We’re looking for someone who excels in strategic analysis and is passionate about applying those skills to help out-of-school youth succeed in the informal sector. The ideal candidate will have some kind of analyst or management/strategy consulting experience.
Position Overview
Educate!, a fast-growing and award-winning social enterprise, is looking for a Head of New Product Development to lead market research and development for an innovative new product for out-of-school youth in East Africa. We’re looking for someone who excels in strategic analysis and is passionate about applying those skills to help out-of-school youth succeed in the informal sector. The ideal candidate will have some kind of analyst or management/strategy consulting experience.
In our first ten years, Educate! became the biggest youth skills provider in East Africa by scaling our proven in-school model to impact hundreds of thousands of youth in Uganda and Rwanda. In 2021, our top priority across the organization is testing and developing a bootcamp model for out-of-school youth in Kenya and Uganda. We already have evidence that this type of model can lead to better life outcomes for youth and are looking for the right person to lead the research, analysis, and experimentation needed to develop a model that can ultimately be scaled to reach hundreds of thousands of out-of-school youth across multiple countries, providing an alternative to secondary school for a huge and underserved segment of African youth.
Head of New Product Development for out-of-school youth will also join a dynamic leadership team committed to organizational and professional growth. Sound exciting? We think so too! Read below or visit our careers page to learn more about Educate!
About Educate!
Educate! prepares youth in Africa with the skills to succeed in today’s economy.
We tackle youth unemployment by partnering with schools and governments to reform what schools teach and how they teach it, so that students in Africa have the skills to attain further education, overcome gender inequities, start businesses, get jobs and drive development in their communities. Our model is delivered through practically-trained teachers and youth mentors. Educate!’s goal is to make this practical, skills-based model part of national education systems.
In 2019, we partnered with the government to pilot in 60+ schools in Kenya, worked in 275+ secondary schools in Rwanda, and 800+ schools in Uganda (25% of the country) reaching over 46,000 students intensively and 470,000 more broadly. In 2020 we continued to impact youth through distance learning and today we are leveraging that experience to create even more sustainable products that will impact more youth over the long term.
Two rigorous external evaluations, including a randomized controlled trial, found that towards the end of secondary school, participants of our program earn nearly DOUBLE the income of their peers. A follow-up RCT found that four years later, our graduates demonstrate large and durable shifts in skills, coupled with significant improvements in education and gender equity-related outcomes. Girls achieve even greater results. Our graduates change their lives and their communities, such as Daniel who leveraged both his medical education and the transferable and business skills gained through Educate! to open a rural health clinic in his community employing two people and conducting about 350 checkups per month.
Educate! is a non-profit social enterprise with about 130 staff and more than 300 youth mentors. We have been backed by top foundations such as MasterCard, Big Bang Philanthropy, Mulago, Echoing Green, Ashoka, and Global Innovation Fund. Educate! won a 2018 Klaus J. Jacobs Prize (and was featured in a video), a 2015 WISE Award, and was highlighted by Bill Gates, in the World Bank’s S4YE's Impact Portfolio, an Al Jazeera documentary, Forbes 30 under 30, and The Brookings Institution as one of 14 case studies in their global scaling education learning initiative. Educate! was also selected by the UN’s Generation Unlimited as 1 of 20 innovative youth solutions.
Educate!'s long-term vision is to design solutions that measurably impact millions of youth across Africa each year.
Key Performance Objectives
Market Research and Analysis
Analyse data and rank top areas with highest levels of OoSY and largest scale potential for bootcamps.
Coordinate the research and recommendation of top industries and positions for informal sector youth employment and entrepreneurship by ranking key industries and growth sectors by size and youth participation potential.
Lead market research to discover key operational and strategic partnerships to invest in OoSY
Business Model Analysis
Research products and services for validated business models
Develop business models based on product research and identify key assumptions for testing
Connect with subject matter experts to understand technical elements of Business Models / Products
Research and connect with potential partners in order to determine whether to invest in exploring an explicit partnership program, according to key partnership criteria
Product Development and Testing
Develop the initial user testing and feedback collection process for top business models
Support in survey design and data analysis for field research
Support Designer with technical content for training design
Managing Experimentation Process
Design and run experiments to validate business model hypothesis
Develop frameworks and templates for designing and documenting design experiments and validated learnings/insights
Ensure streamlined systems to collect, analyze, and interpret data to inform product development
Qualifications and Profile
- Dynamic experience highly preferred, with demonstrated ability to operate well in complex and fast-changing environments
Experience in business analysis/consulting or a related field.
Exceptional analytical and research skills.
Passion for Educate!’s mission is a must, but past work in education or youth development is not required. We value diverse perspectives and encourage applications from people with a variety of backgrounds. Background working with youth in the informal sector would be an asset.
Fits our Five Cultural Tenets (see What is Educate! About? below); Learn more by looking at Educate!’s culture deck here
What Is Educate! About?
1. We Put Youth First - The youth we serve come first. Always. In everything. That means we wake up thinking of ways we can serve youth even better and get the highest impact out of every dollar that we spend. It means Educate! doesn’t own a single vehicle, because we’d rather take the bus if it means one more student can participate. It means making every decision like the future depends on it — because if we get our way, it does.
2. We Are Always Learning - When you work at Educate!, educating yourself is part of your job too. We encourage every employee to find the best book on management; share the latest article on graphic design; bring in your favorite college mentor; or meet the researcher pushing the edge of the field. We are always thirsty for knowledge and love to share.
3. We Only Solve a Problem Once - We are allergic to band-aids so we love the person who brings the new system to solve the problem for good, even problems we haven’t recognized yet.
4. We Are Flexible - We thrive on change — we’re driving it. We are growing every day, so we have to adapt quickly to meet new challenges, and our team keeps up.
5. We Exceed Expectations - We assume we can achieve the impossible because we already have, year after year. We want our staff to create your own challenges, ask the toughest questions, and dream scary big!
Every person at Educate!
— from interns to the executive director — is evaluated by how they live up to these five cultural tenets. They are at the core of how we achieve our mission.
Educate is committed to providing an inclusive and welcoming environment for all who interact in our community. In creating this environment, we encourage people from a variety of cultures, backgrounds, and life experiences to join our diverse team. For East Africa-based roles, we prefer candidates who are nationals of the country where the role is based and/or part of the East Africa Community.
