Consultant to Upgrade the Budget Planning Tool (BPT) at Creative Associates International - LEARN to Read Project

Creative Associates International is a dynamic, fast-growing global development firm that specializes in education, economic growth, democratic development, and post-crisis stabilization. Based in Washington, D.C., Creative has a field presence in more than 25 countries with a strong client portfolio that includes the U.S. Agency for International Development and the State Department, among others. Since its founding in 1977, Creative has earned a solid reputation among its clients and is well-regarded by competitors and partners alike.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Consultant to Upgrade the Budget Planning Tool (BPT)

Location: Abuja (FCT)
Employment Type: Contract (September 2024 – June 2025)
LOE: 90 Days
Number of Consultants: One (1)

Program Description

• Funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development and in close partnership with federal partners and select Nigeria States (designated as legacy [Bauchi and Sokoto], Adamawa as launching state and the On-demand services technical assistance).
• The five-year Leveraging Education Assistance Resources in Nigeria (LEARN) project will support sustainable improvements in reading outcomes for first and second-grade pupils.

Introduction

• The Budget Planning Tool (BPT) is a digitized tool used by the state to develop and track the implementation of strategic documents.
• The USAID-funded project, NEI Plus supported the government of Bauchi and Sokoto states to develop the BPT. The BPT captures policy framework and strategic activities in a prioritized manner, tracks progress against planned activities and targets, and is used to produce a performance monitoring report.
• The digitized planning tool reduces the turn-around time for the development of strategic documents (MTSS, MTBESP, Strategic Education Sector Operational Plan or SESOP, Annual Implementation Plan (AIP), and Departmental Work Plan (DWP), and it aids the seamless implementation management of the strategic documents. A part of the management tools requested by the Launching state is the BPT, for effective management of the state’s strategic document and possible scale-up to other social sectors in the state.

Justification and Recommendations:

• The BPT Tool was developed in 2016 for use in Bauchi and Sokoto, and the advance in technology and state-specific objectives review requires a need to update some of its features and follow current technologies.
• The upgrades expected from the digital tools is to include a monitoring dashboard to its management functionality. with the capacity to be faster, user-friendly, and graphically appealing.
• A robust application for managing budgeting and planning. The tool in the legacy state will be used as a source and guide for the revised version for the launch and on-demand states.

Limitations and recommendations:

• The BPT is low and lags.
• The BPT needs a better User interface.
• The tool has limitations in tracking and reporting the implementation of the MTSS, and MTBESP.
• The BPT has the limitation of not being able to generate implementation reports.
• The tool has limitations on tracking budget provisions & expenditures for Education MDAs
• The tool needs to have a dashboard that gives an overall view and snapshot of the MTSS/MTBESP and budget implementation for Education MDAs.
• The tool shows errors in the export of reports such as Quarterly performance reports, and financial performance.
• There is a need to update and upgrade the tool since when it was developed for almost 8 years thereby capturing the emerging issues.
• There is a need to agree on where the BPT will be housed, part of the EDMS or a Standalone platform.

Objectives

• The Objective of the assignment is to jointly work with the launching and legacy states to review and update the existing Budget Planning Tool and deploy it in the launching State, legacy State, and on-demand state.
• To train the BPT working group on the management of the BPT platform with an interactive training manual.

Scope of Work:

• Facilitate a Feedback session with users of BPT in the launching state and potential users of the BPT from the launching state.
• Purchase the agreed domain name and hosting service for the BPT.
• A flow chart for all Modules for the BPT developed.
• Review the Budget Planning tool to update and add additional features:
  • MTSS, MTBESP implementation Tracking Module.
  • Quarterly and Annual Report producing module.
  • Quarterly and Yearly Budget implementation Tracking Module.
  • Include a dashboard module visualizing budget performance and other strategic document levels of implementation.
  • Include project locations and implementation reports by location
  • Update the BPT chart of the account and include the account code on implementation targets
  • Update the reports module to search by account codes
  • Include a Budget Prioritization Framework.
  • Include a robust budget-tracking module
  • Include Multi-Agency Instances to include (Federal, State and MDAs).

• Provide training for Key Staff in the launching and legacy State of the new and improved BPT portal.
• Update the User Manual for the BPT platform.

Deliverables:
Work in collaboration with the LEARN to Read Planning tech team and the State Ministry of Education to:

• Agreed on domain name and hosting of the BPT application.
• Feedback session with users and potential users of the BPT to inform uptake.
• Profile Account for Adamawa created on the portal.
• A Flowchart for all the BPT modules developed.
• A new and Improved BPT tool with the below modules:
  • Include a MTSS, MTBESP implementation Tracking Module.
  • Include a Quarterly and Annual Report producing module.
  • Include a Quarterly and Yearly Budget implementation Tracking Module.
  • Include a dashboard module visualizing budget performance and other strategic document levels of implementation.
  • Include project locations and implementation reports by location
  • Update the BPT chart of the account and include the account code on implementation targets.
  • Update reports module to search by account codes
  • Include a Budget Prioritization Framework.
  • Include a robust budget-tracking module
  • Include Multi-Agency Instances to include (Federal, State and MDAs).
• A user manual for the BPT platform.
• Planning Officers in legacy & launching trained on Using the new BPT Tool
• The project technical team will consistently co-review the deliverables and work rate of the consultant.

Specific Tasks of the Lead Consultant:

• Facilitate the feedback session with users and the potential users of the BPT. Submit inception report.
• Develop flow charts for the Modules.
• Train relevant stakeholders from Legacy and launching State on the new and improved BPT.
• Develop the BPT manual.
• Provide and supervise day-to-day leadership throughout the BPT review process.
• Provide and submit the BPT platform review report.
• Submit the final reviewed BPT including the source code.
• A report on the process of review.

Skills Required:

• Verifiable working experience with C#, .Net and MySQL.
• Significant PHP, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript skills and working experience.
• Existing knowledge of the BPT.
• Ability to make a clean and good site, based on mock-ups and slicing image files up.
• Familiar with Core Web Vitals, and how to test and report them.
• Forensic attention to detail.
• Previous experience working on similar or related assignments.
• Excellent communication in oral and written English with strong report-writing skills.
• Good past performance references from reputable organizations.

Application Closing Date
27th August, 2024.

Method of Application
Interested and qualified candidates should send their CV to: [email protected] using the job title as the subject of the mail.