About The/Nudge
The/Nudge is an action institute building resilient livelihoods to alleviate poverty. We work with women, farmers, tribals and youth on rural development, agriculture, skilling and economic inclusion, along with 15+ central and state government partners. Our economic inclusion journey for 25 million Indians, has reached 10 states with $250M of government funding to cover 1.25M people. Our incubator, accelerator and grand challenges have supported 200+ social entrepreneurs including 17 Forbes 30U30, 3 EarthShot Prize winners, 1 Time Magazine cover and more.
Set up with support from 90+ eminent philanthropists , 40+ corporates and 15+ foundations including Gates, Mackenzie Scott, Vinod Khosla, Nandan Nilekani, Tata Trusts, Skoll, Meta, LinkedIn, HDFC, Mphasis, KPMG and L'Oreal, we are contributing towards a "poverty-free India, within our lifetime". What are we solving for?
We are solving for households in poverty who are also financially and socially vulnerable through a targeted, multi-faceted, and sequenced model called the graduation approach, which has demonstrated that we can durably pull households out of poverty.
At The/Nudge Institute, we are in the process of catalyzing the propagation of the same. Our purpose is to contribute to ending poverty in India.:
- Continue to implement on its own to iterate the design for impact at scale
- Enable more NGOs to adopt technical and capacity-building support
- Enable govt to adopt by providing research, design, and implementation support
- Continue to generate data on poverty and evidence on graduation approach to nudge governments to adopt at-scale
- Build technology solutions for NGOs and governments to adopt and implement at scale & with quality.
- The Non-Farm & Enterprise Livelihoods Specialist will lead the design, strengthening, and scaling of non-farm and enterprise-based livelihood opportunities for vulnerable rural women across Jharkhand.
- The role will focus on identifying viable micro-enterprises, craft-based livelihoods, and service enterprises, and strengthening value chains, supply systems, and market access to enable sustainable income diversification beyond agriculture.
- The Specialist will be responsible for developing practical, market-linked enterprise models and building the capacity of field teams and community institutions to effectively support women entrepreneurs at scale.
- This role requires strong experience in rural enterprise development, value chain strengthening, market systems, and capacity building, along with the ability to translate technical concepts into simple, scalable solutions suited for large livelihood programs.
What will you do?
1. Enterprise Opportunity Identification & Model Development
- Lead market and value chain assessments to identify viable non-farm livelihood opportunities for rural women.
- Design and refine scalable micro-enterprise models that are demand-driven, low-risk, and financially viable.
- Develop enterprise implementation guidelines, including investment planning, costing, pricing, input sourcing, and expected returns.
- Continuously adapt enterprise models based on field learning, market dynamics, and performance outcomes.
- Enterprise categories may include, but are not limited to:
- Small retail and trade-based enterprises
- Local service enterprises
- Food processing and value-added products
- Craft-based livelihoods (bamboo, leaf products, weaving, tribal crafts, etc.)
- Small manufacturing or home-based production
- Agri-linked enterprises such as input supply, aggregation, or primary processing
2. Value Chain & Market Systems Strengthening
- Identify opportunities to strengthen forward and backward market linkages for enterprise activities.
- Facilitate access to reliable suppliers, raw materials, equipment, and local service providers.
- Support development of market channels, buyer linkages, and aggregation systems where relevant.
- Promote collective enterprise approaches through community institutions (VOs/CLFs) to improve
3. Capacity Building & Field Systems Strengthening
- Design and deliver practical training modules for field teams on enterprise promotion and support.
- Build capacities of field teams in enterprise selection, basic business planning, costing, working capital management, and local market engagement.
- Develop simple tools, training materials, and operational frameworks to support enterprise rollout.
- Provide ongoing mentoring and technical guidance to district and block teams.
4. Enterprise Ecosystem Strengthening
- Explore opportunities to strengthen the enterprise support ecosystem, including linkages with relevant government schemes, market actors, and service providers.
- Provide technical inputs to improve access to working capital and enterprise support services, in alignment with program design.
- Support community institutions in strengthening enterprise-related functions such as procurement, aggregation, and market engagement, where relevant.
5. Monitoring, Learning & Scale-up
- Track enterprise performance indicators such as investment, revenue, profitability, and sustainability.
- Identify systemic challenges and recommend programmatic improvements.
- Document successful livelihood models for institutional scale-up within JSLPS systems.
- Contribute to evidence generation and learning for non-farm livelihood promotion strategies.
Who are we looking for in this role?
- Master’s degree in Rural Development, Business Management, Economics, Agricultural Economics, or a related discipline.
- Minimum 8+ years of relevant experience in rural enterprise promotion, value chain development, or non-farm livelihood programs.
- Demonstrated experience in designing and scaling small enterprise models in rural contexts
- Strong understanding of rural markets, supply systems, and value chain dynamics.
- Experience in training and mentoring field teams or community institutions.
- Prior experience working with SRLMs, government livelihood programs, or large-scale rural development initiatives preferred.
- Willingness to travel extensively across districts in Jharkhand.
- Proficiency in Hindi is mandatory; familiarity with local dialects will be an advantage.
What’s in it for you?
Own your growth: An impact-led learning environment encourages Nudgesters to invest in their learning and capacity building needs through initiatives and policies, including L&D wallet, individual development plan and internal role change opportunities.
Find your tribe: Our hiring philosophy emphasises intent, attitude, smarts and skills, in that order, to build a cohesive environment for Nudgesters. The organisation is committed to curating people-centric policies, enhancing how employees experience life at The/Nudge.
Take big bets: Organisational initiatives are intended to facilitate Nudgesters with a view to the big picture, illustrated by our impact across 50000+ households, 15+ governments, 200+ social enterprises and Charcha: India’s largest social sector convening forum.
Make it happen: A product-based approach in an action-biased environment empowers Nudgesters to implement audacious plans. Driven to fail fast, we endeavour to optimise resources in favour of programs that align with our scale ambition.
You can learn more about what we do and how we do it through this deck. We aspire to be an inclusive and diverse organisation and encourage qualified individuals, irrespective of their religion, caste, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, ethnicity, age, or any other dimension of identity, to apply. Please visit The/Nudge Institute career page to apply online. Knowing English & local language (Assamese) is a must. Female candidates are encouraged to apply.
