Business Development and Partnerships Associate

Job Summary The Business Development and Partnerships Associate will support ZSE Group in identifying and pursuing business opportunities, grants, programme contracts, and strategic partnerships across its brands. The role involves researching funding and partnership opportunities, supporting proposal development, coordinating inputs from internal teams, maintaining business development records, and assisting with relationships with funders, corporates, development organisations, and ecosystem partners. The successful candidate should be a strong communicator, organised, commercially aware, detail-oriented, and comfortable working to deadlines. Relevant internship, NYSC, volunteer, freelance, academic, or project experience is welcome. Key Responsibilities * Research and identify relevant RFPs, EOIs, grants, tenders, fellowships, partnership opportunities, and other business development opportunities across approved platforms and networks. * Review opportunities against basic criteria such as eligibility, strategic fit, requirements, potential value, organisational capacity, and submission deadlines. * Maintain an up-to-date opportunity tracker and share relevant opportunities with the appropriate team lead or CEO for review and decision-making. * Research potential funders, corporates, development organizations, government agencies, DFIs, foundations, and ecosystem partners relevant to ZSE Group and its brands. * Support the preparation of proposals, concept notes, expressions of interest, capability statements, and partnership documents. * Draft and edit sections of proposals and other business development documents using approved organizational information and templates. * Coordinate inputs from internal teams, including programme descriptions, methodologies, workplans, team profiles, budgets, monitoring and evaluation information, and supporting documents. * Maintain proposal timelines and follow up with team members to ensure required inputs are submitted before deadlines. * Review proposal documents against submission requirements, including eligibility criteria, required attachments, formatting, page limits, and other compliance requirements. * Support the submission of proposals and applications through relevant portals or approved channels and maintain records of submitted applications. * Assist with tracking proposal outcomes, requesting feedback where appropriate, and documenting lessons that can improve future submissions. * Support outreach and relationship-building activities with potential funders, corporate partners, ecosystem organisations, and other strategic stakeholders. * Prepare meeting briefs, presentations, concept notes, follow-up emails, and other materials required for partnership discussions. * Maintain accurate records of partner conversations, meetings, opportunities, next steps, and follow-up actions in the approved CRM or tracking system. * Support the development of partnership proposals, MoUs, concept notes, and other collaboration documents under appropriate supervision. * Support the handover of successful opportunities to delivery teams by organising relevant contracts, proposals, budgets, client information, and other project documents. * Maintain an organised business development and bid library containing approved company profiles, team CVs, past performance information, methodologies, policies, templates, and other reusable materials. * Keep the business development pipeline current, including opportunity value, stage, owner, deadline, next action, and outcome. * Prepare weekly pipeline updates and contribute to monthly business development reports. * Work closely with Programmes and Community, Client Engagement and Venture Building, and other teams to gather information and identify opportunities across ZSE Group's brands. * Monitor trends in funding, entrepreneurship, skills development, financial inclusion, women's empowerment, and other sectors relevant to ZSE Group. * Communicate proactively about deadlines, risks, missing information, and opportunities requiring escalation. * Maintain confidentiality when handling proposals, budgets, partner information, organizational documents, and other sensitive business information.