Senior Monitoring, Reporting, Evaluation, Learning and Adaptation (MRELA) Officer

Mercy Corps is an international non-governmental organization founded in 1979, dedicated to supporting efforts towards accountability for program participants and community partners. They actively engage communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring, and evaluation of their field projects.

This role supports the FCDO-funded Border Security Programme (BSP) in Kenya, which addresses irregular migration and associated criminal activity in East Africa, particularly human trafficking and smuggling. The program integrates prevention, protection, and pursuit strategies, initially focusing on Kenya's border regions with planned expansion to Uganda, Ethiopia, and potentially Somalia. The Senior MRELA Officer, reporting to the Programme MRELA Manager, is responsible for contributing to the program's quality assurance, accountability, documentation, and learning functions. This involves hands-on data collection, facilitating learning processes, and strengthening the capacity of program staff and partners. The officer must uphold ethical and responsible data practices due to the sensitive nature of the program and the vulnerability of its target population.

1. Lead the development, testing, and implementation of MRELA tools and system components for the BSP program, including data collection instruments and management systems.
2. Contribute to the design and review of intervention strategies, program logic, and theories of change, incorporating monitoring evidence and learning.
3. Ensure program teams and partners adhere to Mercy Corps’ MEL Minimum standards.
4. Support the MRELA manager in translating the MRELA strategy into practical systems and workplans.
5. Maintain accurate documentation of progress against agreed markers and evidence of changes.
6. Validate and verify results data from partners and grantees, conducting systematic data quality checks.
7. Implement a Data Quality Assessment (DQA) plan, documenting findings and tracking corrective actions.
8. Conduct monitoring visits to program sites and partner locations, collecting supplementary data.
9. Maintain a secure and organized data management system compliant with Mercy Corps’ data protection policies.
10. Ensure monitoring approaches are sensitive to protection and confidentiality needs of beneficiaries in trafficking contexts.
11. Work with the MRELA Manager to track activity progress against targets and raise data-driven concerns.
12. Lead the design and implementation of quantitative and qualitative data collection, including instrument development, digital tool configuration (CommCare), training, supervision, and data analysis.
13. Support the planning, design, coordination, and supervision of program assessments, evaluations, and research.
14. Develop core evaluation assets such as Scopes of Work, survey instruments, and sampling methodologies.
15. Support recruitment and training of data collection teams and provide technical oversight.
16. Manage external evaluation consultants, ensuring quality and timely deliverables.
17. Contribute to and review evaluation reports, ensuring evidence-based findings and actionable recommendations.
18. Coordinate results reporting with consortium partners, ensuring adherence to formats and quality standards.
19. Consolidate, analyze, and synthesize quantitative and qualitative data for donor and internal reports.
20. Contribute clear, evidence-based narratives for performance indicators.
21. Review partner reports for data accuracy and consistency.
22. Maintain organized documentation of all monitoring data and evaluation reports.
23. Maintain an up-to-date database reflecting program indicators and learning outcomes.
24. Facilitate regular program reflection and learning events to enable adaptive management decisions.
25. Document and disseminate program lessons, good practices, and insights.
26. Contribute to the program’s learning and research agenda.
27. Assess MRELA capacity gaps among grantees and provide targeted training and coaching.
28. Support grantees in developing and maintaining effective MEL systems.
29. Build capacity of team members in using monitoring tools and data for planning.
30. Advise on and support the adoption of digital technologies for MRELA functions.
31. Maintain an active advisory relationship with the program team on ethical data collection.
32. Establish strong working relationships with partner MRELA focal points.
33. Participate in MRELA advisory activities, providing feedback on data quality.
34. Represent the MRELA function in program meetings, presenting data-driven insights.
35. Conduct oneself professionally and personally to uphold Mercy Corps' mission.
36. Perform other assigned relevant duties.
37. Actively learn and integrate safeguarding principles into work, including risk mitigation.
38. Practice Mercy Corps values, respecting participants and team members.
39. Encourage open communication and reporting of concerns within the team.

1. Bachelor’s degree in social science, statistics, business administration, or a related field.
2. Minimum of 5 years of professional experience in program monitoring and evaluation within international development or humanitarian contexts.
3. Strong understanding of MEL concepts and frameworks, including program logic, results chains, logframes, theories of change, and participatory monitoring.
4. Proven ability to implement quantitative and qualitative data collection tools and knowledge of sampling techniques.
5. Excellent data analysis skills, capable of working with both quantitative and qualitative datasets.
6. Demonstrated knowledge of at least one statistical analysis package (e.g., SPSS, STATA, Python).
7. Experience with digital data collection platforms, preferably CommCare and Power BI.
8. Exceptional written and verbal communication skills in English, with the ability to present complex data clearly.
9. Desirable experience working in counter-trafficking, migration, protection, or security-related programming.