Consultant to guide ILGA-Europe in developing Programmes Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning Frame

Nature of the consultancy: 

Under the overall supervision of the Programmes Team of ILGA-Europe and in close coordination with Senior Programmes Officers, the Consultant will guide in developing Monitoring, Evaluation & Learning Frame (ME&L) for a number of ongoing and planned projects of ILGA-Europe. The Consultant will use ILGA-Europe’s current Strategic Framework and relevant project documents and reports as a benchmark when guiding ILGA-Europe in developing the ME&L Frame. The overarching task of the Consultant will be to support ILGA-Europe by identifying alternative methods of capturing learning emerging from projects and programmatic activities, with a view of informing the organization’s planning and LGBTI movement building work in Europe and Central Asia for years to come. In addition, when piloting proposed methods by conducting ME&L activities, the Consultant will provide coaching and support to relevant ILGA-Europe staff in applying new learning and/or methodology in practice.

Context:

The consultancy will contribute to the following ILGA-Europe (IE) projects:

• IE’s 5-year project on support to Central Asia is nearing to an end. The Consultant will guide IE on capturing learning as a result of this project and how the obtained information will inform IE’s future support work in the region. The Consultant shall help IE staff understand what worked well, what did not work at all, what are the needs that remain relevant and how they could be better met in the future.
• IE’s one-year long regranting programme under Strengthening the European LGBTI movement in the context of rising anti-LGBTI forces launched in September 2021. The consultant will guide IE Senior Programmes Officers, so by the end of 2022 they can develop and implement the end-of-programme evaluation to capture how LGBTI organisations who participated in the programme see the continuation of this work and what IE needs to support in the future.
• IE is expecting to launch a project funded by the US Government. The Consultant will work with IE to develop ME&L plan to be used for this planned work.

As a result of this consultancy work, IE will have an adjustable and flexible ME&L Frame to capture learning from implementing its programmes and projects and ME&L Plan for its US funded work.  

Objectives of the consultancy:

• Guide IE in developing ME&L Frame to capture learning from its programmes and projects;
• Guide IE in capturing learning from its ongoing Central Asia support project which shall be part of the final project report and also inform IE in planning its future support work in Central Asia;
• Develop ME&L plan for the planned work funded by the US Government using US Government ME&L standards and requirements.
• Depending on the need, take part in conducting some of the ME&L activities (interviews and/or focus group discussions).

Role of ILGA-Europe:

• Provide relevant information about the projects mentioned in this TOR;
• Prepare ground work by drafting raw visions on ME&L for the Consultant to review and provide feedback;
• Organise calls between ILGA-Europe and Consultant when and where necessary to discuss the reviews and feedbacks;
• Link Consultant when and where relevant with partners, LGBTI activists in member states across Europe and Central Asia;
• Arrange logistics when and where necessary to organise conversations with various project partners, grantees and independent activists (if required).

Role of the Consultant:

1. Review ILGA-Europe’s Strategic Framework and project documents and reports of the projects mentioned in this TOR in order to make links between the Strategic Framework and the projects. These links need to be clearly articulated so they could be used as a benchmark for ME&L Frame;
2. Review ME&L ideas/visions prepared by IE Programmes Staff and guide them in finalizing/fine-tuning their ME&L visions which will be part of the ME&L Frame;
3. Conduct interviews, focus group discussions with LGBTI activists and grantee organizations across Europe and Central Asia participating in the projects mentioned in this TOR. Findings of such discussions will be used to enrich IE’s learning and in planning its future LGBTI movement building work;
4. Using US Government ME&L standards and requirements, develop an ME&L plan for IE’s upcoming project.

Final deliverables and weight of the tasks (preliminary plan):

• Between July 10 to July 31, 2022 develop an ME&L plan for the US funded planned work – 30%;
• Until August 31, 2022 conduct interviews with Central Asian grantees and Central Asian LGBTI activists to capture learning from IE’s Central Asia support work and provide the first draft of the ME&L Frame – 30%;
• By December 15, 2022 guide IE to capture learning from regranting programmes Strengthening the European LGBTI movement in the context of rising anti-LGBTI forces and help finalize IE’s ME&L Frame – 40%.

Profile of the consultant

Interested Consultants are required to submit a motivation letter (no more than 1 page) and a summarised CV (no longer than 4 pages) reflecting on their expertise and experience that shall correspond to the following criteria. The Consultant can be based anywhere, but shall be able to stay connected with relevant IE staff online during CEST/CET and Central Asian business hours. They shall have specific working experience in areas described in this TOR, and in particular:

• Have a proven track record of expertise in capturing learning from human rights/movement building/development projects and programmes using various monitoring and evaluation approaches;
• Have a proven track record of developing ME&L plan specifically for activities funded by the US Government (highly desirable);
• Skills and knowledge in applying unconventional/alternative ME&L approaches, both qualitative and quantitative methods that help capturing learning;
• Have communication skills in English and Russian (since interviews with partners and grantees will be conducted in one of these two languages), and excellent report writing skills.

The following criteria will be considered as an advantage:

• Experience on conducting M&E of human rights and specifically LGBTI projects;
• Understanding of European (including Eastern European) and Central Asian context of human rights and social justice movements.

Budget proposal:

Interested Consultants shall submit a budget proposal along with their motivation letter and CV. When preparing the budget proposal, the Consultants shall be aware of the following:

• If during the implementation of the tasks under this TOR the Consultant will be required to travel, IE will cover travel expenses separately from the cost of this TOR in accordance with IE DSA regulations and standards;
• Indicate whether the Candidate is a VAT payer and is able to issue a relevant invoice. Otherwise if the consultant is not able to issue an invoice with VAT, IE will proceed with withholding a 21% VAT amount from the lump sum in accordance with fiscal legislation in Belgium;
• Given the tasks described in this TOR and timeframe indicated, provide budget proposal using the table below:

Interested Consultants shall submit their motivation letter (max 1 page) demonstrating their interest and thoughts on how they would approach this task, their CV (max 4 pages) reflecting on their relevant work experience and expertise, along with the budget proposal to ILGA-Europe Senior Programmes Officer Nurbek at nurbek@ilga-europe.org no later than 5 PM CEST on June 17, 2022.

• Click here to download these terms of reference in PDF.