Our Organization

The African Impact Initiative (AII) is committed to building the future of the African continent and diaspora community, by empowering our early visionaries to create sustainable solutions to our biggest challenges. Our vision is a reality where it’s never too early or difficult, for African innovators to bring their ideas to life and make a difference. Since formally starting in 2018, AII has raised over $5 million which has supported thousands of Africans in line with our mission.

The African Impact Challenge (AIC) is our flagship impact-entrepreneurship program that trains, invests in, and supports early African founders across the continent. Since launching in 2020, AIC has built the capacity of 1000+ early-stage African entrepreneurs and funded over 100 of them to build 79 startups. This has happened in Ghana (2020), Kenya (2021), Rwanda (2022) and South Africa (2023). This year (2024), we are expanding to Botswana. In 2022, AIC launched a Pan-African Health Entrepreneurship Stream, which now runs annually alongside our Country Innovation stream above - with the support of Mastercard Foundation. Each year we bring AIC winners from across the continent, to build and learn at the heart of Toronto’s startup ecosystem (where we are headquartered) for 3 months with all expenses covered. Recognized by the United Nations SDSN as a Top 50 Youth Solution globally - our moonshot goal for AIC is to enable innovators in every African country, to build market-creating innovations (focused on increasing adoption, accessibility, and affordability) which solve their country’s biggest challenges scalably.

OUR Program Manager OPPORTUNITY

The African Impact Initiative is hiring for a Program Manager based on the continent, to lead the growth, strategy and operations of the African Impact Challenge (AIC). Our ideal candidate is a natural leader and a strategic thinker, with proven experience & valuable connections within the African startup ecosystem. He or she will design a comprehensive monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL) framework to guide the impact of our rapidly growing AIC program. He or she will also design and implement a strategic plan - to guide the impact of AIC’s pre-incubation, incubation and implementation program phases. This will include the development of key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure progress against predefined targets, the evaluation of startup solutions effectiveness in addressing region-specific challenges, and the development of tailored initiatives to drive go-to-market penetration for our funded startups.

The successful candidate will have an entrepreneurial mindset, along with experience in managing and growing similar programs or impact-focused funds. He or she will also possess exceptional people skills, extensive experience engaging with African startups and investors directly, along with expertise in streamlining operations on complex multi-year projects. If you are a leader driven by purposeful passion, who would love to spend the next phase of your career creating meaningful impact for the next generation of African entrepreneurs, we would love to hear from you!

our program manager’s Responsibilities

● Oversee sourcing, recruitment and due diligence for startups engaged and funded through the African Impact Challenge across the continent. Build and maintain strong relationships with the founders who participate in the program each year.

● Provide operational leadership to African Impact Challenge program staff and mentors, by guiding them with a servant-leadership approach. At African Impact Initiative, we see employees and co-workers as family. The program manager will bring out the best of their direct reports, and help them achieve their full potential.

● Lead the stakeholder management, partnership development and longer term fundraising for the African Impact Challenge across the continent. Manage our network of co-investors, and facilitate access to additional capital for portfolio startups.

● Develop our alumni engagement strategy, to provide tangible value for our growing community of AIC graduates. Build out an internal system for tracking progress of funded portfolio startups and providing hands-on-value with their needs as they scale.

● Design and implement the African Impact Challenge’s Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) methodology across program streams and phases. Track key performance indicators (KPIs) for program staff, mentors and startups. 

● Design and implement the African Impact Challenge data governance strategy - which includes program intake, secure data storage, insights analysis, and impact reporting. Establish feedback mechanisms and channels for information sharing.

● Represent the African Impact Initiative publicly as a thought leader, by driving the brand awareness of AIC across the African ecosystem. Be comfortable speaking at large-scale events, delivering presentations to c-suite executives, and pitching the program to our impact investors.

Minimum Qualifications:

● Completed degree (bachelors or masters) in a field relevant to the role. Additional certification in project management (PMP or equivalent) is a big plus, but not required.

● 7+ years of industry experience in role(s) focused on supporting startups in Africa.

● 5+ years of experience in leadership role(s) with a focus on operational management.

Click Here To Apply.