Senior Manager, Project Implementation

Position Title: Senior Manager, Project Implementation

Position Location: Tamale, Ghana

Reports To: ACTIVATE Project Director

Contract Term: 2 Years

Salary Level: PRO-4

Languages Required: English

APPLICATION DEADLINE: 15th July 2026. Applications will however be reviewed on a rolling basis. Once suitable candidates have been identified, we may proceed to the next stages of the recruitment process.

EXPECTED START DATE: 17th August 2026

Are you a proactive builder who can evaluate scaling workflows, design an optimization strategy, refine implementation tools, and act as the operational champion for high performance and quality? WUSC is currently looking for a Senior Manager, Project Implementation to serve as the primary operational engine of the ACTIVATE project, ensuring that as we expand our interventions, our delivery remains seamless, high-impact, and rigorous.

BACKGROUND

WUSC is a Canadian global development organization working to catalyze positive education and economic outcomes for young people. We bring together and collaborate with a diverse network of partners (including students, volunteers, schools, governments, not-for-profits, and businesses) who share this mission. Together, we influence systems change, and foster inclusive, youth-centered solutions that enable young people to thrive and belong. We work with all young people, with a focus on women and displaced populations. WUSC currently operates in 28 countries across Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as in Canada, with an annual budget of approximately CAD $65 million. Our global team includes over 100 staff in Canada and more than 250 staff internationally, implementing a diverse portfolio of development projects in collaboration with numerous multilateral and bilateral donors, and philanthropic foundations.

The Accelerating Change Through InnoVation in Agricultural TVET (ACTIVATE) project is a 5-year collaborative initiative that will contribute to a stronger, gender-responsive, socially inclusive and market-driven Agriculture Technical, Vocational Education and Training (ATVET) System that facilitates sustainable employment pathways, well-being and resilience of young women and men in Ghana. ACTIVATE will blend education and high quality, market relevant skills training in specific agriculture value chains and support growth of agripreneurship.

The project will reduce gender specific barriers, elevate the voice and aspirations of youth and integrate a strong inclusivity lens, with respect to gender and disability while building collaboration and linkages among key stakeholders such as public and private actors, academia, and agriculture value chain actors to create decent work for young people.

ACTIVATE will respond to key challenges facing the agriculture and adjacent sectors including insufficient management capacity of ATVET sector facilitation bodies, non-alignment of new TVET policies and reforms across sector ministries, low quality of ATVET instruction, curriculum and equipment, lack of ATVET engagement with industry, poor business skills among others

Responsibilities

Under the supervision of the Project Director, Project Implementation will manage a dedicated team of six, with a focus on strengthening key implementation areas and institutionalizing robust accountability systems. This role demands a powerful blend of operational discipline and supportive coaching—tasked with optimizing field execution, elevating team capabilities, and ensuring all implementing partners and technical teams consistently deliver on time, within scope, and to the highest standard.

Operational Coordination & Field Execution

• Direct the day-to-day rollout of all project interventions, ensuring field activities strictly align with approved work plans, targets, and timelines.
• Act as the operational linchpin coordinating technical leads and field implementation teams, breaking down silos to ensure seamless, synchronized activity delivery.
• Serve as the primary day-to-day operational contact for implementing partners, translating high-level stakeholder agreements (managed by the Project Director) into practical, on-the-ground execution.
• Establish and facilitate high-cadence implementation review meetings with partners and teams to track progress, instantly surface blockers, and aggressively follow up on action items.

● Provide hands-on operational supervision, mentorship, and active coaching to field-based staff to rapidly elevate performance, address capabilities gaps, and enforce a culture of accountability.

● Provide direct oversight and coordination of project operations within the Northern Zone, ensuring effective implementation, performance management, and achievement of zonal targets.

Performance Management and Accountability

● Establish a comprehensive performance management strategy to standardize project execution, monitoring, and quality control across all project activities.

● Build and deploy practical tools, tracking systems, and reporting mechanisms (e.g., dashboards, templates) that enable technical leads and field teams to clearly gauge progress against project milestones and KPIs.

● Create and manage clear governance structures to hold field staff, technical leads, and external implementing partners accountable for their agreed-upon deliverables and timelines.

● Continuously evaluate ongoing project activities to diagnose what is working and what isn't, providing data-driven insights to optimize field operations.

● Lead the diagnostic process when performance gaps or bottlenecks are identified, and co-design mandatory corrective action plans with field teams to bring lagging activities back on track.

Reporting & Adaptive Management

• Synthesize field insights, performance metrics, and emerging risks into actionable, data-driven recommendations, driving the project’s adaptive management approach to quickly pivot strategies when interventions stall.
• Proactively identify and monitor project-level risks and bottlenecks, developing early-warning mechanisms and mitigation strategies before they impact donor milestones or project compliance. Create an operational feedback loop that extracts practical lessons from field implementation, ensuring these insights directly shape ongoing work plans, resource allocation, and project improvements.
• Establish clear schedules and data-integrity standards for technical leads and implementing partners, aggressively chasing and quality-checking their inputs to eliminate late or subpar submissions.
• Establish clear schedules and data-integrity standards for technical leads and implementing partners, aggressively chasing and quality-checking their inputs to eliminate late or subpar submissions.

Work environment

• Promote and maintain an organizational culture that advances gender equality, reduces power abuse and inequalities, and fosters trust, respect and safety.
• Create a working environment is free from sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment (SEAH)
• Ensure high standards of prevention and response measures for SEAH are in place consistent with the WUSC's safeguarding policies and WUSC's Code of Conduct.

QUALIFICATIONS AND COMPETENCIES

Education

• Master's degree in Project Management, Development Studies, Agriculture, TVET, Business Administration, Public Policy, or a related field.

Experience & Competencies

• Minimum of 7–10 years of relevant professional experience in project coordination, implementation oversight, partnership management, or development programming.
• Minimum of five (5) years of progressive management experience directly supervising decentralized field teams, with a proven track record of coaching staff to meet targets.
• Demonstrated experience designing and deploying performance management frameworks, operational tracking tools, or project dashboards.
• Proven experience diagnosing implementation bottlenecks and successfully enforcing mandatory corrective action plans to bring interventions back on track.
• Expert-level experience leading the synthesis of messy field data into polished, high-quality donor, narrative, and periodic performance reports.
• Experience working with government institutions, development partners, and donor-funded projects.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills in English.
• Curious, enthusiastic and willing to innovate and adapt.

Key Skills and Competencies Required

Accountability & Performance Leadership

• Performance Enforcement: Strong supervision and accountability management skills; comfortable holding internal teams and external partners to strict deadlines and deliverables.
• Influence Without Authority: Proven ability to manage laterally and upward, effectively coordinating and influencing cross-functional technical leads to achieve project results.
• Coaching & Mentorship: Deep capacity to assess capability gaps in field staff and provide structured, operational coaching to elevate performance.

Operational Execution & Crisis Management

• Rigorous Execution Management: Exceptional follow-up capabilities; a "get-things-done" mindset that thrives on untangling operational bottlenecks.
• Workstream Prioritization: Ability to manage multiple, complex workstreams simultaneously, maintaining strict quality control under tight deadlines.
• Adaptive Problem-Solving: Sharp decision-making skills to pivot strategies rapidly based on what field data shows is working or failing.

Data Synthesis & High-Impact Communication

• Analytical Rigor: Ability to synthesize complex, raw data from the field into clear, actionable insights for senior management and the Project Director.
• Donor-Ready Reporting: Exceptional written communication skills with the ability to draft compelling, analytical project narratives that meet rigorous donor standards.
• Operational Diplomacy: Strong negotiation, conflict resolution, and facilitation skills to align diverse implementing partners around shared targets.

Languages

• Complete fluency in English is required.

WHY WORK WITH WUSC?

Join Us. Our work is important, cutting-edge, and rewarding. We encourage curiosity, innovation, and flexibility.

WUSC offers a dynamic international work environment with a diverse intercultural workforce. We offer employees exciting opportunities to apply their skills and gain experience all while making a difference in the lives of youth around the world. Employees at WUSC work hard to create lasting change in education, economic opportunities and empowerment.

WUSC’s office in Ghana is located in Westlands. Here’s some of what you can expect working with us:

• 37-hour workweek, some ability to work flexible hours
• 20 days annual leave
• Health Insurance cover
• Free access to an e-learning platform with 350+ courses on various topics
• Get to know and exchange with people from all over the world
• Being part of a friendly, caring and enthusiastic team!

APPLICATIONS

WUSC’s activities seek to balance inequities and create sustainable development around the globe; the work ethic of our staff, volunteers, representatives and partners shall correspond to the values and mission of the organization. WUSC promotes responsibility, respect, honesty, and professional excellence and we will not tolerate harassment, coercion, sexual exploitation or abuse of any form.

Persons with disabilities who need accommodation in the application process, or those needing job postings in an alternative format, may e-mail a request to jobs-ghana@wusc.ca.

WUSC is an equal opportunity employer. We welcome and encourage applications from individuals of all backgrounds and abilities. Accommodations are available upon request for candidates taking part in all aspects of the selection process. Please note that only the candidates selected for an interview will be contacted.