African Development Bank (AfDB) -  the premier pan-African development institution, promoting economic growth and social progress across the continent. 

POSITION : Principal Risk Mitigation Product Officer

The Hiring Department

• The role of the Bank’s Private Sector Development Department is to promote private sector in Regional Member Countries, ensuring that it plays a central role in laying the foundations in the development role of the Bank, in line with the Bank’s 10 Year Strategy and HI 5 initiatives.
• As part of the Private Sector Development Department, the Strategy and Transaction Support Division is responsible for preparing strategies, policies, guidelines, and analytical tools relevant to the private sector development; it also ensures global client management and undertakes specialized assignments for the Regions and the Sectors.
• It also provides ad hoc advice on transaction bankability and structuring of transactions.

The Position

• Provide assistance to institutional counter-parties in the design and use of products aimed at scaling up Bank’s Non-Sovereign Operations development impact while mitigating risks;
• Encourage enhanced private sector investment in Africa through effective use of the Bank’s risk mitigation products;
• Conduct business ecosystem assessment including by sector.

Responsibilities

• Improve risk allocation through better use of risk mitigation instruments in infrastructure and real economy; and for all markets (from middle-income to post-conflict countries);
• Improve technical capacity of staff from Operations, in using risk mitigation products and more generally across stakeholders such as governments, banks and other private sector investors.
• Improve knowledge of potential investors of new products and risk mitigation instruments offered by the Bank.
• Optimize the use of risk capital deployed by the Bank in private sector transactions, in line with the Bank’s policies and guidelines.
• Contribute actively to the work conducted by the other Bank’s departments, with rating agencies, to explore possibility of using new products and mechanisms to boost private sector development,
• Perform capacity building trainings for Investment Officers (IOs), business partners and other stakeholders
• Disseminate and communicate best practices.
• Perform market testing and pipeline building for pilot transactions;
• Participate in due diligence on new products/programmes, conducted by concerned Bank’s departments.

Selection Criteria

• Hold at least a Master's degree or its equivalent in Finance or Economics.
• Have a minimum of six (6) years of relevant professional experience in the Bank or a similar institution and/or in strategic consultancy, business development.
• Strong interpersonal, communication and negotiation skills.
• First-hand knowledge of financial instruments and techniques.
• Strong experience with Credit enhancement instruments.
• Sound knowledge of tailored products (such as guarantees) for sector based investments.
• Experience with aggregation and pooling structures for investors.
• Ability to respond swiftly to new situations and to anticipate new issues.
• Proven ability to acquire new skills (particularly in legal, investment, risk capital, technology and innovative sectors).
• Proven ability to integrate socio, environmental and economic indicators in the model.
• Capacity to adapt to the rapidly evolving needs of the Bank’s NSOs ecosystem.
• Solid negotiation skills, diplomacy and credibility to deal with clients at all levels.
• Builds talent and capability inside the organization through coaching, mentoring, training, developmental assignments and knowledge sharing.
• Ability to communicate effectively (written and oral) in English or French, preferably with a working knowledge of the other.
• Having private sector experience will be an added advantage.
• Disciplined approach whilst maintaining creativity and lateral thinking for effective problem solving;
• Sense of initiative and innovation in proposing solutions to client needs.
• Ability to deal with sensitive issues in a multi-cultural environment and to build effective working relations with colleagues.
• Competence in the use of Bank standard software (Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint). Knowledge of SAP is desirable.