Project Assistant (IYBA-SEED Brussels) (H / F)

Under the hierarchical supervision of the Project Coordinator, the Project Assistant provides administrative, financial and logistics support to the project “IYBA-SEED : Investing in Young Businesses in Africa – Supporting Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Development”.

The Project Assistant is part of the central Project Management Unit (PMU) and is based in Brussels.

Functional supervision is provided by the IYBA-SEED Project Officer in Brussels, who is responsible for training and supporting him / her in his / her mission.

He / she will work on a daily basis with and is at the service of the PMU (coordination team and team of technical experts) as well as the EF field teams (mainly Deputy Lead Benin, Deputy Lead Senegal and Country Lead Togo).

The position requires a high degree of autonomy and interpersonal skills appropriate to working in a European, international and multicultural environment, as well as a good command of both English and French.

The main tasks are listed below (non-exhaustive list) :

Logistics support

• Direct organisation and management of travel in collaboration with a travel service provider (control of itineraries received and cost optimisation)
• Booking air / train tickets and local transport
• Direct booking of meeting rooms, hotels and airport-hotel transfers in an international context
• Administrative management of visas and all administrative formalities prior to travel
• Ensures or supports the organisation of specific events (missions, seminars and meetings)
• Relations with service providers : processing, negotiation of quotes, management of subscriptions, control of invoicing
• Budgetary monitoring of the organisation of missions to ensure control of travel costs
• Ensuring the logistics and smooth day-to-day running of the PMU office : supplies, consumables

Administrative support

Financial support

Expertise France is the French public international cooperation agency. It designs and implements projects which aim to contribute to the sustainable development of partner countries, in line with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the 2030 Agenda and the priorities of France’s external action.

IYBA-SEED is co-funded by the European Union (DG INTPA), the German Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), Team France and SlovakAid, for a period of 4 years (2023-2026). It is implemented by a consortium of leading European development agencies, including Enabel (Belgium), Expertise France (France), GIZ (Germany), SAIDC (Slovakia) and SNV (Netherlands). The consortium is led by Expertise France.

IYBA-SEED is part of the third Building Block of the Team Europe Initiative TEI IYBA “Investing in Young Businesses in Africa”, which is made up of three Building Blocks : 1) Increase the financial and technical support for pre-seed stage entrepreneurs and micro and small enterprises, 2) Increase the finance for SMEs and entrepreneurs at seed and early stages, and 3) Supporting the ecosystem, with a special emphasis on women and young people.

IYBA-SEED takes an “Ecosystem Strengthening” approach : it targets the entrepreneurship ecosystem and its actors, in order to reach young businesses (i.e. SEED beneficiaries) which are defined as :

The project aims to “contribute to creating decent jobs and resilient economies by strengthening entrepreneurship ecosystems in a number of sub-Saharan countries so that they can increase access to Business Development Services (both financial and non-financial) for SEED beneficiaries” in 5 countries in sub-Saharan Africa (Benin, Kenya, Senegal, South Africa and Togo).

IYBA-SEED works on four key components / specific objectives

Qualifications and experience

Specific knowledge, skills or competences

Soft skills

WHAT WE OFFER

Application closing date : 02 / 04 / 2023

Starting date : ASAP