Regional Director, Southeast Asia-Pacific

Roles & Responsibilities

Organizational Background:

The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) is a US non-profit, tax-exempt, private organization established in 1895 that saves wildlife and wild places by understanding critical issues, crafting science-based solutions, and taking conservation actions that benefit nature and humanity. With more than a century of experience, long-term commitments in dozens of landscapes, field presence in 56 nations, and experience of helping establish over 150 protected areas across the globe, WCS has amassed the biological knowledge, cultural understanding and partnerships to ensure that vibrant, wild places and wildlife thrive alongside local communities. Working with local communities and organizations, that knowledge is applied to address species, habitat and ecosystem management issues critical to improving the quality of life of poor rural people whose livelihoods depend on the direct utilization of natural resources.

Program Summary:

The Southeast Asia-Pacific Region comprises six country programs: Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, and Fiji, reporting to a regional management and fundraising office in Singapore. This has recently been created as a new 'super-region', following the merger of two former regions of Southeast Asian Archipelago and Melanesia. The new region now encompasses the Coral Triangle; a global centre for marine biodiversity with extraordinarily high integrity coastal reef ecosystems. It also includes Asia's largest and highest tropical island; New Guinea, containing the largest tracts of high integrity tropical forest in Asia, and third largest tropical forest in the world. The extensive Southeast Asia and Pacific Island archipelagos harbour outstanding species endemism in both their coastal and terrestrial realms, combined with vast marine jurisdictions. Across the Pacific Islands in particular, the region also encompasses a remarkable interconnectedness between people, culture and nature that offers a uniquely participatory and inclusive approach to conservation. The program is anchored in Singapore, a rapidly growing centre of philanthropy and nature-based finance in Asia. The region is primed for unparalleled opportunities for conservation, and the position is timed to capitalize upon WCS's current and significant standing across the region, on which to strategically grow our impact.

Position Objectives:

The Wildlife Conservation Society seeks a motivated and experienced leader to head this new region and drive conservation programming across the Southeast Asia Pacific. The successful candidate will be expected to lead a process that will bring together our current conservation strategies in the two former regions - that highlights the shared values and themes whilst respecting the unique socio-cultural and political contexts of each of the two geographic areas - and deliver a new strategic vision for the region. The position requires environmental-sector expertise and experience of the Asia-Pacific region, proven experience of program development and strong leadership and communication skills.

Specifically, the candidate will ensure:

• Development and implementation of a new regional strategic vision
• Management support and strategic guidance to country programs in the implementation of this vision
• Build-out and management of a lean but highly targeted regional technical and operational support team
• Strategic partnership development with government, bilateral, multilateral agencies and partner institutions in the region in order to enhance and enable the regional vision
• Development of a strategic business development unit within Singapore, to capitalize upon emerging philanthropic and private finance opportunities for nature and biodiversity.

Overall Responsibilities

• Generating a bold, broad, and forward-looking vision for conservation in the region, accompanied by a holistic operational strategy to achieve it.
• Creating a powerful communication package for prospective donors, trustees, partners, and the general public
• Building effective and strategic regional partnerships that complement and enhance our conservation delivery, and ensuring strong regional representation to governments, donors, partners and policy processes
• Actively contributing to the WCS Global Leadership Team and creating nodes of engagement for other global departmental and cross-regional exchange and engagement
• Leading the region to address threats and opportunities that are both common across countries and too large for individual country programs to address alone
• Improving and enhancing operational support to Country Programs to manage expansion, increase impact and coordinate capacities
• Strengthening internal systems to better position the organization to compete in a world of larger scale and more complex grants and policy initiatives. This includes overseeing the development of administrative systems and their implementation, and the establishment of a business unit with the capacity to address comprehensive financial planning and business development at the country and regional scale
• Ensuring that a system of accountability and knowledge management for all programs within the region is in place with which to share results, evaluate progress and encourage critical peer review
• Ensuring the safety and security of our staff, partners, programs and organizational reputation
• Promoting and facilitating opportunities to enhance the work of country programs through strong and effective connections between WCS global thematic program expertise and country programs that are fully aligned with regional priorities
• Leading and cultivating a work culture that aligns with WCS's Core Values and attracts, develops, and retains top talent.

Qualifications

• A Master's, PhD or equivalent experience in the field of conservation biology, natural resource management, plus at least 10 years relevant work experience
• Familiarity with the conservation and management priorities, obstacles, and governance frameworks in the region
• Experience managing complex or multiple projects, including staffing, workloads, and finances under deadlines
• Strong team leadership skills and supervisory experience for big or multiple teams
• Strong fundraising track record
• Extensive first-hand experience in at least one country in the region (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, and Fiji)
• Strong network with individuals and organizations in the conservation and development sector, particularly within the Southeast Asia-Pacific region
• Excellent communication and inter-personal skills and demonstrated success in working with diverse partners, including national governments, to achieve common objectives.
• High level negotiation and influencing skills, and the capacity to develop and maintain strong relationships with governments, donors, not-for-profit, scientific and political communities or corporate sectors
• Willing to undertake significant travel
• Commitment to WCS's mission and Core Values, which are: Respect, Accountability & Transparency, Innovation, Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion, Collaboration, and Integrity

Attributes that will make your application stand out

• Impact-orientated, with program-building skills
• Proven ability to simplify complex problems into compelling and effective solutions
• Strong leadership and team building skills

Tell employers what skills you have

Harbour
WCS
Program Development
Knowledge Management
Natural Resource Management
Philanthropy
Biodiversity
Biology
Vision Development
Grants
Team Leadership
Team Building Skills
Business Development
Wildlife

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