Tuesday, October 18, 2016

Vacancy: Consultant for Program Monitoring Visits

1)   Purpose:
This Terms of Reference has been prepared with the aim of engaging third party consultants for periodic monitoring of the field activities of the partners of Water.org in the area of water and sanitation microfinance.
 
2)   Scope:
Water.org plans to engage consultant firms with previous experience of working with microfinance institutions and NGOs. Previous experience of assessing development work in the area of water and sanitation is required. The selected consultant will be engaged whenever there is a need to conduct an on-sight assessment of the quality of the work executed by our partner organisations in their operational areas.
 
3)   Rationale for the Engaging External Consultant Firms:
As part of internal monitoring processes and requirements, and for transparent reporting to our stakeholders, Water.org engages third party consultants to review programs executed by our partner organizations.
 
4)   Water.org’s Background:
About Water.org
Water.org has been at the forefront of developing and delivering solutions to the water crisis for more than two decades. Founded by Gary White and Matt Damon, Water.org challenges the traditional approach by pioneering innovative, community-driven, and market-based solutions to ensure all people have access to safe water and sanitation; giving women hope, children health, and communities a future. Water.org has positively transformed the lives of more than three million individuals in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean by providing access to safe water and improved sanitation. Water.org’s headquarters is in Kansas City, Missouri, USA.
 
Approach
Water.org empowers people to take action and deliver solutions that accelerate progress and impact. The approach ranges from building and rehabilitating wells and toilets to pioneering market‐based approaches such as WaterCredit. Its work is comprehensive and demand‐driven – communities know what solutions will work best for them in the long‐term – and rooted in local technologies and innovations. Water.org works in partnership with local non-governmental organizations and microfinance institutions to achieve its objectives. The monitoring visits will focus on reviews of these partners.
 
WaterCredit Initiative:
WaterCredit empowers those living in poverty to gain access to affordable financing to meet their own water and sanitation needs. This comprehensive initiative puts microfinance tools to work in the water and sanitation sector.  In Indonesia, Water.org works closely with BPR BKK Purwodadi and KJKS BMT-BUS as a strategic partner that gives financing to offer water and sanitation solutions to its membership or customer base. 
 
5)     Approach and Methodology:
The third party monitoring firm will visit program sites and verify household WASH improvements via a mobile platform to assess program progress and user satisfaction by meeting with client face-to-face and verifying information reported by the partner. This includes assessing partner services, status of WASH improvement and usage, and immediate impacts on quality of life. Client surveys also identify risks, gender dynamics, concerns and best practices within the program implementation period.
 
i)     Code of Conduct: Consultants will maintain independence and the highest professional ethical standards in collecting and reviewing information and presenting the assessment results. Consultants will not share collected information and visit findings with the Water.org partners without the permission of Water.org.
ii)      Methodological Framework: An ideal team of the consultant would include someone with water and sanitation technical background and a person with good understanding of MFI operations. The consultant is responsible for conducting a randomised selection of a minimum of 97 WaterCredit clients to 1) verify that they have taken out a water and/or sanitation loan, 2) verify that the loan has enabled the client to construct a functional water and/or sanitation improvement, 3) assess the construction quality and functionality of the improvement, 4) conduct a brief survey of the client to understand their use of and satisfaction with the improvement.
iii)   Mobile Survey Platform: Water.org is utilizing mWater mobile survey tools for data collection purposes. Utilizing mWater survey tools would help ensure quality control and would require training among the research team and enumerators. Water.org will provide remote training on the mobile survey tool, if needed. The Consultant must use this platform to conduct its independent verifications of client data and is responsible for training enumerators on the survey tool. Water.org will provide tablets to be used for conducting mWater surveys in the field. Each mWater Survey will take between 45- 60 minutes.
 
6)     Data Collection and Analysis Methods:
The data collected will be processed as per Water.org guidelines, details of which will be provided to the consultant upon award of contract. General points to be covered will include, but are not limited to the following verification activities:
 
i)       Visit site of water and sanitation improvement;
ii)      Conduct client verification survey, which include observations of the water and sanitation improvement status and quality         and client document (e.g., passbook in WaterCredit programs);
iii)     Provide photo documentation of household/community WASH improvement through the mobile survey; and,
iv)     Verify the accuracy of the partner reporting (WaterCredit Loan Report) against the client data collected in the field.
 
7)     Deliverables:
The consultant will be responsible for the following:
      ·     Gather relevant program information from Water.org and the partner to plan the client survey activities and schedule.
      ·     Select the clients to be visited and work with the partner to coordinate and facilitate the field work with local communities.
      ·    Learn mWater platform, including creating user accounts, deploying a survey, conduct a survey, and reviewing the survey data               that comes in.
      ·     Hire, train and deploy the enumerators to conduct the surveys. In areas where the enumerators are not able to speak the local               language, hire a local translator.
  •  As needed, translate the survey via Excel or CSV spreadsheet that Water.org will upload into the mWater platform so  enumerators will have survey in local language.
  • Administer the client surveys using a method approved by Water.org.  Each survey takes approximately 30-40 minutes to conduct.
  • Ensure quality control in the data collection, and review and ultimately approve or reject the surveys submitted by the enumerators in the mWater platform.
  • Analyse the data and write a draft report. The mWater platform provides basic analysis of the results. Draft and final reports are to be submitted in English.  Findings in the report should be concise, clear, and use clear visualizations and tables that show findings effectively and efficiently. The report will include the following:
i)       Key findings and trends from the analysis of the client verification survey data;
ii)      Suggestions and recommendations to enhance client satisfaction, quality of water and sanitation improvements and           water quality issues; and,
iii)     Supporting documentation uploaded into the mWater portal, including completed Water.org mobile client surveys and photos.
        Water.org will provide a template to utilize for the concise report.
     ·   The first draft of the report must be submitted to Water.org within 10 days of the completion of the program monitoring activities.         Water.org and the consultant may spend additional time in refining and finalizing the draft report. It is expected that the period from         completion of the monitoring assessment until completion of the final report shall take no more than three weeks. Additionally, all           documents, reports, surveys, and findings pertaining to monitoring visits will be kept confidential by the Consultant and submitted         to Water.org after the assigned assessment is completed.
 
8)     Request for Proposals

Water.org wishes to hire a Consultant to work with Water.org to conduct partner visits as described in the scope of work above. The proposal should include a technical and financial proposal (see sample budget template below) as well as a project timeline, with the first stage of the work to be completed by end of November 2016.  Please refer to Timeframe section for additional information. Applicants may be firms or groups of individuals with a designated team lead. Applicants must have at a minimum the following qualifications:
        1.      Proposed staffing plan includes at least one native or fluent English speaker.
        2.      Proposed staffing plan includes a sufficient number of qualified enumerators to collect the household surveys in the partner                     geographies.
        3.      Demonstrated experience and familiarity with the WASH and/or microfinance sector.
        4.      Demonstrated experience with conducting household interviews.
 
9)     Budget
A proposed budget shall be included with the Consultant’s submission, and the final budget approval shall be fixed and not subject to negotiation.  A sample budget template is provided below.  The Consultant shall provide budget information either in this format, or in a manner that includes similar details.  All taxes should be included in the budget.  The Consultant shall be responsible for payment of all taxes. All amounts shall be presented in IDR.  Budget notes are encouraged.  
 
 
ACTIVITY
Planned Activity Dates
Estimated Person-days
Personnel Expenses
Unit Cost
Total
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Activities - Total
 
 
 
 
Other Engagement Expenses
No. of Trips (travel)
No. of Persons (travel)
Unit Cost
Total
Travel
 
 
 
 
Flights
 
 
 
 
Train
 
 
 
 
Auto/Other
 
 
 
 
Per diem
 
 
 
 
Communication
 
 
 
 
Supplies
 
 
 
 
Taxes
Type of Tax
Tax %
 
 
Total – Other Expenses
 
 
 
 
Grand Total
 
 
 
 
 

BPR BKK Purwodadi
 
Period
Schedule
Branch
# Client Interview
I          
November 2016
Karang rayung, Gubug, Tawang Harjo, Kedungjati
30
II        
July 2017
Kradenan, Penawangan, Godong, Toroh, Geyer, Pulokulon
40
III      
February 2018
KPO (Purwodadi), Ngaringan, Tegowanu, Grobogan
30
 
 
TOTAL
100
(*): Branch Names for Period II and III are to be confirmed based on disbursement progress and program’s priorities.
 
KJKS BMT-BUS
 
Period
Schedule
Branch
# Client Interview
I          
November 2016
Sarang, Kragan, Kaliori, Lasem Kota
30
II        
July 2017
Tuban, Blora, Bojonegoro
40
III      
February 2018
Pati (Juwana, Tayu), Purwodadi, Demak
30
 
 
TOTAL
100
(*): Branch Names for Period II and III are to be confirmed based on disbursement progress and program’s priorities.


11)  Submission of Proposals
Complete proposals should be emailed to Catur Adi Nugroho, Program Officer, at cnugroho@water.org (cc: ryuniawati@water.org). Deadline for submitting proposals is October 24th, 2016.

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