The International Rescue Committee (IRC) responds to the world's worst humanitarian crises, helping to restore health, safety, education, economic wellbeing, and power to people devastated by conflict and disaster. Founded in 1933 at the call of Albert Einstein, the IRC is one of the world's largest international humanitarian non-governmental organizations (INGO), at work in more than 40 countries and 29 U.S. cities helping people to survive, reclaim control of their future and strengthen their communities. A force for humanity, IRC employees deliver lasting impact by restoring safety, dignity and hope to millions. If you're a solutions-driven, passionate change-maker, come join us in positively impacting the lives of millions of people world-wide for a better future.
The Regional People and Culture Business Partner will support the implementation of P&C strategies and initiatives aligned with the overall business strategy in the Middle East North Africa and Ukraine (MENAU) Region. This role will bridge the gap between P&C Regional Leadership and business core operations, ensuring that P&C practices and operations across all P&C pillars within the region directly support the countries and as such, the organization’s growth and success are aligned with business objectives. The position holder will serve as the go-to person for country P&C leads and other regional functions on daily people and culture-related issues and operational matters, providing guidance and support to ensure the effective management of people and culture within the region. In addition to this role implementing P&C policies, it is crucial to understand the business challenges to leverage P&C expertise and design solutions that enhance organizational performance and the employee experience.
The MENAU region operates in 8 country programs and 10 geographical countries with more than 1200 full time employees and an additional 1,250+ auxiliary workers.
Key Responsibilities
• Strategic Partnership: Support the translation and implementation of regional P&C strategies into actionable plans aligned with business goals and priorities. Act as a key integrator across Country Programs, COEs, and regional leadership to ensure consistent and effective implementation of P&C priorities.
• Business Partnering: Lead regional P&C Ops, performance management and data. Respond to policy inquiries and requests and lead on exit management for regional staff and Country Program P&C lead roles.
• Employee Relations: In coordination with the Regional People and Culture Director (RPCD), conduct effective, thorough, and objective investigation for regionally assigned cases. Implement post- investigation recommendations in complex cases and advise on escalated CP P&C matters. Provide technical advice to CP P&C leads or management in coordination with GER COE.
• Talent Management: Oversee talent acquisition and retention strategies to ensure the region attracts and retains top talent. Give recruiters regional context. Provide technical guidance & training to CPs in coordination with Talent Acquisition COE.
• Compliance: Ensure compliance with local labor laws and regulations for the CPs and specifically for the regional office. Keep abreast of changes in employment legislation in coordination with CP P&C Leads.
• Culture and Engagement: Support RPCD in fostering a positive organizational culture and enhancing employee engagement. This includes facilitating Duty of Care initiatives that promote the physical and emotional well-being of staff to ensure a supportive and inclusive environment for all employees. Additionally, engage with Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) and coordinate opportunities for connection and knowledge-sharing with groups like Women@Work (W@W), Men Allyship, etc. to strengthen community and inclusivity across the organization.
• Learning and Development: Identify training needs, manage L&D opportunities, complete the annual review reporting & follow up and coach staff through performance evaluation process & through complex issues in coordination with L&D COE.
• HR Metrics and Reporting: Analyze Regional P&C metrics and provide insights into story-telling and decision-making such as Quarterly P&C scorecard, Quarterly LDGs, etc. and continuously review and recommend improvements to P&C processes such as workforce analysis.
• Compensation & Benefits: Provide technical support to CPs and lead on benchmarking & analytics in coordination with C&B COE.
• Organizational Development: Support leaders in making org dev decisions and execute follow-up. Always ensure in coordination with Regional P&C Directors that country P&C structures are fit for purpose, alignment of strategies and SAP priorities, processes and people capabilities.
• GEDI: Partner with GEDI Advisors and country P&C functions, to implement context relevant solutions, policies and programs to enable inclusion and promotion of key practices that strengthen representation and equitable opportunities for underrepresented groups, including women, persons with disabilities, and other marginalized or underrepresented populations, throughout the employee life cycle.
• Employee Experience: Collaborate with the RPCD and country program People & Culture (P&C) teams to promote and support staff well-being.
• Duty of Care: Ensure Duty of Care principles are embedded within P&C practices across the MENAU region by working closely with Country P&C teams and program leadership. Support initiatives that promote staff wellbeing, safety, and psychological health, and contribute to the development and implementation of systems and practices that foster a safe, respectful, and supportive working environment for all employees.
• Safeguarding: Uphold safeguarding standards within people practices by partnering with Country P&C teams to support prevention, awareness, and response efforts, identify barriers and enablers, and promote a safe, respectful, and protective workplace culture.
• P&C Partnership for Strategic Projects and Emergency Surge Support – Serve as the primary People & Culture partner for critical multi-country strategic regional projects as well as providing emergency surge support, including short-term deployment to country programs as and when needed.
Key Working Relationships:
Position Reports to: Regional People and Culture Director
This role is an individual contributor to the business strategy with no direct supervisory responsibilities.
Key Internal Stakeholders:
• Country P&C Leads
• CRRD P&C Leadership Team
• Global P&C COE leads and teams
• Regional and Global Functional Leads and Teams
• Global Functional Leads
Key External Relationships:
• Other INGOs regional HR Business Partners and any HR Forums representing INGOs.
Qualifications
• Education: Bachelor’s degree in human resources, Business Administration, or related field. Master’s degree preferred.
• Experience: Minimum of 7 years of HR experience, with at least 3 years in a regional or multi-site role.
• Professional HR Certification – Professional HR certification (e.g., SHRM-CP, PHR) preferred. Familiarity with geographic context, cultural competence, and language proficiency relevant to the specific region is highly desirable to effectively support and engage diverse teams within the region.
• This position requires occasional travel within the region.
Desired Skills and Competencies
• Broad expertise in specific subject matter areas and/or geographic contexts (including language support), providing P&C partnership to country programs across key areas such as employee relations, performance management, senior recruitment, learning & development, and compensation & benefits.
• Apply strong working knowledge across core People & Culture areas including organizational change, GEDI, safeguarding, Duty of Care, talent management, employee experience, workforce planning, to guide and support leaders, adapt global frameworks to country-specific realities and contexts, and address people-related challenges effectively.
• Act as a role model for IRC’s desired culture by demonstrating respectful, inclusive, and empathetic behaviors, and actively supports leaders and teams to embed equity, inclusion, and belonging in everyday practices.
• Strong business acumen and understanding of regional operations, enabling alignment of P&C support with organizational priorities.
• Strong advisory capability in managing complex and sensitive people matters.
• Strong stakeholder management and relationship-building with senior leaders and country teams.
• High capability in change management and supporting regional transformation initiatives.
• Strong data literacy to translate HR metrics into insights and recommendations.
• Strong problem-solving skills for complex, cross-country P&C issues.
• Excellent communication and influencing skills with senior stakeholders.
• Excellent spoken and written English and Arabic.
• Ability to travel within the region up to 20% of the time
PROFESSIONAL STANDARDS
All International Rescue Committee workers must adhere to the core values and principles outlined in IRC Way - Standards for Professional Conduct. Our Standards are Integrity, Service, Equality and Accountability. In accordance with these values, the IRC operates and enforces policies on Safeguarding, Conflicts of Interest, Fiscal Integrity, and Reporting Wrongdoing and Protection from Retaliation. IRC is committed to take all necessary preventive measures and create an environment where people feel safe, and to take all necessary actions and corrective measures when harm occurs. IRC builds teams of professionals who promote critical reflection, power sharing, debate, and objectivity to deliver the best possible services to our clients.
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