Africa’s Voices Foundation Research Assistant (Somali Speaking)

Background

AVF is a fast-growing start-up, capitalizing on interactive media and digital communications to curate and spark engaging discussions that convene citizens’ voices as evidence and elevate them to the level of decision-making. We equip development, humanitarian and governance organisations with unique capabilities to listen intelligently to the citizens they serve. Spun out of cutting-edge research at the University of Cambridge in 2015, we have an established presence in East Africa and beyond with a vibrant growing core team in Nairobi. Our clients include UNICEF, the European Union, ICRAF, Somalia Stability Fund, and the MasterCard Foundation.

Responsibilities:

• Perform literature reviews to inform project design
• Coding, tagging and analysing local-language data
• Qualitative analysis of local-language data
• Support overall programme and research design
• Drafting reports as required.
• Assist with other tasks as and when necessary, including survey and questionnaire design and translation

Selection Criteria:

Essential

1. Diploma or Undergraduate degree in a relevant social science discipline (such as sociology, political science, international development, public health, social psychology)
2. One year professional experience working as part of the design and implementation of research and analysis/monitoring and evaluation projects
3. Experience in qualitative research methods such as content analysis, thematic analysis and grounded theory.
4. Excellent Somali language skills in Maxaa- Tiri, with understanding of regional variations and dialects within Somalia highly desirable
5. The ability to transfer style, tone and cultural elements accurately from Somali (Maxaa -Tiri) to English and English to Somali (Maxaa -Tiri) .
6. Extremely high attention to detail
7. Ability to learn quickly and actively, seeking to continuously improve skills and knowledge
8. Proven ability to perform tasks for tight deadlines and under pressure
9. Fluency in written and spoken; Somali (Maxaa -Tiri) and English language

Desirable

1. Knowledge/experience of working in social/behaviour change campaigning or public opinion research or humanitarian programming
2. Knowledge and experience of quantitative research methods
3. Experience designing and conducting field research, especially focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews
4. Experience in English-Somali translation for development programmes
5. Experience in survey/questionnaire design