Role purpose

The Regional Director leads IFRC’s work in the region and is a member of the Global Leadership Team (GLT). Under the overall leadership of the Secretary General and the direct line management of the USG-NSDC, the Regional Director provides vision, leadership, strategic guidance, and effective management of the IFRC Secretariat’s work and resources in the region of assignment, including in the relevant strategic areas of National Society development, operations coordination, partnerships and humanitarian diplomacy, and management.

The Regional Director also coordinates activities closely with the Executive Office; Under-Secretary General, Humanitarian Diplomacy and Digitalization (HDD); and the Under-Secretary General, People and Strategy (PAS), to ensure effective coordination across the IFRC Secretariat.

Major Duties and Responsibilities

Champion and ensure effective and agile model of leadership working as one IFRC.

Within the framework of IFRC’s Strategy 2030, the Agenda for Renewal, and the IFRC Way of Working, and under the guidance of the USG-NSDC, the Regional Director is responsible for providing strategic leadership across the region and ensuring impactful support to National Societies. This includes strengthening their capacities to reduce and address fragility, enhance resilience, and ensure effective readiness and preparedness for crises.

As a member of the Global Leadership Team, the Regional Director is responsible for ensuring that IFRC operates as one organization, maximizing and connecting capacities, expertise, and resources at delegations, and global levels. The Regional Director will provide leadership for the implementation of the Agenda for Renewal and the IFRC Way of Working, translating these directions into effective regional and country-level action in support of the ambitions and objectives of Strategy 2030.

Ensure delivery of the five strategic priorities underpinned by the five strategic shifts of IFRC Renewal and support National Societies in advancing the implementation of Strategy 2030

• Ensure that the IFRC secretariat efforts are focused on mobilizing investments in delivering relevant and effective programs and services by national societies in the areas of:
• Response – in scale, speed and scope that is comprehensive and people-focused
• Resilience – focusing on climate and environmental challenges, health and wellbeing and migration and identity, and
• Respect – for our fundamental principles and our work on values, power and inclusion.
• Lead the implementation of the five Strategic shifts of the IFRC Renewal in the region, ensuring that deepening localisation and accountability; sharpening humanitarian focus, influence, and impact; intensifying trust and collaboration; accelerating digital transformation and AI adoption; and fostering a more innovative and agile Secretariat are fully integrated into Regional and Delegation plans and translated into measurable results.
• Place People and National Societies at the centre of IFRC planning, decision-making, and operational delivery, ensuring that support reflects their priorities and capacities while strengthening accountability to communities, agility, principled conduct, partnerships, and alignment with IFRC statutory instruments and General Assembly resolutions.
• Ensure that the Global teams and Delegations operate as one IFRC system, effectively connecting delegations and global capacities, tools, standards, and resources to strengthen preparedness, readiness, and response capabilities of National Societies and IFRC offices and maximize collective impact.
• Provide strategic oversight of country-level capacity, resources, and delegated authority, ensuring implementation of the target of at least 75% of financial resources at country level, appropriate delegation of authority, robust first- and second-line oversight, transparency and accountability, and adherence to technical quality standards while maximizing the effective use of resources.

Ensure National Society Development

• Provide strategic leadership and direction for National Society development and strengthening across the region, ensuring that IFRC regional and country teams prioritize investment in stronger, more sustainable, accountable, and trusted National Societies as critical local humanitarian actors and partners of choice.
• Lead strategic engagement with National Society leadership, maintaining regular dialogue to understand priorities and concerns, identify opportunities for collaboration, and advance institutional development, including integrity, safeguarding, systems strengthening, financial sustainability and domestic income generation, branch development, and stronger relationships with public authorities.
• Direct and oversee efforts to strengthen the institutional foundations and effectiveness of National Societies, including their legal base and auxiliary role, Unified Plans and operational plans, and the development and implementation of policies, systems, programmes, and capacity-strengthening initiatives that enhance the effectiveness, efficiency, accountability, engagement, and trust of IFRC membership.
• Drive coordinated and evidence-based investment in National Society development, ensuring consistent use of the National Society Investment Dashboard across regional and delegation teams to identify priorities, align technical and financial resources, coordinate partner support, and establish appropriate investment mechanisms at country and regional levels.
• Strengthen leadership, volunteering, youth, and branch development across the region, including regional leadership-development initiatives, mentoring future leaders, advancing women in leadership, promoting strategic foresight and leadership learning, and ensuring that all teams actively contribute technical and financial resources to agreed strategies and plans.
• Provide strategic leadership, management, and coordination for high-quality support to National Societies, ensuring that relevant internal and external analysis informs strategic alignment across the region and that IFRC support enables National Societies to strengthen community resilience and address the needs of vulnerable people across health, social, economic, and other programme areas, consistent with priorities established by the Secretary General and under the overall guidance of the USG-NSDC.

Lead Strategic and Operational Coordination

Responsible for ensuring coordination is integral component for the IFRC Renewal in action across the region:

• Membership Cooperation, including IFRC Secretariat and its member NSs implement the IFRC Way of Working and use IFRC policies as key reference guidance to work effectively as a network.
• Movement Coordination, including IFRC, its member NSs and the ICRC implement the Seville Agreement 2.0 and its tools.
• Coordination with external partners, such as governments, international organizations, civil society organizations, NGOs, private sector entities, and other stakeholders involved in humanitarian work.
• Ensure that Federation policies, procedures, guidelines, and quality standards are properly implemented, and adhered by staff and all partners with whom the Federation works.
• Ensure adequate cooperation and coordination in all programmes and operations ensuring the most effective and efficient mobilisation and utilisation of resources.
• Build effective cooperation and partnerships with a wide range of partners and stakeholders in government, civil society, academia, and the private sector, and where appropriate engage with the UN Country Team and other humanitarian actors.
• Ensure that the Cooperation Policy and other Policies are effectively implemented and monitored.
• Provide strategic leadership for IFRC engagement and dialogue with the ICRC across the region, fostering strong coordination, joint context analysis, and timely identification of Movement-wide opportunities, challenges, and risks, and promoting coherent and complementary action in support of National Societies and the wider Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement.

Lead Effective Humanitarian Diplomacy

• Provide strategic leadership for purpose-driven humanitarian diplomacy, communications, and external relations across the region, translating IFRC global strategies and positions into regional priorities and establishing consistent protocols and approaches for external engagement across the Regional Office and Country Delegations.
• Build and strengthen strategic partnerships and broad alliances that advance shared humanitarian priorities and position IFRC and its network of National Societies as partners of choice, including proactive engagement with regional intergovernmental organizations, international financial institutions, embassies, academia, civil society, and other influential regional and international actors.
• Represent and advocate for IFRC positions on key humanitarian and development issues in high-level regional, Movement, and external forums, contributing regional perspectives to Federation-wide policy development and ensuring that the priorities and ambitions of National Societies are effectively promoted and supported.
• Champion the Fundamental Principles and a principled approach to humanitarian action across the region, ensuring that IFRC teams lead by example, consistently apply Federation-wide standards and guidance, and work with National Societies to address stigma, discrimination, social exclusion, and violence while contributing to peace and social harmony.
• Ensure effective regional advocacy and strategic alignment around National Society priorities, enabling Country Delegations and the Regional Office to support, promote, disseminate, and advocate for National Society humanitarian and development priorities, plans, and actions with relevant partners and decision-makers.
• Drive stronger information management and digital transformation in support of humanitarian action and influence, ensuring timely and relevant analysis and reporting for IFRC senior leadership, humanitarian diplomacy, communications, and decision-making, while supporting Federation-wide digital transformation to strengthen IFRC’s capacity to serve National Societies and remain fit for the future.

Ensure Agility

• Drive an agile, adaptive, and accountable approach to IFRC operations across the region, strengthening systems, processes, and ways of working to improve responsiveness, effectiveness, quality, and impact in support of National Societies.
• Ensure appropriate capacity and resources are positioned at country level, enabling IFRC teams to provide effective support to National Societies on core priorities and ensuring that financial resources are allocated strategically to maximize country-level impact.
• Exercise sound judgment, creativity, and flexibility in implementing IFRC decisions and strengthening coordination, ensuring effective engagement with National Societies, the wider Movement, donors, humanitarian actors, the private sector, and other relevant stakeholders.

Ensure Transparency and Accountability

• Ensure overall accountability, effective management, and organizational oversight across the region, including the Regional Office and Country and Cluster Delegations, maintaining accountability to affected people and communities, National Societies, donors, partners, and other stakeholders, and fostering a culture of transparency, learning, responsibility, and continuous improvement.
• Provide strategic oversight of IFRC risk, business continuity, legal compliance, and duty of care, ensuring that strategic and operational decisions are informed by effective risk management; that Risk Registers and Business Continuity Plans are maintained and regularly updated; and that applicable legal obligations, status agreements, and institutional responsibilities are consistently upheld.
• Ensure sound financial stewardship and effective management of IFRC resources across the region, including robust budget planning, expenditure control, financial oversight, and delivery within approved budgets, safeguarding IFRC resources and strengthening organizational accountability.
• Promote and model a safe, respectful, inclusive, and accountable organizational culture, ensuring that staff understand and adhere to the IFRC Code of Conduct and that grievances, misconduct, fraud, harassment, contractual concerns, disciplinary matters, and other breaches of IFRC standards are handled appropriately, confidentially, and in close coordination with HR, Legal, compliance, and relevant global functions, with appropriate support provided to affected staff.
• Ensure comprehensive security management and protection of personnel, assets, and operations across the region, maintaining effective 24/7 security-management arrangements, identifying and mitigating security risks, and ensuring that IFRC and other Red Cross and Red Crescent personnel, assets, and operations under IFRC responsibility are adequately protected.
• Maintain effective engagement with IFRC governance structures and relevant global functions, working closely with the Governance Support Team to support the substantive and strategic agenda of IFRC governance bodies in the region and facilitate strong linkages, dialogue, and exchanges with National Societies.

Promote Safeguarding

• Champion a safe, respectful, inclusive, and empowering working environment, demonstrating the highest standards of personal conduct and promoting zero tolerance for sexual exploitation and abuse, harassment, discrimination, sexism, gender inequality, abuse of power, and other behaviours that undermine the dignity or safety of affected people or IFRC personnel.
• Provide visible leadership in promoting IFRC standards of conduct and safeguarding, ensuring that managers and staff understand their responsibilities, encouraging healthy and respectful exchanges, addressing inappropriate behaviour, and taking timely action when conduct may contribute to an unsafe, discriminatory, or hostile working environment.
• Ensure accountability for compliance with IFRC standards and policies, holding managers and staff accountable for their behaviour and responsibilities, addressing areas of concern or required improvement, and integrating conduct and safeguarding responsibilities, as appropriate, into performance management processes.
• Promote and monitor staff wellbeing and a healthy workplace culture, ensuring that managers remain attentive to staff welfare, take appropriate action when concerns arise, and foster an environment in which people feel safe, supported, respected, and empowered to perform their duties.

Profile 

Education

• Post-graduate degree in management, humanitarian or development issues, or other relevant area; or a first-level university degree combined with extensive relevant experience.

Experience

• At least 15 years of professional experience in coordination, humanitarian operations, social or economic development, institutional development, diplomacy, partnerships, and government relations. 
• At least 10 years of experience in effectively managing and motivating teams and direct supervision of staff.
• Proven leadership and management experience, including in the areas of human resources management, financial management, digitalization, administration, and organisational risk management.
• Experience in developing strategy, developing tools and guidance, providing technical assistance and establishing and maintaining networks.
• Experience in leading large-scale organisational transformation and change management initiatives in complex, multi-country environments.
• Demonstrated success in programme planning, budgeting and financial management, implementation, monitoring, reporting and evaluation.
• Professional experience within the RC/RC Movement.
• Good understanding of IFRC policies and strategies as well as a demonstrated ability to translate these into an operational context.

Knowledge and Skills

• Sound knowledge and practical understanding of IFRC and its institutional dynamics.
• Working knowledge of compliance, legal, and regulatory frameworks relevant to humanitarian operations.
• Strong understanding of localisation, membership coordination, and country-led approaches within complex humanitarian networks.
• Outstanding written and oral communication skills, including in public speaking.
• Ability to conceptualize strategic approaches and translate them into practice and results.
• Ability to network effectively and influence and inspire others, including the membership, governments, other agencies, and own peers, staff, volunteers, and partners.
• Demonstrated ability to represent the organization credibly and effectively in high-level strategic, diplomatic, governance and external stakeholder forums and to undertake high-level advocacy role.
• Focus on quality and standards, results, and accountability.
• Capacity to multitask, set priorities, and meet deadlines.
• Capacity for teamwork and trust-building, including in National Society relations.
• Management style that inspires, builds confidence as well as finds creative and constructive solutions to difficult issues.  
• Ability to lead, develop and coach diverse teams, fostering collaboration, trust and high performance across multicultural, cross-functional, virtual and geographically dispersed environments.
• Ability to drive change and improvements and ability to deliver strategies in a challenging environment.
• Demonstrated core proficiency in (a) digital communication & collaboration, (b) basic digital content creation, (c) digital safety & security, (d) data literacy, and (e) problem solving with technology (including responsible use of AI assistants.
• Understanding of and commitment to IFRC’s mission and values.

Languages

• Fluent spoken and written English. 
• Good command of another IFRC language (French, and/or Spanish, and/or Arabic) or language relevant in the region.

Competencies

Values

• Respect for Diversity
• Integrity
• Professionalism
• Accountability

Core Competencies

• Communication
• Collaboration and Teamwork
• Judgement and Decision Making
• National Society and Customer Relations
• Creativity and Innovation
• Building Trust

Managerial Competencies

• Managing Staff Performance
• Managing Staff Development

Functional Competencies

• Strategic Orientation
• Building Alliances
• Leadership
• Empowering Others

Terms of Appointment

Immediate Supervisor: Under Secretary General, National Society Development and Coordination (USG-NSDC)

The following roles report directly to the Regional Director: The Deputy Regional Director, the Heads of Delegation in the region, as well as identified IFRC leads for different thematic, operational, and technical areas in the region.

Role Locations

IFRC Regional Offices – Asia Pacific (Kuala Lumpur), Europe (Budapest) and Middle East and North Africa (Beirut)

How to Apply

To apply for this position, please ensure you complete the Application Form provided below by 07 December 2026 (23:59 hrs, GMT +1). It is essential that you submit your CV in English, specifically in Microsoft Word format (.doc/.docx), not exceeding 10MB.

Applications in other languages or formats will not be considered.

Rest assured, all information will be handled with the utmost confidentiality.

SRI Executive is exclusively retained by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) to undertake this assignment.