Our Organisational Structure

MANAGEMENT AND COORDINATION

NMJD has offices and staff in Freetown (Western Area), Bo (southern region), Kenema and Kono (eastern region), and Makeni (northern region).  The Freetown office serves as the Head Office of the Organization and also hosts the Natural Resource Rights and Governance Programme, Land for Life Consortium and the Knowledge Management and Communication Team, as well as the Administrative Offices.  The Executive Director, Deputy Executive Director, Knowledge Management and Communications Team and Director of Admin and Finance are all based in the Freetown Office.  The Promotion of Women Empowerment and Rights (POWER) Project is based in the Makeni Office, whilst the Kenema Office hosts the Improving Livelihoods, Food and Nutrition Security of Family Farmers Project and Land for Life – Making Policies Work for Food Security – Consortium.  The Kono Office hosts the Promoting Environmental Justice and Human Rights through Advocacy and Legal Education and Reducing Injustice and Building Empowered Societies Projects.

Whilst all the Regional Offices are headed by Regional Programme Directors, the Kono Office is headed by a District Manager. For the most part, the separation of programmes and staff work well because this approach enables staff to implement the programmes more effectively by building stronger relationships with both the local communities, local civil society organizations and coalitions, local authorities, and local media (especially community radio networks). On the other hand, hosting the Natural Resource Rights and Governance Programme in the Freetown Office is deliberate, meant to give the programme staff more and easier access to national coalitions, media houses, and government MDAs. This way, NMJD can be able to contribute more effectively in setting national policy agendas, especially in the natural resource sector. Several administrative and coordinating structures are put in place to ensure the effective functioning of the organization, as well as effective coordination and monitoring of its activities and programmes: Among them are:

Board of Advisors

The Board of Advisors is made up of nine members (4 women and 5 men) representing all the regions of the country. It is the highest decision-making body of the organization. It oversees, makes policies and approves programmes, budgets and reports. It meets once every 12 months. There are four Board Committees that are assigned with specific tasks. The current chair is a woman (Mrs Marian Moijueh).

Annual Assembly

The Annual Assembly comprises representatives of NMJD animated groups and communities, Management Team, Board of Advisors, Animators and staff, civil society groups, government MDAs, partners and the general public. It meets once a year to review the work of the previous year, plan for the future, reflect/analyze the socio-economic, political and security situation and come up with policy recommendations and action plans for implementation at all levels.

Senior Management Team

The Senior Management Team is the organization’s coordinating system. It comprises the Executive Director, Deputy Executive Director, Director of Admin and Finance, Regional Programme Directors, L&D Team, and the Director of Knowledge Management and Communications. It meets at least once in every three months, and collectively takes responsibility for the day-to-day running of the organization.

Other Management and Coordinating Structures

In order to effect decentralized governance and enhance the participation of all key stakeholders in the day-to-day running of the organization, as well as in the delivery of programming activities, the following standing structures/committees have been established within the organization and are functioning effectively:

Area Management Teams (AMTs)

The Area Management Teams (AMTs) are composed of the Regional Programme Directors, Programme Managers and Finance Officers. These Teams are responsible for the day-to-day running and coordination of activities of their regions. They are semi-autonomous and take decisions independently without much reference to the national office in Freetown. The main objective for establishing AMTs is to promote decentralization within the organization and to devolve more functions and authority to regional offices as well as to build the capacity of key staff in leadership.

Change Management Team (CMT)

The Executive Director, Knowledge Management and Communications Director and the Organization Transformation (OT) facilitators constitute the CMT. Headed by the Executive Director, the CMT is responsible to drive the ODC process by ensuring that ODC plans are rolled out, the process monitored, lessons and good practices captured and shared. It is also tasked with the responsibility to make sure that the ODC process is integrated into programming activities of the organization

Learning and Development Team (L&D)

The L&D Team comprises all Programme Managers, Director of Admin, OT facilitators, Director of KMC and the L&D Coach/Mentor. The Team coordinates all learning events and takes the lead in carrying out Leaning Needs Assessments (LNAs) for staff within the organization. The main purpose of this Team is to make sure that all learning events attended by staff do address their personal learning needs, are relevant to their jobs in enhancing their competences, and can contribute to achieving the project/programme objectives and the organization’s goal.

Communications Focal Points

There is a communications focal person in each regional and district office of the organization that serves as a communications focal point. The focal persons assist the Regional Programme Directors in disseminating information promptly to staff, and soliciting feedback from them where feedback is needed. This is intended to enhance communication within NMJD, and with external audiences.

Safeguarding Focal Persons

There is a Safeguarding Focal Person in each of the Organization’s Area Offices. This is because NMJD staff and its agencies are obligated to ensure the safety and welfare of children and adults, especially women and young girls, at risk, including taking appropriate steps as set out in the Organization’s Safeguarding Policy to ensure that suspicious and allegations of abuse and poor practice are taken seriously and reported immediately and appropriately.  The work of the Safeguarding Focal Persons is two-fold: to orientate staff on the Safeguarding Policy and to monitor the implementation of the policy, including investigating allegations of abuse or poor practice

Area Team Meetings (ATMs)

These meetings are held every month at regional area office level, and are attended by all staff and volunteers of the organization. Staff use these meetings to share information about their work including achievements/successes, challenges, lessons and best practices. Specifically, these are reflection, sharing and learning sessions for staff.

Programming Team Meetings

The Programming Team comprises all programme staff including Programme Managers and Animators. But other categories of staff also attend Programming Team meetings to share their work and experiences with them. These meetings are generally meant to bring staff together so that they can reflect on their work, share successes, challenges and best practices, do a critical analysis of the environment under which they work and then review work plans to integrate important emerging issues. The Deputy Executive Director, who is responsible for all programmes, convenes and supervises these meetings.

Board Committees

The Board of Advisors of NMJD has established four Committees to assist them in the execution of their responsibilities as Board members. The Committees also draw membership from selected NMJD staff based on the relevance of the staff’s job responsibility to the mandate of a committee. The Committees are:

1. Executive, Personnel and Human Resource
2. Programme and Strategic Planning
3. Public Relations and Fund Raising, and
4. Finance, Audit and Institutional Development.

These Committees meet regularly to engage and interrogate issues within their remit, and then make proposals and recommendations to the Board. Minutes of Committee meetings are circulated promptly to all members of the Board and Senior Management Team.

OPERATIONAL OFFICES AND CONTACT PERSONS.