The Civil Society Innovation Initiative (CSII) Incubate’s goal is to support the startup and operationalization of regional innovation hubs in 6 regions globally: Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), Middle East and North Africa (MENA), Africa, South Asia (SA), Central Asia (CA), and East Asia and Pacific (EAP). From these regions, a small group of participants were expected to emerge as champions of the CSİI idea at their own initiative; engage with and recruit other organizations in their region to collaboratively establish a regional Civil Society Innovations Hub. The champions are expected to proactively reach out to donors, Counterpart and CIVICUS to receive technical assistance that will help them design their own concept of an innovative Civil Society hub and to broaden the conversation in their regions. The hubs will be presenting their pitch packages during the International Civil Society Week (ICSW) in Bogota Colombia in April 2016.
Counterpart will be providing customized support to each hub based on their area of need and interest and will simultaneously build a global architecture of resources and platforms to enhance networking and knowledge sharing among civil society champions and other key stakeholders across all regions. By the end of CSİI Incubate, hubs will have access to a variety of toolkits, focusing on topics such as leadership, social innovation modeling, and hub set-up, as well as an online platform to house resources and to facilitate networking. This platform will serve as the virtual backbone of the CSİI system, allowing technical expertise and other resources to penetrate closed or closing spaces.
Program Objectives and Technical Requirements:
To provide Short Term Technical Assistance to the regional hubs as needed and as requested by the hubs to 1) help create pitch packages and 2) help operationalize the pitch packages, Counterpart is looking to contract Subject Matter Experts (SME) who will provide technical assistance to:
• Provide facilitation for:
o Program/proposal design and review with a focus on innovation process integration and modeling
o Product and service development processes for designated regional incubators
• Coach and mentor:
o Regional hub incubators in detailed planning and strategy development of their startup plans (feeding into their pitch)
o Regional hub incubators in their process of identifying, conceiving of, and designing products and services
• Review, revise, and coach:
o Regional incubators on their pitch package and presentations for Bogota
• Travel to ICSW and provide:
o On-site and targeted/immediate review assistance on regional pitches
o Provide defined workshop/consultancy style TA to regional incubators
o Assist in the facilitation and leading of pitch presentations, workshops, and other meetings
• Provide written and ad-hoc briefings/feedback:
o To C+CI/donors on areas of observed need, capacity development
o Innovation integration and strengthening needs
Technical Assistance timeframe: expected to take place between March 25, 2016 and September 30, 2016, based on the need and interest shown by the hub(s).
Interested applicants – both individuals and organizations are welcome to apply. Please respond with your resume, availability in the technical assistance timeframe and billing rate per hour.
Deadline to respond: 5 pm EST on March 25, 2016.
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