Summary
The Flowminder Foundation is looking to appoint a new board member (non-exec) to strengthen the organisation’s engagement with senior government end users and to scale its resource mobilisation.
We seek individuals excited by the prospect of improving the lives of millions of vulnerable people in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) through the use of novel data sources and high-quality science.
Board members are expected to attend six board meetings per year, and to participate in the life of the organisation between board meetings, including advising the staff team and acting in an ambassadorial role for the Foundation. The total expected contribution per board member is on average 1 day per month.
Board members can be located anywhere in the world. Our board meetings are generally online and participation is remote. We look for opportunities to meet physically but not being able to do so is not a blocker for becoming a member of the Board.
About the Flowminder Foundation
Flowminder is a Swedish operational, non-profit foundation with 38 staff across our three offices in Stockholm (Sweden), Southampton (UK) and Geneva (Switzerland), with team members in Africa and the Caribbean.
Flowminder seeks to improve population well-being among vulnerable people in LMICs by providing high-value decision support through data science in the development and humanitarian sectors. Flowminder uses new types of large-scale digital data sources, such as de-identified mobile operator data and satellite data, combined with traditional population surveys and robust data science to develop and implement solutions that can positively impact the lives of millions of people.
Flowminder was founded in 2012, building on pioneering work by Drs. Bengtsson, Lu and Tatem, to use de-identified mobile operator data to monitor and predict population displacement after the 2010 earthquake in Haiti and to understand population mobility to assess malaria transmission dynamics between Zanzibar and the Tanzanian mainland in 2008.
Flowminder has since expanded to work with mobile operators and to support governments, intergovernmental and national organisations across a number of sectors and countries in sub-Saharan Africa, the Caribbean and Asia. Flowminder has also developed several additional pioneering data products based on data sources other than mobile operator data. The organisation is currently scaling services to support placement of public services in LMICs and improve the sampling of household surveys (www.gridsample.org).
Flowminder is active in a number of countries, including Haiti, Ghana, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Mozambique, Papua New Guinea, Ethiopia, Somalia, South Sudan and Sudan.
Flowminder receives grants and provides consultancy services within its focus areas. Flowminder’s largest donors and clients include the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (GAVI), the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the US Centers for Disease Control, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, International Organisation of Migration, Agence Française de Développement (AFD), UK FCDO, Swiss FDFA and the World Bank. The organisation’s work has been featured in media such as New York Times, Financial Times, The Economist, CBS, Le Monde and many others.
Flowminder’s work to engage government end users and to mobilise resources is spread across several staff with different geographic focus and topic area expertise. The engagement work is coordinated by the (non-board) Director of Strategic Partnerships, based in the UK. In many cases, the end users of Flowminder’s services are governments in LMICs or intergovernmental organisations.
What we are looking for
We are looking to create a strong board team to support the scaling of our impact through new partnerships with end-user organisations, mobile operators, and funders, as well as to expand the success of our products and services and increase their value to end-users.
We are now looking for an individual who can provide additional leadership in engagement with senior (government) end users and funders to scale Flowminder’s work to support vulnerable populations.
We seek individuals with senior experience in development or humanitarian organisations, with good connections to both end-users and donors who can support business development, product and programme design.
The ideal candidate will have worked on supporting governments in LMICs to embrace new solutions in sustainable development or humanitarian work. Alternatively the candidate has worked at senior levels in the role as a donor for large programmes seeking to fund new solutions.
We are looking for individuals who have had such roles in governments, intergovernmental organisations, private sector or civil society organisations.
We value technical or operational experience in low- and middle-income countries, as well as in the development and humanitarian sectors, which would confer an ability to support the development of our products and services.
Additionally, Flowminder is looking to recruit other board member roles after this role has been filled. These additional roles are listed on our website.
Additional experience and attributes which are valuable include the following:
Experience from and knowledge of:
- Both donor and recipient organisations
- Board work, ideally at a charity or company of a similar size and sector to Flowminder.
- Experience developing and successfully fundraising for large scale programmes
- Understanding of funding landscape relevant to Flowminder
Skills:
- Strategy setting
- Interpersonal skills
- Risk management skills
- Analytical skills
- Management/project management
In addition we seek the following attributes in all candidates:
- Commitment to the objectives of the Foundation
- Willingness to act as an ambassador for Flowminder and personal networks in the development or humanitarian sectors that can support Flowminder’s development
- Willingness to fulfil the duties and standards of conduct required of a board member of a not-for-profit organisation with a focus on improving population wellbeing
- Understanding of equality and diversity issues
- Integrity and being able to share one's view, even when it is not shared by others on the board
- Ability to operate well as part of a team, nurturing the development and accomplishment of the Board
Compensation
Compensation at a rate of USD 500 per full day work will be provided for board meetings and for attending and undertaking all the necessary prep work required before each meeting. Board meetings with preparation will typically consume half to a full day of work, depending on the subject matter involved. Other work for the organisation by board members is generally not compensated for.
To Apply
Please send your CV and cover letter to bm1+careers@flowminder.org or directly contact Linus Bengtsson, Chair of the Board at linus.bengtsson@flowminder.org.
Does this opportunity excite you but you are not 100% sure if you meet the role requirements? We are aware that some candidates might not apply to a job unless they tick all boxes. If you feel this way, we are still keen to hear from you and explore if you can be a good fit.
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