Consultancy – Arab Region and Afghanistan Advocacy, Profiling, External Communications and Storytelling

Purpose and Objectives:

The overall purpose of the consultancy is to strengthen ActionAid’s advocacy, external profile and storytelling in the Arab Region and Afghanistan, amplifying the voices of women, young people and crisis-affected communities to regional and international audiences. Specific objectives are to:

• Develop and support the roll-out of an advocacy, profiling and external communications

strategy covering both contexts, aligned with ActionAid’s global strategy and country/regional priorities as well as country strategic priorities;

• Advice and support raising ActionAid’s visibility and credibility with media, policymakers,

donors, UN agencies, civil society networks and the public;

• Produce compelling, ethical, feminist, human-centered stories and communications products

that profile ActionAid’s humanitarian and women’s rights work;

• Identify and capitalise on key advocacy moments and media opportunities (e.g. international

days, high-level events, humanitarian appeals);

• Facilitate strengthening the capacity of ActionAid staff and partners in storytelling, media

engagement and ethical content gathering

Scope of Work and Key Tasks

Working closely with ActionAid Arab Region, ActionAid Afghanistan and relevant Global Secretariat

teams, the consultant will:

• Conduct a rapid review of existing advocacy and communications materials, channels and

capacities in both contexts;

• Map key stakeholders, media outlets, journalists, creative allies, policy processes and advocacy

opportunities relevant to ActionAid’s priorities;

• Develop key messages, narratives and a positioning framework tailored to distinct audiences

(media, donors, policymakers, public), including risk-sensitive messaging for the Afghanistan context;

• Gather, write and edit human-centered stories, case studies, op-eds, blogs, press releases,

briefing notes and social media content, working through country teams and local facilitators where direct access is not possible;

• Support media engagement, including building media relationships, drafting press materials,

pitching stories and preparing spokespersons;

• Plan and support ActionAid’s engagement in key advocacy moments both nationally, regionally

and globally during the consultancy period;

• Design and deliver practical capacity-building sessions for staff and partners on storytelling,

ethical content gathering, media engagement and digital communications;

• Ensure all content gathering and publication complies with ActionAid’s feminist principles,

informed-consent protocols, safeguarding policies and do-no-harm standards – including protecting the identity and security of contributors, which is critical in the Afghanistan context;

• Coordinate regularly with country, regional and Global Secretariat communications and

advocacy focal points to ensure coherence with federation-wide messaging. How to apply Interested candidates can request the full ToR form Chris Homann (he/him) at [contact details removed] with the subject line “Consultancy – Advocacy and Communications, Arab Region and Afghanistan” Proposal must be submitted as per the ToR to [contact details removed] by 25 August 2026 at 08:00 / 8AM GMT time zone, with the subject line “Consultancy – Advocacy and Communications, Arab Region and Afghanistan”.