Technical Fisheries Junior Manager at Blue Ventures Tanzania

Blue Ventures is a marine conservation organisation that puts people first. We support coastal fishers in remote and rural communities to rebuild fisheries and restore ocean life. Our work began two decades ago in Madagascar's remote coastal communities and is growing globally. Across a dozen countries, we're partnering with traditional fishers and community organisations to design, scale, strengthen and sustain fisheries management and conservation at the community level. We bring partners together in networks to advocate for reform and share tools and best practices to support fishing communities across the globe.

Job Description Details

• Location: Zanzibar, Tanzania, with frequent travel
• Closing date for applications: 21 November 2025
• Contract status: National post, full-time
• Start date: As soon as possible
• Contract duration: Permanent
• Remuneration: TZS 31,919,286-42,243,827 gross per annum
• Salary Band: C2

Summary Job Description

The Technical Junior Manager will provide technical support to our partners in Tanzania, covering three of our four pillars (Secure Rights, Community-Based Fisheries Management, and Food Security), implementing Blue Ventures fisheries data systems and supporting fisheries monitoring data processes across partners and communities in close collaboration with the global Technical Knowledge, Programme Performance, and Data Science teams.

The Junior Manager will lead the delivery of technical training to partner organisations involved in community-based fisheries management, providing guidance on marine resource management and building partner capacity through training on mobile monitoring tools for fisheries data collection and analysis. This role will also oversee and support data collection, analysis, and sharing processes to empower communities to adaptively manage their marine resources.

We are seeking a candidate with strong technical expertise and experience in fisheries, particularly in community-based fisheries management principles. The ideal candidate will have a background in fisheries science and ecology, with a solid understanding of community-led approaches to fisheries management and conservation. They should be skilled in supporting partners to interpret data and apply it to inform management decisions. Experience in research and managing data collection is essential, ideally within the fisheries and socio-economic sectors. The role requires substantial skills in data collection, management, and analysis, along with practical experience in working with environmental data to produce reports and analyses. As this position involves communicating complex scientific concepts to non-technical audiences, exceptional communication skills and the ability to simplify technical language for a broader audience are crucial.

The candidate will coordinate with team members across all BV countries, ensuring methodologies, tools, and training resources are consistent and aligned with global strategies. This includes collaborating to adapt resources to local contexts while maintaining alignment with organisational goals and sharing knowledge from Tanzania to foster learning across the organisation. The successful candidate will contribute to developing and rolling out tools and training to our partners in Tanzania to help communities monitor and manage fisheries and coastal ecosystems, working closely with the global Technical Knowledge, Data Science and Programme performance teams.

These types of tools and materials include:

• Accessible tools and appropriate technologies: Intuitive to use and readily available, including software and mobile apps for data collection and interpretation; simple decision-support tools for assessment, planning, and problem resolution; and community-level materials for everyday activities, such as meeting facilitation guides.
• Educational resources: Manuals, guides, videos, and online materials that provide concise information and serve as self-learning tools, allowing partners to access and acquire knowledge at their own pace.
• Knowledge development: Structured learning experiences to transfer theory to practice and enhance the background knowledge and competencies, such as workshops or webinars.
• Skill development: Specific hands-on training, mentoring, or learning exchange programs to enhance technical expertise and the skills that are relevant to fisheries.

Responsibilities

Technical support and leadership

• Develop and lead comprehensive training programmes to ensure partners' technical teams are proficient in using the mobile-based data collection system, enhancing their capacity for data-driven decision-making.
• Lead collaboration with the global Data Science team to support partners and communities in ongoing data collection, including overcoming data blockages where necessary.
• Monitor partner performance and training impact through regular technical progress reviews, evaluation findings, and feedback from partners and communities. Adjust partner priorities and workflows based on learning and organisational needs.
• Define and implement a technical strategy that supports partners in implementing strategic programme pillars to enable them to achieve their goals, objectives, and targets.
• Collaborating with the Head of Technical Capacity - East Africa and the global Technical Knowledge team, supporting the creation of global toolkits and workshops, developing and reviewing training materials, and documenting lessons learnt.
• Ensure partner staff develop and apply all modules' effective participatory and adult training techniques.
• Evaluate and document key learning, best practices and relevant fishery/country information, including broader contextual learning around management experiences.
• Review key knowledge outputs produced by the regional programmes team, including interpretation of results, copy editing, and quality assurance.
• Identify advocacy needs and opportunities to the regional advocacy lead and support the technical aspects of advocacy on fisheries, where needed.

Data monitoring

• Oversee data entry processes to guarantee accuracy and reliability within the system, implementing robust quality control measures and regular audits.
• Review reach data (i.e., the number of communities, areas covered by management, etc.) produced by the Programme Performance team to ensure accurate values are being included in reports and data summaries available for broader use.
• Work closely with the Partner Network and Programme Management team to provide data for donor reporting requirements.
• Continuously monitor and manage the data visualised on BV's data system dashboards, ensuring real-time accuracy, accessibility, and relevance for end-users.
• Assess data system feedback and provide recommendations to continuously refine and improve data collection, management, analysis, and visualisation processes.
• Support partners and colleagues to run spontaneous analyses where necessary, including in Excel or other software.
• Act as the Tanzania representative in global working groups dedicated to designing and improving survey tools to optimise data collection methods and ensure alignment with program goals and data needs.
• Contribute to preparing technical scoping plans, country/partner diagnostics, technical scoping reports, and assessments, compiling due diligence need assessments, expected outcomes, and other relevant materials to enable transparent decision-making.

Programme support

• Coordinate internal and external learning and knowledge-sharing exchanges for fisheries monitoring, management and governance.
• Collate national data and information to be used in global and/or external research projects.
• Review key knowledge outputs produced by the team, including interpretation of results, copy editing, and quality assurance.
• Share best practices from Tanzania with regional and global field colleagues and partners.
• Flag national advocacy needs and opportunities to and support technical aspects of advocacy on fisheries where needed and guide development of partner work plans in line with our Technical Strategy.
• Support project development, grant proposals, and reporting for Tanzania, drawing on best practices and lessons learnt internally and externally to support improvements in fisheries programming.
• Contribute to the development of the regional fisheries strategy and agenda.
• Support partners in developing work plans and monitoring project implementation.
• Line manages the Technical Fisheries officer.

Skills and Experience

Required

• Degree (or equivalent, advanced) in fisheries science, fish ecology, ecology, environmental science, biology, applied statistics, conservation or sustainable development with a statistical component.
• Practical experience in community-based fisheries management and conservation or development.
• Experience in community-led fisheries monitoring, management and governance is an asset and translating evidence into actions (narrative framing).
• Expertise in data management and the use of tools such as Microsoft Excel and Google applications.
• Experience in the training and implementation of data collection tools.
• Ability to analyse and interpret large datasets and to train how to communicate results clearly to a variety of target audiences.
• Excellent communication skills and the ability to work closely with teams in the field.
• Understanding of the complexities of working in resource management and development projects.
• Rigorous and serious, particularly concerning the confidentiality of information; Initiative, adaptability and agility in the face of unforeseen/new situations.
• The possibility of making a long journey and being away from home for varying periods.
• Flexibility of working in field environments.
• Excellent level of written and spoken English and Swahili.

Desired

• Experience with securing rights, food security and financial inclusion initiatives.
• Experience in monitoring and evaluation.
• Understanding of qualitative data collection methods.
• Good knowledge of statistics (descriptive and inferential) and experience in open-source software (e.g. R or Python).
• Proven training experience in data management.
• Knowledge of Kobo toolbox software.
• Qualification in project management.

You will be a great fit if...

• You show a commitment to Blue Ventures' mission and values, evidenced by a high level of personal and professional integrity, humility, and humanity.
• You demonstrate a strong bias for action and comfort with the uncertain; you are motivated to move forward, make decisions, and finalise details quickly once information is available.
• You've shown a willingness and ability to challenge the status quo creatively and productively.
• You have an analytical mindset and orientation towards measurement, outcomes, and continuous improvement and learning.
• You value in others, and in yourself, data-driven and consultative decision-making.
• You think critically and put a high value on offering and receiving constructive feedback and criticism.
• You're a natural relationship builder and have a proven ability to work collaboratively with others in a complex organisation, demonstrating professional curiosity, team building, and facilitation skills.
• You enjoy collaboration and have a genuine interest in learning from and developing others.
• You're a people person who takes pride and pleasure in developing talent and creating safe, happy, productive, and engaging workplace cultures and environments for staff at all levels and from varied backgrounds.
• You crave building teams, finding talent, nurturing relationships, and tackling challenging people-related issues.
• You are a passionate professional who combines strong leadership skills with patience and a humble approach.
• You're able to engage people's energies, hearts, and minds in service of a mission.
• You use exemplary interpersonal skills to establish relationships of trust and influence.
• You're detail-oriented and compliance-minded; you enjoy dotting i's and crossing t's.
• You demonstrate excellent organisational skills, an ability to marshall resources, and a desire to continually improve systems and processes.
• You show self-motivation, flexibility, and the ability to work and thrive in a fast-paced, energetic, entrepreneurial environment.
• You're trustworthy in managing sensitive situations and information; you are discrete, professional, and possess excellent judgement.
• You are comfortable with a playfully professional workplace culture.

Application Process

• Applicants should apply online via Blue Ventures' website by 21 November 2025.
• Please note that applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis and first-round interviews may be conducted with short-listed candidates before the application deadline.
• All shortlisted candidates will be contacted within two weeks of the closing date.

Safeguarding and General Notes

• Blue Ventures is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of young and vulnerable people and expects all members of staff to share this commitment.
• All candidates will be asked questions on safeguarding and child protection.
• We encourage applications from all individuals regardless of age, gender, race, ethnicity, disability, religion, or sexual orientation, and evaluate all candidates based on merit.
• It is the responsibility of all employees to ensure that equal opportunities are available and accessible for all and that no one is excluded or further discriminated against due to the multiple identities they may hold.
• Team members are required to show flexibility in their approach to work and be willing to undertake other tasks that are reasonably allocated to them but which are not part of their regular job description.