Policy Advocacy Specialist

Tanoto Foundation Indonesia has grown in term of activities, grant size and the number of staff in the last few years. Alongside with that growth, Tanoto Foundation had evolve to focus and balancing out between program implementation and advocacy. The number of our beneficiaries also growing in all over Indonesia. As Such, a Specialist position with Policy and Advocacy expertise is needed in order to supports the development and execution of evidence-informed policy advocacy strategies to advance the organization's priorities in education and broader human capital development.

Key Responsibilities

1. Policy Analysis and Evidence Translation

1. Analyse national and subnational policies, regulations, development plans, government priorities, and emerging policy issues relevant to the organisation's strategic agenda.
2. Conduct policy and regulatory mapping, stakeholder analysis, political economy analysis, and other analytical work required to inform advocacy strategies.
3. Synthesize research, programme evidence, data, and field learning into clear and actionable policy implications and recommendations.
4. Identify policy gaps, windows of opportunity, and potential pathways for influencing policy formulation and implementation.
5. Maintain up-to-date intelligence on relevant government policies, institutional developments, and policy processes.

2. Advocacy Strategy and Policy Engagement

1. Support the development and implementation if national and subnational advocacy strategies, including clear objectives, target stakeholders, influencing pathways, milestones, and indicators of success.
2. Translate strategic priorities into practical advocacy plans and engagements.
3. Prepare substantive inputs for government consultation, policy dialogue, roundtables, hearings, working groups, and other policy engagement platforms.
4. Support efforts to embed evidence and programme recommendations into government policies, plans, regulations, programmes, and implementation mechanisms.
5. Track policy commitments and ensure systematic follow-up toward concrete policy uptake.

3. Government and Stakeholder Engagement

1. Build and maintain constructive working relationships with relevant government ministries/ agencies, local governments, development partners, academia, civil society organizations, think tanks, and other strategic actors.
2. Support stakeholder mapping and engagement strategies based on influence, interest, institutional mandate, and opportunities for collaboration.
3. Represent the Policy Advocacy team in selected meetings, consultations, and external forums.
4. Develop briefing materials, talking points, meeting notes, stakeholder profiles, and follow-up actions for senior-level engagements.
5. Coordinate multi-stakeholder discussions and facilitate policy dialogue where required.

4. Policy Products and Strategic Communication

1. Develop high-quality policy products, including: (a) policy briefs; (b) policy notes ; c. regulatory and policy analysis; (d) stakeholder and political economy mappings; (e) advocacy briefs; (f) talking points and executive briefings; (g) presentation and decision-making materials.
2. Ensure policy products and concise, evidence-based, audience-specific, and oriented toward decision-making, rather than descriptive reporting.
3. Collaborate with programme, MLE, communication, and regional teams to translate technical findings into compelling policy narratives.

5. Project and Workstream Management

1. Independently manage assigned policy advocacy workstreams from planning through delivery.
2. Develop and maintain clear workplans, timelines, milestones, dependencies, stakeholders responsibilities, and follow-up mechanisms.
3. Anticipate implementation bottlenecks and proactively escalate risks with proposed solutions.
4. Ensure meetings and advocacy engagements are followed by clear decisions, owners, deadlines, and documented next steps.
5. Coordinate internal and external contributors to ensure deliverables are completed on time and to the expected quality standard.
6. Manage multiple priorities simultaneously while maintaining attention to detail and strategic relevance.

6. National-Subnational Policy Coordination

1. Work closely with regional and programme teams to strengthen alignment between national policy priorities and subnational advocacy priorities.
2. Provide technical support to regional teams on policy analysis, stakeholder engagement, government planning processes, and advocacy strategy.
3. Identify promising regional policy practices and evidence that can inform national policy conversations and vice versa.
4. Support capacity strengthening for internal teams and partners on policy advocacy approaches and tools.

7. Monitoring, Learning, and Reporting

1. Establish and monitor advocacy milestones and indicators beyond activity completion, including policy influence stakeholder commitment, institutional change, and policy uptake.
2. Maintain systematic documentation of advocacy progress, decisions, commitments, and lessons learned.
3. Contribute to periodic management updates and reports with concise analysis of progress, challenges, implications, and recommended next steps.
4. Use learning from advocacy implementation to continuously strengthen strategy and execution.

Qualifications and Requirements

Education

• Minimum Bachelor's degree in Public Policy, Political Science, Public Administration, International Relations, Development Studies, Economics, Education, Law, Social Sciences, or another relevant discipline.
• Master's degree is preferred, particularly in public policy, governance, development, or a related field.

Professional Experience

• Minimum 5 years of relevant professional experience in policy advocacy, public policy, government relations, development programmes, think tanks, research organisations, philanthropy, civil society, or related fields.
• Demonstrated experience engaging with government institutions and public policy processes in Indonesia.
• Experience working across both national and subnational government environments is strongly preferred.
• Demonstrated experience translating research, evidence, or programme learning into policy recommendations and advocacy actions.
• Proven experience independently managing projects or complex workstreams involving multiple stakeholders and deadlines.