About the Role

EarthEnable is at a pivotal stage of growth, operating across three East African countries with expanding field teams, financial systems, and community-facing operations. As we scale, we need to build the governance and risk infrastructure to match our ambition — and we need someone to build it.

The Senior Manager, Audit & Risk will own two deeply connected functions: internal audit and enterprise risk management. This person will establish and run EarthEnable’s audit program (both process and financial audit) across Rwanda, Uganda, and Kenya, while also building and managing our risk management framework across four live risk pillars: operational and financial risk, people and safety risk, fraud exposure, and data protection obligations as a data processor and controller in all three countries.

This is a function-building role. EarthEnable does not currently have these systems in place at the level the organization needs. The right candidate is someone who has built these functions before and can design the architecture, execute the first cycles, and progressively embed risk-aware thinking across the organization. This is not a compliance checkbox role; it is a strategic accountability function that reports directly to the COO and maintains a dotted-line relationship to the Board Audit Committee.

Specific responsibilities of the role will include:

1. Internal Audit: Process & Financial

• Design and execute a risk-based internal audit plan covering operational processes and financial controls across all three countries.
• Conduct regular process audits to assess whether field and operational workflows are functioning as designed.
• Conduct financial audits to verify accuracy, integrity, and compliance of financial records and transactions.
• Identify control gaps and work with country and functional leadership to implement practical, sustainable improvements.
• Produce clear, executive-level audit reports with findings, root causes, and time-bound remediation plans.
• Track and verify closure of audit findings; escalate unresolved issues to the COO or Board Audit Committee as appropriate.
• Coordinate and support external audits and donor-required reviews.

2. Enterprise Risk Management

• Design and implement EarthEnable’s enterprise risk management (ERM) framework, structured around four priority pillars (detailed below).
• Establish and maintain a dynamic risk register — a living document that is reviewed and updated at defined intervals, not a static spreadsheet.
• Advise the COO and country leadership on risk exposure with clear, actionable recommendations.
• Integrate risk thinking into operational planning, new country or product expansion, and strategic initiatives.

3. People & Safety Risk

• Own EarthEnable’s people risk pillar, with particular urgency around field worker safety including motorcycle and road accident risk for staff who travel as a core part of their work.
• Establish and audit safety protocols for field operations across all three countries.
• Develop and maintain an incident reporting and response framework; analyze trends to drive preventive action.
• Partner with HR and Country Managing Directors to ensure safety policies are understood, applied, and audited in practice not just on paper.

4. Fraud Risk

• Build and implement EarthEnable’s fraud risk framework, covering prevention, detection, investigation, and response.
• Conduct targeted fraud risk assessments in high-exposure areas procurement, cash handling, field payments, and inventory and stock management.
• Establish confidential reporting mechanisms and ensure staff are aware of and trust them.
• Lead or support investigations where fraud is suspected; document findings with appropriate rigor.

5. Data Protection & Regulatory Compliance

• Own EarthEnable’s obligations as a data processor and data controller under applicable data protection law in Rwanda, Uganda, and Kenya.
• Conduct a baseline compliance gap assessment and develop a roadmap to close identified gaps.
• Establish data governance policies, covering data collection, storage, access, retention, and breach response appropriate for a field-based, multi-country organization.
• Liaise with legal counsel and/or data protection specialists where technical compliance questions require specialist input.
• Ensure staff who handle personal data understand their obligations and that systems are fit for purpose.

6. Governance, Reporting & Cross-Functional Leadership

• Establish dashboards and regular reporting mechanisms that give the COO, executive team, and Board clear and timely visibility into organizational risk.
• Promote a culture of accountability and ethical practice across all functions and countries.
• Partner with Finance, Operations, HR, Quality Assurance, and Systems teams to embed strong controls into day-to-day processes.
• Support Country Managing Directors in understanding and managing risk within their countries as a resource and advisor, not an enforcer.

Beyond the milestones: senior leadership has confidence in the risk and control environment. When problems emerge, and they will, they are surfaced early, investigated properly, and fixed durably. EarthEnable’s people are safer. Our exposure to fraud is lower and better managed. Our data obligations are met. And the audit function is trusted rather than feared.

Qualifications of our candidate

• Bachelor’s degree in Finance, Accounting, Risk Management, Business Administration, or a related field. Master’s degree preferred.
• Professional certification strongly preferred: CPA, ACCA, CIA, CISA, CRMA, or equivalent.
• 7–10+ years of progressive experience across audit, risk management, compliance, or internal controls, ideally spanning more than one of these disciplines.
• Demonstrable experience building or significantly rebuilding an audit or risk function, not just maintaining an existing one.
• Familiarity with data protection regulations in at least one East African jurisdiction (Rwanda, Uganda, or Kenya). Familiarity with all three is a strong advantage.
• Experience operating in multi-country, field-based, or high-growth environments. Social enterprise or development sector experience is an advantage.
• Demonstrated ability to work with and influence senior leaders including the ability to deliver difficult findings with clarity and without flinching.

Key competencies:

• Builds systems, not just reports, able to design frameworks that outlast their creator
• High integrity and professional independence, willing to escalate when necessary
• Practical and field-aware person, understands that controls must work in rural, distributed contexts
• Strong analytical and investigative thinking
• Clear written and verbal communication, including executive-level reporting
• Collaborative — works with functions rather than over them
• Sound judgment under ambiguity and in high-stakes situations