COUNTRY DIRECTOR - AFGHANISTAN

• Lead the development and execution of a bold, contextually relevant country strategy aligned with CARE’s global Vision 2030 and humanitarian-development-peace nexus.
• Ensure the strategy is grounded in thorough contextual analysis and stakeholder consultation, reflecting the needs and aspirations of the communities we serve.
• Anticipate and adapt to shifts in the operating environment—conflict, policy, and humanitarian dynamics—ensuring CARE maintains relevance, agility, and impact.

• Provide oversight to ensure CARE’s programs are rights-based, gender-transformative, and driven by evidence and accountability.
• Ensure integration of humanitarian response, resilience, and long-term development programming to maximize impact at scale.
• Promote innovation and continuous learning, leveraging data and feedback to improve program design and delivery.
• Uphold compliance with CARE’s Program Quality Standards, donor regulations, and sector best practices.

• Lead CARE Afghanistan’s humanitarian response strategy, ensuring readiness for rapid-onset crises and protracted emergencies.
• Champion early warning, contingency planning, and risk mitigation across all teams and sectors.
• Oversee crisis coordination, ensuring high-quality, principled response efforts that safeguard the dignity and safety of affected populations.

• Lead the development and execution of a robust fundraising and donor engagement strategy to ensure the country office’s financial health.
• Oversee financial planning, budgeting, and monitoring to ensure alignment with strategic priorities and donor requirements.
• Ensure strong internal controls, compliance systems, and risk mitigation practices are in place to safeguard resources and organizational reputation.

• Foster a strong, inclusive, and high-performing team culture that reflects CARE’s values of respect, integrity, commitment, and excellence.
• Build a resilient and accountable leadership team, supporting performance management, succession planning, and professional growth.
• Ensure strong people management systems, well-being mechanisms, and a safe working environment for all staff, especially in a high-risk operational context.
• Promote a culture of feedback, collaboration, learning, and innovation across the organization.

• Position CARE as a leader and trusted partner within national, regional, and global platforms focused on humanitarian and development outcomes.
• Cultivate and maintain strategic relationships with government actors, donors, UN agencies, INGOs, local civil society, and media to advance CARE’s mission.
• Represent CARE in high-level forums, advocating for the rights of women and girls, and influencing policy and practice in alignment with our programming.
• Champion partnership approaches that build local capacity, shift power, and amplify the role of national actors in sustainable development.

• Serve as CARE’s legal representative in Afghanistan, ensuring full compliance with host country laws, regulations, and CARE International policies.
• Uphold organizational policies on ethics, safeguarding, diversity, and accountability to affected populations.
• Ensure the safety, security, and well-being of staff, assets, and operations through effective risk analysis, mitigation, and compliance with CARE’s global safety and security protocols.
• Contribute actively to CARE’s global and regional leadership bodies, sharing lessons and shaping collective impact.

• Shape one of CARE’s most strategically significant country programs.
• Amplify the voices of women and girls and advocate for their rights at the highest levels.
• Work alongside dedicated, talented staff and partners who believe in dignity, equality, and justice.
• Lead in a context where your decisions directly impact lives—and where your leadership truly matters.

• Bachelor’s Degree in related field
• 6-8 years in senior management position in development field
• Strategic and operational Management
• Demonstrated experience in leading strategic and operational planning
• Extensive conceptual skills including strategic analysis
• Demonstrated management skills in a complex international setting
• People/Relationship Management

• Demonstrated self-awareness, leadership and interpersonal skills
• Strong human resource management skills including capacity building, coaching and conflict management
• Experience supervising and developing a multi-disciplinary team in a cross-cultural setting;
• Demonstrated interest and ability to give feedback, develop, motivate and lead a diverse team to achieve results;
• Experience in establishing and maintaining collaborative relationships with donors and government counterparts;
• Strong representation, influencing and negotiation skills;
• Demonstrated use of positive coping strategies in stressful environments
• Financial Management

• Knowledge and experience with financial management as demonstrated by ability to:

• Manage a complex budget
• Effectively follow-up on internal and external audit recommendations
• Ensure donor compliance and reporting
• Information/Knowledge Management
• Ability to establish a learning culture within the CO and to facilitate knowledge sharing across CARE

• Master’s Degree in related field
• 8+ years in a senior management position in development field
• Demonstrated experience in program design, implementation and evaluation
• Experience managing emergencies
• Demonstrated experience in proposal development with a range of international donors (i.e USAID, BHA, EU, FCDO,CIDA, ECHO, OCHA Pooled Funding and UN)

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