities.

Overview of the role:

In GOAL, safeguarding means taking all reasonable steps to assess and prevent harm, particularly sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment (SEAH) from occurring; to protect people, especially vulnerable children and adults, from risk and harm; and to respond appropriately when harm does occur. Key to our safeguarding commitment is to ensure that SEAH risks are identified and mitigated across our operations and programmes and that our staff have a good understanding of safeguarding and PSEAH and are supported to report incidents and potential risks.

Throughout its various programmes, GOAL is mainstreaming gender, inclusion, and protection considerations to ensure activities are safe and inclusive to different groups. In addition, GOAL’s Protection and Safeguarding department conducts activities to raise awareness and provide information to mitigate protection and safeguarding risks and ensure adherence to GOAL’s safeguarding policies (Code of Conduct, Child Protection Policy, Protection from Sexual Exploitation and Abuse Policy, Whistleblowing Policy, Gender Equality Policy and Strategy, etc.). The Protection and Safeguarding department also supports individuals at-risk by providing customised protection case management and referrals.

The Senior Safeguarding & Protection Officer will support GOAL Syria efforts to enhance safeguarding in both programmes and operations, based on a strong commitment to put safeguarding policies into practice across our daily operations, recruitment, programming, communication, and office culture. She/he will play an active role in increasing GOAL staff and other stakeholders’ knowledge and understanding of safeguarding and PSEAH. The Senior Safeguarding & Protection Officer will develop capacity building plans, design and conduct trainings and implement awareness and information dissemination activities with various stakeholders, based on identified needs and best practices.

The Senior Safeguarding & Protection Officer will work to ensure that all Syria Response programme and programme support staff in Syria, Türkiye and Jordan understand and abide by the Safeguarding principles and policies. The candidate will additionally maintain and regularly train a network of Safeguarding Focal Points across GOAL and GOAL’s implementing partners, provide inductions and mandatory trainings to new staff. S/he will coordinate closely with the HR and other related parties to ensure smooth and effective implementation of the overall safeguarding capacity building plan.

Main responsibilities:

Safeguarding in programmes, operations and culture:

• Support the implementation of GOAL’s Safeguarding annual action plan in close coordination with the GESI and Protection Adviser and the Safeguarding and Protection Deputy Manager at the field level, and in collaboration with other departments.
• Work with various teams across GOAL’s departments to identify safeguarding risks and establish mitigation practices.
• Work in coordination with HR to support GOAL’s various teams to create a safe environment and organisational identity guided by GOAL’s values, code of conduct and commitment to Safeguarding.
• Foster an organisational culture transformation by rolling out different initiatives/training, awareness-raising, and training for staff, and building the capacity-building of managers and senior staff to foster a gender-sensitive culture and lead by example.
• Work with HR to ensure coordinated, well-tracked system to track inductions of newly hired staff to GOAL polices and reporting pathways, adherence to safe recruitment procedures and participation in annual safeguarding trainings.
• Identifying ways in which safeguarding of children across GOAL’s various sectors can be improved and potential ways of strengthening GOAL’s complaints and feedback mechanism to be child-friendly and inclusive to girls and boys.
• Be an entry point for staff to receive the right information and options on reporting channels.
• Produce periodic activity reports and activities related to Safeguarding.

Capacity building on Safeguarding:

• Assist in organising and facilitating safeguarding induction for newly recruited staff and external stakeholders (including partners and service providers).
• Conduct safeguarding knowledge assessment for GOAL staff and other stakeholders to identify training needs. Develop a comprehensive capacity building plan based on the assessment outcomes to address identified gaps.
• Drive safeguarding capacity building initiatives with GOAL staff and conduct regular trainings (in-person and virtually) including developing training materials, identifying knowledge gaps, document and monitor the implementation.
• Liaise with internal departments including but not limited to HR, MEL, Partnership Coordinator, Quality, filed management as well as field staff to insure smooth and effective implementation of the overall capacity building plan.
• Support the development and design of information dissemination, awareness-raising and capacity building activities for programme participants in coordination with the line manager and the Safeguarding and Protection Deputy Manager at field level.
• Monitor the effectiveness of the different trainings and awareness sessions by strengthening tools like pre and post-tests and satisfaction surveys, in coordination with GOAL’s MEL team.
• Support the training management system for proper documentation of all training and capacity building efforts, keep track of the attendance sheets, and generate reports as required using the TMS dashboard.
• Provide regular support to GOAL’s field Safeguarding focal points. This includes assessing learning needs, provide coaching and mentoring, and organise regular meetings.

Safeguarding with GOAL partners:

• Based on close communication with the partners, and in close collaboration with GOAL Syria’s Partnership Coordinator, and under the guidance of the line manager, provide support to GOAL Syria’s implementing partners to deliver safe programmes. This includes assessment of current policies and practices, developing needs-based capacity-building plan, establishing clear reporting structures, and provide coaching to the partners’ safeguarding focal points.
• Establish a strong relationship with GOAL partners and other key stakeholders through maintaining respectful communications, listening to what they identify as their needs to enhance safeguarding practices.
• Facilitate regular monthly meetings with GOAL partners on Safeguarding. This includes identifying key topics, leading discussion, distribute tasks, follow up on actions and activities.
• Support partners in ensuring comprehensive tracking systems for data reporting purposes.

Representation and Documentation:

• Participate and represent GOAL internal and external meeting focusing on safeguarding to develop and maintain effective working relationships with all stakeholders.
• Facilitate the Protection & Safeguarding Task-force meetings with direct guidance from the line manager and follow up with the committee members on actions and activities.
• Maintain updated reporting on trainings and other activities conducted, documentation of the main challenges, success stories, recommendations, and plans.
• Perform other duties related to Safeguarding as assigned by the line manager(s), the Global Safeguarding Adviser, and the country Senior Management.

Requirements (Person Specification)

1. Bachelor’s degree, preferably in law, social sciences, social work, sociology, anthropology, political science, or other relevant areas;
2. At least four years of work experience with NGOs, INGOs or Humanitarian agencies in a similar position working on safeguarding and/or prevention of sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment (PSEAH), and/or protection.
3. Minimum 1-year experience in a position where designing and conducting trainings and capacity-building initiatives related to safeguarding and/or PSEAH was part of the responsibilities.
4. Minimum 1-year previous experience working on projects Syria, specifically in the Syrian humanitarian context;
5. Knowledge of Protection and Gender in humanitarian action, especially in the Syrian context. This will be assessed by the tasks described in the candidate’s application, ensuring that he/she have previous responsibilities and tasks related to protection and gender in humanitarian projects.
6. Previous experience in writing external donor reports; preferably in data analysis and needs assessment. This should be mentioned as one of the tasks in the candidate’s previous job responsibilities.

General terms and conditions

Safeguarding:

Children and vulnerable adults who come into contact with GOAL as a result of our activities must be safeguarded to the maximum possible extent from deliberate or inadvertent actions and failings that place them at risk of abuse, sexual exploitation, injury and any other harm. One of the ways that GOAL shows this on-going commitment to safeguarding is to include rigorous background and reference checks in the selection process for all candidates.

Accountability within GOAL:

Alongside our safeguarding policy, GOAL is an equal opportunities employer and has a set of integrity policies. Any candidate offered a job with GOAL will be expected to adhere to the following key areas of accountability:

• Comply with GOAL’s policies and procedures with respect to safeguarding, code of conduct, health and safety, confidentiality, do no harm principles and unacceptable behaviour protocols.
• Report any concerns about the welfare of a child or vulnerable adult or any wrongdoings within our programming area.
• Report any concerns about inappropriate behaviour of a GOAL staff or partner.

General Terms and Conditions:

GOAL has a Staff Code of Conduct and a Child Protection Policy, which have been developed to ensure the maximum protection of programme participants and children from exploitation. GOAL also has a confidentiality policy ensuring the non-disclosure of any information whatsoever relating to the practices and business of GOAL, acquired in the course of duty, to any other person or organisation without authority, except in the normal execution of duty. Any candidate offered a job with GOAL will be expected to adhere to these policies any job offer made is also subject to police clearance. GOAL is an equal opportunities employer.

This Job Description only serves as a guide for the position available. GOAL reserves the right to change this document. Any published closing dates are estimated. Due to the nature of GOAL’s work we aim to fill vacancies as quickly as possible. This means that we will close adverts as soon as we have found the right candidate, and this may be before the published closing date. We would therefore advise interested applicants to submit an application as early as possible.