Team Leader, Institutional Dev & Innovation Ecosystems

About this role

Oxford Policy Management (OPM) is building a roster for an upcoming eight-month assignment to strengthen digital innovation ecosystems in secondary cities across Tanzania and Uganda, and is seeking a Team Leader to head a multidisciplinary expert team. The assignment, subject to award, will support up to 12 Innovation Support Organisations, including hubs, incubators, and accelerators, in locations such as Mwanza, Dodoma, Arusha, Tanga, Mbeya, Gulu, Mbarara, Jinja, and Mbale. The Team Leader will provide overall strategic direction, coordination, and quality assurance for a team comprising an Institutional Diagnostic and Business Model Expert, a Capacity Building Specialist, and a MEL Specialist.

Responsibilities include reviewing and signing off diagnostic findings, maturity scorecards, and capacity development roadmaps, ensuring coherence of the final assignment report and knowledge products, coordinating workstreams, acting as the primary point of contact for stakeholders, leading engagement with participating ISOs, and undertaking field missions to both countries for inception, coordination, quality assurance, and selected ISO visits. Candidates need a university degree in business, management, economics, development studies, public policy, entrepreneurship, or organisational development, at least ten years of professional experience in institutional strengthening, organisational diagnostics, or entrepreneurship ecosystem development, at least five years of that experience in Africa, a strong understanding of institutional diagnostic frameworks and maturity assessments, demonstrated experience leading multidisciplinary teams on multi-country technical assistance assignments, strong stakeholder management, and excellent written and spoken English. Strongly preferred experience includes designing or delivering capacity building programmes, familiarity with institutional diagnostic tools, secondary city ecosystems, donor funded programme structures, and working knowledge of Swahili or relevant Ugandan languages.

OPM is an international development consultancy focused on sustainable policy change, and the engagement is on a consultancy basis within a project-led team. Field missions to Tanzania and Uganda are required, with an anticipated start in Q4 2026. Applications should be submitted through OPM's careers site; applicants are reviewed on a rolling basis.