ACCORD - Director - Adivasi Innovation Hub - NGO

ABOUT US:

- ACCORD is a community organization which has been working with the tribal communities of Gudalur for the past 30 years. It acts as the organizational back-up and support for Adivasi Munnetra Sangam (AMS), an association of the four major tribal groups in Gudalur with more than 18000 members. The focus and work of ACCORD have always been to ensure self-reliance among the Adivasi community and ensure that they meet and interact with the rest of society on equal terms.

- Towards this end, ACCORD has worked on ensuring land rights for the tribals - reclaiming more than a 1000 acres of lost land, implemented a host of livelihood projects including a landmark scheme to grow coffee and tea in reclaimed land, formed associations to market precious forest produce such as honey by establishing the Just Change India Producer Company (JCIPC) with four other community groups across India.

- Towards this end, ACCORD has worked on ensuring land rights for the tribals - reclaiming more than a 1000 acres of lost land, implemented a host of livelihood projects including a landmark scheme to grow coffee and tea in reclaimed land, formed associations to market precious forest produce such as honey by establishing the Just Change India Producer Company (JCIPC) with four other community groups across India.

- ACCORD initiatives in the fields of education as well as health care led to the establishment of Gudalur Adivasi Hospital under ASHWINI as well as Vidyodaya school, under VBVT.

- As ACCORD steps into the journey of implementing its vision of self-reliant villages and enabling the youth to develop micro-enterprises, it is felt that a separate entity is required to implement this initiative. This idea emerged from years of learnings of enterprise creation initiatives from the community like the First People's enterprise, The Adivasi tea leaf marketing, Ecospace etc., some of which were reasonably successful, while other faced challenges from the market linkages to lack of specialized human resources. Hence, this proposed entity will include an Incubation centre - called - Adivasi Innovation Hub- which will support the micro-enterprises involving the Adivasi youth community, who number around 7000 youth in Gudalur. The Adivasi Innovation hub will build on the groundwork done over the years by AMS and ACCORD.

- The intent of the Hub is to enable micro-enterprises keeping in mind three values that Adivasis treasure most: an egalitarian society, a collective model and being one with nature.

- The entity is named the - Adivasi Innovation Hub since we believe that our innovation would be in developing a model of entrepreneurship that blends Adivasi values with the dominant market economy.


KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:

- Co-develop the vision for AIH, its overall strategy and build AIH into a model incubator for Microenterprises (ME) that cater to the needs of tribal communities

- Hire key personnel for developing partnerships and building market linkages.

- Build a team that understands the values of Adivasi community and fosters the entrepreneurial spirit in the Youth

- Lead and manage the implementation of the Hub and provide leadership to the team by providing direction and guidance to all functional areas, including, business planning, deal evaluation, community engagement, operations & fundraising.

- Develop relationships across public, private and the social sector.

- Proactively manage and mitigate risk, whether legal, financial or operations.

- Serve as a public champion for the cause of Hub and establish its credibility in the social enterprise ecosystem

- Be the acting CEO for ME's until a suitable a candidate is groomed or identified

- Develop a model that encourages transfer of ownership of the Hub to the community over a reasonable span of time

- Periodic updates to Members of the Board and Donors

DESIRED CANDIDATE PROFILE:

- Respect for Adivasi traditions and values and designing a functioning model accordingly with tribal/marginalized communities

- Prior experience in impact investment and in establishing ME's with success

- Passion for social impact

- Having leadership experience of at least 10-15 years in the social /Impact sector

- Strong stakeholder management skills: working across teams

- Extensive experience in forming corporate and government partnerships.

- Exceptional verbal and written communication skills

- Fluency in English and Tamil

- Knowledge of Malayalam will be an added advantage

EDUCATION:

Graduate/Masters degree in development, rural management, social entrepreneurship OR any equivalent degree or qualification

LOCATION:

Preferably full time in Gudalur. We will be happy to support exceptional candidates needing to operate from multi locations as long as they devote sufficient time for AIH Gudalur.