Job Title: Communications and Membership Officer- Practical Action’s Global Distributors Collective (GDC)

ABOUT THE ROLE
The Communications and Membership Officer will be a member of Practical Action’s Global Distributors Collective (GDC) team.

For the past three years, Practical Action has been hosting and building the GDC: a collective of over 160 last mile distribution companies that cumulatively reach millions of the poorest consumers in the world with beneficial products like solar lanterns, water filters and improved cook stoves. The GDC provides a collective voice for distributors to ensure their priorities are heard; drives research and innovation across the sector; facilitates the exchange of information, insight and expertise; and provides critical services that leverage economies of scale.

The GDC has recently finalized its 2022-25 strategy and will be focusing on six key areas:
• Accelerating innovation, e.g. through our Innovation Challenges
• Building capacity, e.g. through information exchange, formal training for managers and agents, and mentoring programmes
• Helping members access products, suppliers and services at affordable prices
• Helping members access finance and become investment-ready
• Undertaking market intelligence and research, e.g. by creating a performance benchmark for the last mile distribution sector
• Engaging with members and advocating for their interests.

The Communications and Membership Officer is an important role in the GDC team, focused on strengthening communications and member engagement activities for our growing Collective. The person in this role will liaise closely with GDC members around the world, as well as working alongside GDC colleagues in Practical Action Consulting (PAC) and with team members based in the GDC implementing partner organizations Hystra and Bopinc.

ACCOUNTABILITIES
Communications (75%)
Work with and support the GDC Communications and Impact Manager to deliver the GDC’s communications and member engagement plan to increase the GDC’s visibility, and share key information and knowledge products with GDC members, partners and the wider sector. This includes:
• Creating and disseminating a range of GDC communications content including leading the production of the monthly GDC newsletter, drafting GDC member spotlights, creating partner engagement toolkits and report dissemination plans, etc.
• Designing simple graphics for use on different communications channels, including the GDC newsletter and social media platforms, and improving the presentation of written content, e.g. short reports and PowerPoint presentations
• Acting as a ‘brand champion’ for the GDC, including reviewing and copyediting written and visual content from the wider team (e.g. blogs, presentations, reports, infographics, etc.) to ensure consistency of the GDC brand and tone of voice across all communications outputs and channels
• Leading the day-to-day maintenance of the GDC website, including keeping existing content up-to-date, developing new content, and helping to shape, implement and analyze GDC website developments
• Coordinating GDC social media content (particularly on LinkedIn), including copywriting messaging, scheduling posts, researching hashtags/handles, and monitoring engagement metrics
• Supporting the design and delivery of in-person and virtual GDC engagement activities including webinars, workshops and events. This includes drafting invitations and agendas, managing the registration process, developing presentations, liaising with venues and speakers, helping with on-the-day event delivery, and coordinating post-event activities
• Supporting the review and analysis of the performance of GDC communications channels/activities, and making recommendations to improve performance and engagement
• Liaising directly and independently with other stakeholders at Practical Action (e.g. the central Communications and Marketing team) as well as externally (e.g. web developers, graphic designers and partner organizations), to increase the impact of GDC communications activities.

GDC member engagement and administration (25%)
• Sourcing, tracking and disseminating resources and opportunities that are relevant for last mile distributors
• Coordinating the GDC member on-boarding process, including liaising directly with new members and updating the member database/CRM and communications mailing lists
• Drafting member-specific communications, managing the GDC inbox and acting as a point of call for ad hoc member enquiries
• Supporting in the collection of feedback from GDC members (quantitative and qualitative) to help us refine our interventions, including via the bi-annual GDC member survey. This includes using platforms such as Alchemer, SurveyMonkey and Google Forms, designing surveys using question logic, developing associated member communications, and managing the end-to-end administrative process.
• Providing ad hoc administrative support to the wider GDC team, as required.

PERSON PROFILE
To be successful in the role, the ideal candidate will be able to demonstrate:

Experience & Knowledge
Essential

• Strong previous experience of working in a communications role
• Exceptional written and spoken English
• Meticulous attention to detail
• Exceptional proof-reading and copy-editing skills
• The ability to condense complex/technical ideas, concepts or recommendations into concise and powerful communications and messaging for different audiences
• Proven experience of website management, ideally using WordPress Creative with good design skills, e.g. through PowerPoint
• Proactive, flexible and responsive, with strong interpersonal and relationship management skills and the ability to work under own initiative
• Highly organized with the ability to deliver to time-pressured deadlines
• Very comfortable working remotely, with limited supervision
• Demonstrable interest in, and a commitment to, the Global Distributors Collective’s mission and vision

Desirable

• Experience working or volunteering for a network, membership organization, or in a customer-facing role
• Experience working in the international development sector
• Experience using online survey, events and communications tools/platforms (Dotdigital, SurveyMonkey, Eventbrite, Zoom, etc.)
• Experience developing written and visual social media content and monitoring its performance
• Experience monitoring and analyzing online performance data (e.g. using Google Analytics)
• Experience with InDesign and Adobe Creative Cloud package
• French language skills

Interview Process: First round of interviews to be conducted in the week commencing 27th June 2022 If needed, second round of interviews to be conducted in the week of 4th July 2022.