Youth and Social Cohesion team members are working in development sector for a long time. This team has vast experiences in  rights-based programme design, community mobilisation, partnership management, strengthening platform, movement and policy advocacy. They are also experts in facilitating research, designing advocacy plan and influencing different stakeholders like media, academics, politicians, lawyers, policy makers and officials of different ministries.

Major Accomplishments

1. Already reached 65200 youths through life skill education and involved 62000 youths in intervention to prevent violent extremism.
2. Created employment of 240 unemployed youth through vocational training of specific trade.
3. 380 youth change agents emerged to prevent violent extremism
4. 13 partner organizations already started project implementation under EPR project and 43 other organizations under Sampreeti and Torun Alo project
5. 1353 youth groups formed at grassroots and mobilising the grassroots youth
6. Supported six youth platforms for nation-wide campaign and strengthened platforms

Potential Areas of Contribution:

• 66, 400 young people will receive life skill trainings;
• 16,143 youth will be engaged in PVE intervention
• 27,800 young people (out of 66,400 who received life skills training) will be developed as leaders who will be engaged in voluntary activities;
• 5,000 young people (out of the EPR programme’s proposed 79,100 poor and marginalised men and women) will be involved in income generation activities;

The team is fully equipped with knowledge and insights of dealing with challenging emerging issues in the fields of migration and RMG.

MJF’s Governance Unit has been facilitating several programmes and projects for improving governance situation of the institutions,  both national and local,  including guardian institutions, ministries, autonomous bodies, Local government institutions and local level public service delivery institutions- like- Health, Education, WASH, Social Security, Agriculture and income generation services.  This team played a pivotal role in spearheading RTI movement in Bangladesh. It has introduced bottom-up planning, Citizen Charter, participatory identification of social protection beneficiaries in line with government policies and directions. The team has expertise in facilitating community score cards, social audit, public hearing, interface between service providers and communities.  MJF has developed different tools and modules on social accountability tools and RTI. MJF has outstanding capacity in forming, norming and facilitating various groups, associations and alliances. It has expertise in facilitating Grievance Redress System (GRS).

SRWG Team has long and successful experiences in research, policy advocacy, campaign and partnership management. So far some 20000-25,000 women are working as group leaders under MJF supported initiatives, supervised by SRWG Team. This team credited with various advocacy successes of MJF, prevented child marraiges with PNGOs support and provided legal support to victims of girl and women violence.

Potential areas of contribution

Team can contribute to design and implement programme on violence against women and girls, child marriage prevention and protection, perception and behavioral change of men boys, leadership development and women human rights related policy advocacy.

The programme of TMD is run by a team of rights workers. They have in average more than 20 years of experience in the field of rights-based development targeting poor and marginalised. They all have very strong intellectual, programmatic and managerial capacity to run collectively a large portfolio like ‘Tackling Marginalisation and Discrimination (TMD)’ of EPR programme. They also have adequate skills to conduct advocacy and mobilisation from grassroots to national level and very good linkages with different ministries which are more responsible for taking care of different marginalised communities in Bangladesh. Institutionally MJF’s strategic level staff members (Executive Director and Directors) have long-term experience of guiding TMD portfolio.

Major Accomplishment:

In the last 15 years TMD has produced results like: Occupied lands recovered and distributed (including Khas resources); Formulation, reformulation and implementation of laws and policies done; Access to resources and services increased; Mass awareness raised; People’s organisations built; Social capital/leadership created; Duty-bearers have become more responsive; Culture of silence is reduced; People’s participation increased and Practice of indigenous culture strengthened. In terms of value for money this programme has contributed so far the highest amount.

Potential Areas of Contribution:

From 2019-2023 TMD will contribute to achieving the following:

1. 72,300 poor and marginalised men and women will be benefited from social safety-nets.
2. 124,300 marginalised men and women will get access to basic health service.
3. 11,000 acres of Khas land and water-bodies will be distributed to 34,000 poor and vulnerable men and women.
4. 26,200 minority people will benefit from the support for agriculture service.
5. 25,850 women from various minority groups have increase opportunities for skills and income generation activities (including job opportunities, self-employment and entrepreneurship).
6. 7,400 men from various minority groups have increase opportunities for skills and income generation activities (including job opportunities, self-employment and entrepreneurship).

5,700 men and women will have representation on different government and non-government committees.

Key Expertise

Manusher Jonno Foundation is operating its Human Resources Management and Development (HRM&D) by Coordinator HR and Administration with the help of the team. At present, MJF has 85 employees. The key expertise of HRM & D unit are as follows:

• Compliance:
  • Initiate necessary steps to update Human Resources Management and Development (HRM & D) policies and relevant documents as and when necessary.
  • Make sure that all employees are well informed about the HRM &D Policy and comply with the policy.
• Recruitment and Selection
  • HR’s integral role and responsibilities in the recruitment and selection process involves creating job descriptions, advertising job vacancies, conducting necessary interviews, involving board members, compilation of interview result, reference check, issuing offer letter and employment contract. Finding the best candidates is a challenge for HR department that we have achieved successfully.
• HR Orientation, Training & Development
  • Immediately after joining of a staff to MJF, HRM&D organizes an induction /orientation session for a group of new staff to make them aware of official environment, organizational policy, procedures and practices so that they can begin their job with confidence and minimum knowledge.
  • Take necessary initiative for staff development based on the performance management and arrange training (both in-house and in-country or abroad) accordingly.
• Compensation and Benefits
  • Compensation and benefits package includes basic salary, housing allowance, medical allowance, transportation, provident fund, gratuity and festival bonus, etc. In addition, there are promotional increment, cost of living adjustment, annual increment, performance bonus, hospitalization benefit and death benefit, etc.
  • HRM&D unit initiates salary and benefits survey to justify the market competitiveness by collecting information from other similar national and international organizations and adjust as recommended by Executive Director and approved by Governing Board members.
• Annual Performance Appraisal
  • The Performance Appraisal System in MJF is a systematic and participatory process, by which an individual staff member’s performance is monitored, guided, developed, evaluated and rewarded at the end of a fiscal year i.e. end of June.

Major Accomplishments

• Newly initiated policies (Code of Conduct, Anti-fraud and Corruption Policy, Anti-terrorism Policy, Bribery & Gift Policy, Anti-Money Laundering Policy, Whistleblowing and Safeguard Policy) are developed, approved by Governing Board and circulated to all employees.
• Initiated necessary steps to update Human Resources Management and Development (HRM &D) policy, Gender Policy, Human Rights Policy and Child Protection Policy.
• Annual Performance Appraisal format has been updated and implemented in June 2019.
• Recruitment of staff against vacant positions and newly created positions have been completed successfully.
• Orientation on fire & safety has been conducted for all staffs to ensure safety and security.
• Conflict of Interest register is updated for all staffs in every 6 months.
• Disciplinary actions taken against those staff who had breached the terms and conditions, code of conduct and other relevant policy compliance.

Potential Areas of Contribution

• Competency Review: HRM&D has initiated a process for MJF staff competency and structure review for reorganizing staffing structure, utilizing and maximizing staff capacity as per individual competency.
• Employees Training and Development: Enhancing staff development process by providing /creating new approaches of orientation and training from in-country and abroad based on annual performance appraisal and need assessment.
• Maintaining Good Working Conditions: It is the responsibility of the human resource management to ensure good working conditions to the employee so that they may like the workplace and the working environment. This has been found that employees do not contribute to the goals of the organization as much as they can until they are self-motivated and satisfied with working environment. HRM ensures good working environment by policy compliance such as Gender policy, Code of Conduct, Zero Tolerance, etc. HRM ensures this by celebrating different events such as Birthday celebration, Pohela Boishakh, Celebrating good results, taking meal together occasionally, attending marriage ceremony, etc.

Accounts team consists of five members led by Coordinator –Accounts are very efficient, dedicated to their assigned jobs. All members have the strong academic background in finance and accounting and they all are knowledgeable and acquainted with government rules and policies over VAT & Tax and other NGOAB compliances. They are well conversant with the accounting software SAGE 300 ERP (formerly known as AccPac) and maintaining books of accounts with confidence following the accounting treatment as per BAS (Bangladesh Accounting Standard) and GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles).  Electronic fund transfer system has been introduced for most of the payments to the vendors, parties, consultants and partner NGOs. Processing payments, documentation and vouching, facilitating project audit, annual audit and FD-4 audit, budget follow up, proper-charging and financial reporting, VAT /TAX deduction and payment to Govt. treasury, assets and bank reconciliation, forecasting and cash call, opening and closing bank account and preparation of statements of accounts are the core functions of Accounts Team.

Major accomplishments

There are nine projects presently ongoing including EPR with an annual average funding profile of 10 to 15 million US dollars. Each account personnel are assigned to look after finance and accounts of 2-3 projects. Each of them is responsible for preparation of vouchers against receipts and payments, processing advance and adjustments, staff salary payments, allocation of shared costs to respective project, maintaining books of accounts, preparation of monthly bank reconciliation report (BRR), quarterly financial statements, facilitating audit and preparing donor reports of their assigned projects, accomplishing all the requirements from respective donor (such as forecasting, budget revision, providing necessary information, etc) and maintaining the reporting schedule for timely submission of reports. Fixed asset management, gratuity and provident fund calculation are also performed by the team in an efficient and timely manner.  Financial consolidation report of MJF as a whole prepared by the team reflects the organizational performance at a glance.

Potential areas of contribution

In addition to project wise job assignments, accounts team also performs other scheduled tasks regularly such as monthly and quarterly Tax/VAT deduction, deposition to Govt. Treasury and preparation of statement and submission to VAT & Tax office, NGOAB compliance issues, monthly payments to various stakeholders/counterparts and regular payments for operating purpose, etc. Timely fund disbursement to different partners of different projects that gives a potential impact on achieving the target of the projects.  Payroll is a complex and critical function that the accounts department carries out. Giving input in FD-6 in collaboration with program team is another core function of Accounts Team. Follow up of budget implementation and control, budget revision, accurate forecasting helps management in achieving project targets with better of utilization of resources as committed with donors.

Manusher Jonno Foundation conducts Audit of its financial statement annually (July to June) and all project accounts/financial statements are audited periodically according to DOA (deed of agreement).  The audit is conducted by Independent Chartered Accountants firms enlisted by NGOAB or the respective Donor. MJF has an Audit Committee with the representation of Governing Board members and this Audit Committee selects a qualified audit firm, issues a TOR to perform the annual audit and the Governing Board of MJF approves the selection process & appointment of audit firm.  In addition, the Audit Committee reviews audit findings and audit opinion. Treasurer of GB reports the final results to the Governing Board. Besides this, MJF has introduced Internal Audit Department and this department reports to the Audit Committee through Executive Director of MJF. Earlier the internal audit of the organization was covered by outsourced audit firms (reputed Chartered Accountants firms) on a half-yearly basis.

MJF has a 3 members Audit Committee, headed by Perveen Mahmud, Chartered Accountants, who is a member of Governing Board of MJF. Also, MJF has an internal audit department headed by an Audit Manager. All team members have relevant qualification and long term experience in the area of internal audit, investigations, and grants monitoring. They all have very strong intellectual and expertise on analytical ability and risk assessment mechanism. Director of Finance & Admin also assist the team as and when required.

Major Accomplishments:

In the last 15 years, MJF has accomplished yearly annual audit by number of reputed Chartered Accountants firms and all project accounts/financial statements are audited according to DOA (deed of agreement) periodically. Also arranged/ assisted donor audits according to the donors’ agreement and requirement. The organization also had conducted several investigations based on whistle blowing or complaints received from staff or partners or externals or grants team’s visit reports. The auditors conducted an audit in accordance with Bangladesh Standards on Auditing and International Standards on Auditing. Auditors or the investigation team have recommended for management actions and MJF has taken necessary actions to ensure the implementation of recommendations.

Potential Areas of Contribution:

MJF Audit departmentcontributes in achieving the following:

1. Examining the system of internal control.
2. Checking arithmetical accuracy of books of accounts, verifying posting, costing, balancing, etc.
3. Verifying the authenticity and validity of transactions.
4. Checking the proper distinction of capital and revenue nature of transactions.
5. Confirming the existence and value of assets and liabilities.
6. Verifying whether all the statutory requirements are fulfilled or not.
7. Proving true and fairness of operating results presented by financial position.
8. Providing information to the MJF management for identifying organizational risk, weakness in the internal control system, any non-compliances issues, etc.
9. Ensuring value for money in every aspect of economy, efficiency and effectiveness.

Finding out fraud, corruptions, misuse of funds, mismanagement, resources allocations/ proper utilization of resources.

MJF has 14 member qualified professional team for managing its grants headed by Director Finance and Administration. Four (4) Managers-Grants Control are leading their teams with versed grants management knowledge and experience in development sector for more than 15 years.  All of grants team members completed their higher education on relevant subject matter and most of them have professional background which is contributing to ensure quality output for MJF. This grants team is dedicated to identify strengths and weakness of partner organizations and have diverse experience and knowledge to enhance their financial, accounting and grants management skills through training, orientation and regular monitoring visits.

Major accomplishments

• Review and monitor the Financial Management of PNGOs, sub-grantees, networks and coalitions of MJF funded projects.
• Review the PNGO Fund disbursement, different project budget and also ensure to implementation of audit recommendations by partner NGO.
• Contribute in the Selection process of the PNGOs, sub-grantees, networks and coalitions by due diligence assessments.
• Develop and enhance the capacity of the PNGO as well as MJF staff up to the mark in order to ensure smooth operation of financial activities
• The proposed budget of the selected NGOs to be negotiated in compliance with the budget and expenditure guideline
• Prepare the budget of the proposed project for submission /bidding to different donors
• Take necessary arrangement for revision of PNGOs, sub-grantees, networks and coalitions budget in line with MoU.
• The proposed budget of the selected NGOs to be negotiated in compliance with the budget and expenditure guideline.
• Arrange training and orientation to the partner NGOs after signing the deed of agreement.
• Carry out the risk assessment of the PNGOs and take appropriate steps to mitigate/overcome the risk.
• Assess the internal control system of the PNGOs and take necessary steps where necessary
• Regular monitoring visits to partner NGOs to ensure compliance against deed of agreement, donor and organizational rules /regulations, policies and procedures.
• Follow-up the implementation status of the previous audit recommendations and any other unadjusted events and suggest accordingly. Provide necessary support to the auditor for smooth conduction of audit and arrange external audit for all the sub-grantees.

Supervision and Coordination

MJF set up a Knowledge Management unit in March 2018, based on internal need assessment and a recommendation made in the EPR Business Case. The objectives of setting up of KM unit are:

1. a) Gather evidence on what works, what does not work and capture lesson learned from the programmes; and
2. b) Continuously extract, capture, store and improve both internal and external knowledge to improve the organizational performance.

KM’s portfolio consists of three components: Research, Knowledge Management and Communication. For EPR project, MJF has taken extensive plan to produce various types of research products. To promote a learning culture and shifting MJF into a knowledge hub, KM team introduced ‘Knowledge Ration Hour’ for promoting a healthy learning culture within MJF. It is a dedicated one hour session that created a platform to share individual/ project/ programme learning/ experience with colleagues to gather/ disseminate knowledge. Several rounds of KM Ration Hours have been organized so far. It has become popular among staff for its ‘quiz’ component which tests knowledge on organizational issues and winners are given prizes. KM Team also introduced Workplace, a product of Facebook to promote internal collaboration. With support from MIS Team, KM Team also introduced OneDrive, an online file achieving system of Microsoft, which was secured free of cost. Each staff has now 1 terabyte space available on cloud to preserve and secure office and personal files.

The revamped communications functions of MJF is also slowly setting public agenda on human rights and good governance through the use of strategic media partnership. KM team is also equipped with skills to build action-oriented social movement for raising demands through the use of ICT and social media for effective policy and institutional reforms in support of human rights and good governance, including SDG issues.

Monitoring and Evaluation of MJF is a specialised department for gaining a critical understanding of the progress and to facilitate a systematic process of strategic decision-making at management level. It is responsible for collection and analysis of information to assist timely decision making, ensure accountability and provide the basis for evaluation and learning. It is a continuous function to collect data for the numerical indicators, as well as feedback from people involved in project activities on the qualitative difference that projects have made to their lives. M&E promotes evaluation as a mutual learning assessment process to make it as systematic and objective as possible, of a planned, ongoing, or completed intervention. The aim is to determine the relevance of objectives, efficiency, effectiveness, impact, and sustainability so as to incorporate lessons learned into the decision-making process. M&E department also capacitates project staff members of MJF partner organisations on different M&E issues. M&E ensures value for money (VFM) for each programmatic component to maximising the impact of each pound spent to improve poor people’s lives. The departments see impact as long lasting, positive change in the lives of poor and vulnerable communities. The M&E system helps MJF to understand the contributions the organization has made to positive and negative changes in the lives of the communities they have worked with, and how they can help enable even greater changes in future.

Objectives of the Department:

• Strengthen and Improve Practices of M&E System both at MJF & PNGOs
• Support MJF to track Performance & Progress of both MJF itself & its Projects
• Assess Impact of MJF Program/Projects
• Periodic Feedback for Informed Decision Making

Core functions of the department:

• Capacity building on M&E
• Development of M&E planning and system
• Ensuring better planning and project designing
• Project appraisal and extension
• Review the changes
• Reporting, Dissemination and sharing

MIS is a technical wing of MJF working to manage valuable & consolidated/summarised information which are always challenging. We are working to improve automated systems & software by applying modern IT & network equipment & accessories for better information management practice. The major KPI’s performing by the unit is listed in below:

List of Key Performance Indicators (KPI):

i. Green Technology, Paperless Operation, Maintenance and Implementation of MJF’s programs, projects, procedures/functionalities.

ii. Reduce time of delivery of each process.

iii. Improve quality of delivery of each process.

iv. Reduce cost of delivery of each process.

v. Ensure Information reliability, traceability, security & integrity.

vi. Reduce Redundant Information Flow of MJF.