Regional Communications Officer (Southern Africa)

LOCATION: Southern Africa countries, preferably South Africa, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

REPORTS TO: Regional Communications Manager (Africa & MENA)

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS: Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis and accepted until March 31st, 2025. Interested candidates should submit a resume, cover letter, and three professional references.

ABOUT EQUALITY NOW:

At Equality Now, we aspire to create a world in which women and men have equal rights under the law, and full enjoyment of their human rights. Our mission is gender equality. And how we get there matters. 

Founded in 1992, we are an international human rights organization that works to protect and promote the rights of all women and girls around the world. Our campaigns are centered on four program areas: Legal Equality, End Sexual Violence, End Harmful Practices, and End Sexual Exploitation, with a cross-cutting focus on the unique needs of adolescent girls. 

We are truly global and we have a team of 80+ people located all around the world. We have team members in Benin, Beirut, Delhi, London, Geneva, San Jose, El Salvador, Argentina, Nairobi, Tbilisi, New York and Washington DC among others. We offer a great experience for talented people who are passionate about equality. To work here, you’ll need to share our core values which are: integrity, tenaciousness, perseverance and inclusivity. 

For more information, visit equalitynow.org.

POSITION OVERVIEW:

Equality Now is excited to offer a unique opportunity for a dynamic and motivated individual to join our Communications Team as the Regional Communications Officer, based in Southern Africa. This role is ideal for a communications professional with a well-rounded skill set in advocacy, marketing, and a particular strength in digital communications. The successful candidate will possess exceptional written and verbal English skills, coupled with the ability to thrive in a fast-paced, high-impact environment. As this is a newly created position in the region, we are seeking a proactive self-starter with strong initiative, adaptability, and problem-solving abilities to navigate challenges and seize opportunities.

At Equality Now, we are a busy, determined, and results-driven organization that values excellence in all we do. This role is perfect for someone with 5+ years of experience, adept at managing multiple projects, fostering strong internal and external relationships, and eager to drive meaningful change through strategic communications in the social justice sector. The role requires flexibility, the ability to collaborate effectively with a global communications team, responsiveness to emerging priorities, and a willingness to travel as needed.

MAJOR DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

• Reporting to the Regional Communications Manager for Africa & MENA, the Regional Communications Officer will be a crucial part of Equality Now’s Africa Communications team and be part of the wider global communications team. Your role will be to be the communications representative in a campaign team, led by members of the Africa Program. 
• Your role will be to develop plans that engage target audiences linked to their campaign portfolio as part of Equality Now’s advocacy for legal equality for women and girls. This includes making the organization’s work discoverable to a network of stakeholders and positioning Equality Now as a trusted expert in international and regional human rights. The ultimate aim is to ensure that Equality Now’s recommendations for legal reform are actioned by civil society, human rights bodies, and governments.

Strategy:

• Collaborate with the program and communications team to create and implement an audience-based work plan (with KPIs) that aligns communications activities linked to campaign initiatives including: The SADC Campaign on Ending Child Marriage, and the Campaign on the Nationality Rights Protocol in Southern Africa.
• Ensure all communications activities are aligned with the global communications framework and brand proposition and contribute to the regional communications strategy.
• Work with the Regional Communications Manager to respond to grant proposal requests to advise and budget for communications that meet the needs of the programmatic aims in the grant proposals. 
• Identify and establish key individuals across the campaign and geography and to create a community to engage with. 
• Lead in the development and dissemination of audience-based key messaging and calls to action into communications output and oversee appropriate sign-off.

Activity planning and implementation: 

Develop an activity planner, based on agreed activities detailed in campaign and grant plans, creating communication moments across the year including: 

• Organizing Events/Activations: Organizing various thematic events, workshops, openings, presentations, webinars, conferences, hackathons, flash mobs, influencer engagements; videos, digital moments etc.
• Support the production and launch of knowledge products: Participate in the production and dissemination of knowledge products in conjunction with the Program team; including gathering engaging case studies for communications output; conduct interviews, including with those who are extremely vulnerable, employing the utmost professionalism and sensitivity; with informed consent. 
• Identify and produce well-written, factually accurate, and risk-sensitive copy for use in multi-channel communications outputs. 
• Lead in media and digital amplification during these events.
• Develop and execute effective post-event/moment engagement strategies with key stakeholders including highlight emails, newsletters, social media toolkits, and interactive photo galleries as required.

Engaging the media for thought leadership and accountability:

Maximize proactive and reactive media opportunities, and secure positive media coverage and provide expert comment for EN working with the Africa comms team and global media team by:

• Establishing and maintaining a network of media contacts, including journalists and news editors reporting in southern Africa and international journalists writing about the region.
• Hosting media cafes as a journalist outreach and education tool. 
• Running media trainings on how to write about key issues with journalists including creation of journalist toolkits.
• Hosting story gathering workshops with journalists as a route to increase uptake on stories/issues linked to your campaign portfolio.
• Writing op-eds and press releases, and lead in pitching and placing them in the media- national, regional and international platforms based on activities as detailed above.
• Responding in a timely and effective way to inbound international and regional media or event requests relating to your portfolio of campaigns.
• Monitoring the media to identify reactive media moments to respond to by pitching EN as an expert commentator or via OpEds as a route to amplify EN’s work and establish us a go-to trusted source.

Digital:

• Contribute to team efforts on online movement building for the region by curating participatory social media initiatives in line with programmatic objectives. 
• Use Digital as an advocacy and credibility building tool by creating content for EN Africa’s social channels, including written, visual and audio
• Work with the regional team to create an active, audience and results-driven editorial calendar. 
• As part of the global communications team, ensure your work is reflected in the global editorial calendar and on the EN website.

Working with CSOs:

• Amplify the work of national and international partners via Equality Now global, and regional channels.
• Establish opportunities for the co-creation of social media toolkits, social media planners, and design digital collateral for use by partner organizations and key stakeholders.

• Work together with the programs team in the population of reports in line with donor priorities.
• Assist in development of the Terms of References (ToRs) and invoicing for outsourced services you have commissioned as well as maintain regular communication with the relevant service provider companies, experts and other stakeholders.
• Regularly update the EN photo gallery with corresponding materials in cooperation with regional communications officers and relevant program leads.
• Report on impact, performance and milestones in relation to the communications objectives identified.
• Contribute updates on your work to the internal communications team to share in global staff updates. 

Key Stakeholders:

• They will work closely with the Regional Representative (Southern Africa), the Regional Communications Manager for Africa and MENA, and other communication team members in other regional hubs to create impactful and compelling communications and advocacy communications interventions.

POSITION REQUIREMENTS

Professional Experience and Knowledge:

• Deep understanding of regional dynamics in Eastern, Southern, and broader Africa, ensuring culturally sensitive communication.
• Extensive experience in developing and implementing audience-driven communication strategies aligned with advocacy campaigns.
• Experience leveraging digital platforms for movement-building, advocacy, and credibility-building.
• Ability to curate engaging written, visual, and audio content that aligns with programmatic objectives.
• Strong network of media contacts across Southern Africa and internationally, with experience in media outreach, journalist engagement, and story pitching.
• Skilled in writing op-eds, press releases, and media toolkits to secure national, regional, and international coverage.
• Create engaging content and campaigns focused on the use of storytelling and championship to make advocacy relatable.
•  Expertise in organizing high-impact events such as webinars, conferences, journalist workshops, influencer engagements, and digital activations.
•  Experience facilitating media trainings, journalist story-gathering workshops, and hosting media cafés to strengthen reporting on gender equality issues.
• Strong background in stakeholder engagement, fostering collaboration with civil society organizations (CSOs), human rights bodies, and government actors.
•  Ability to develop compelling, factually accurate, and risk-sensitive content for multi-channel communications, ensuring legal and advocacy issues are accessible to diverse audiences.
•  Skilled in tracking communication impact, performance metrics, and milestones to inform strategy adjustments.

Personal Skills and Abilities:

• Excellent interpersonal and relationship management skills.
• A good all-rounder in ideating and delivering communication tactics: events, PR; digital; media; press etc.
• High-quality writing skills - that extend to digital channels, particularly social.
• Comfortable in training others or learning how to train others
• IT literate, with experience using Microsoft Office applications.
• Ability to undertake research tasks independently.
• Should be creative and innovative.
• Should be enterprising and solution driven.
• An understanding of and commitment to Equality Now’s work and objectives.
• Positive attitude, dependable and a good sense of humor

Education and Certifications:

• A least 5 years of working experience in advocacy communications in regional or international organizations.
• A bachelor’s degree in communications/demonstrable experience of advocacy communications campaign strategy and project management.

COMPETENCIES REQUIRED

Organizational Agility, Innovativeness, Creativity, Problem-Solving, Teamwork 

COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS

Salary: Circa $32,000 - $36,000 (Level 2 position) dependent on location. 

At Equality Now, we offer a competitive salary aligned with global pay parity principles. Compensation is determined based on the candidate’s experience, professional background, location, and the UN Cost of Living index, which adjusts salaries to maintain an equitable standard of living across regions. The range below reflects the salary for this position in Zimbabwe/South Africa, though final compensation may vary based on cost-of-living adjustments and exchange rate fluctuations at the time of hire.

The final offer will be determined based on a variety of factors, including but not limited to relevant experience, skill set, and qualifications/certifications.

HOW TO APPLY

Please visit: https://equalitynow.applytojob.com/ and submit a resume/CV, cover letter. Where possible include links to past work that can be viewed.

Deadline for applications is 31st March 2025.

Due to the volume of applicants anticipated for this role, only shortlisted candidates will be contacted for an interview.

Equality Now is strong because it is diverse. We actively seek a diverse applicant pool and encourage candidates of all backgrounds to apply. Equality Now offers a competitive compensation package, including base salary, savings, health and vacation benefits, and is an Equal Opportunity employer. Equality Now employees are selected on the basis of ability without regard to race, colour, religious beliefs, sex, gender identity and expression, language, political or other opinion, nationality, ethnic or social origin, disability, pregnancy, mental status, HIV status, age, marital status, or sexual orientation.

We welcome all kinds of diversity. Candidates are selected on the basis of ability, in accordance with all country and location specific laws.

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