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We are looking for a Senior Qualitative Researcher (Gender Inclusion) to join our Impact team - Gender Inclusion Team as we scale up and drive digital and financial inclusion across our markets.

We are seeking a passionate and experienced qualitative researcher to lead M-KOPA's gender-sensitive research efforts and help us close the gender gap among our customers and sales agents. In this role, you will design and conduct impactful user research that helps us better understand and serve our female customers and agents, owning the full research cycle from shaping questions to turning insights into action.

About Us

At M-KOPA, bridging the gender gap and increasing financial and digital inclusion for women is a key impact objective and core to our business strategy. With 40% female customers and 45% female sales agents, we believe in both the commercial and impact case, recognizing that women contribute more of their earned income to households with higher investments in children's nutrition, education, and healthcare.

You will lead end-to-end gender-sensitive research, developing hypotheses, choosing appropriate methods, conducting interviews, and generating actionable insights that drive real change. You will own and evolve our gender research framework, ensuring M-KOPA generates meaningful insights about women's experiences as customers and agents. Working cross-functionally, you will embed a gender lens in design and decision-making, running workshops and sharing research insights to inspire product, sales, and marketing teams.

This role offers the opportunity to drive insight-led innovation, tackling diverse research questions from building inclusive sales channels to designing gender-equitable products and services. You will also test hypotheses in the field through small-scale pilots and contribute to thought leadership by producing compelling case studies for M-KOPA's impact reporting.

Expertise

We are looking for a mission-driven, user-obsessed researcher who thrives at the intersection of gender inclusion, commercial impact, and customer insight. You should be deeply passionate about gender inclusion and the commercial and social impact it can unlock through user-centered design.

Core requirements include:

• 6+ years of hands-on experience in qualitative user research and design thinking, ideally in fast-paced or entrepreneurial environments
• Fluency in both English and Swahili, with ability to connect with users in language and context
• Exceptional empathy, communication, and facilitation skills - creating safe spaces for users to share their experiences
• Experience conducting research in a business or private sector context with an eye for customer insight and commercial value
• Bachelor's or master's degree from a leading university
• Ability to thrive in agile, fast-moving environments and comfortable balancing structure with iteration
• Highly self-driven with full ownership mentality and "get-it-done" attitude
• Experience with fintech and digital/financial inclusion for underserved communities
• (Bonus) Experience applying gender equality by design or designing specifically for women

You will be operating as an individual contributor who doesn't wait for instructions but leads with initiative, understanding the realities and lived experiences of our customers and sales agents while being eager to amplify their voices.

Why M-KOPA?

At M-KOPA, we empower our people to own their careers through diverse development programs, coaching partnerships, and on-the-job training. We support individual journeys with family-friendly policies, prioritize well-being, and embrace flexibility.

Join us in shaping the future of M-KOPA as we grow together. Explore more at m-kopa.com.

Recognized thrice by the Financial Times as one Africa's fastest growing companies (2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025) and by TIME100 Most influential companies in the world 2023 and 2024 , we've served over 5 million customers, unlocking $1.5 billion in cumulative credit for the unbanked across Africa.

Important Notice

M-KOPA is an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer committed to assembling a diverse, broadly trained staff. Women, minorities, and people with disabilities are strongly encouraged to apply.

M-KOPA explicitly prohibits the use of Forced or Child Labour and respects the rights of its employees to agree to terms and conditions of employment voluntarily, without coercion, and freely terminate their employment on appropriate notice. M-KOPA shall ensure that its Employees are of legal working age and shall comply with local laws for youth employment or student work, such as internships or apprenticeships. 

M-KOPA does not collect/charge any money as a pre-employment or post-employment requirement. This means that we never ask for ‘recruitment fees’, ‘processing fees’, ‘interview fees’, or any other kind of money in exchange for offer letters or interviews at any time during the hiring process.