Regional Technical Advisor for Health, East Africa Regional Office

Position Title: REGIONAL TECHNICAL ADVISOR (RTA) for Health
Department: East Africa Regional Office (EARO) – Nairobi, Kenya
Band: D
FLSA: Exempt
Reports To: Deputy Regional Director for Program Quality

PRIMARY FUNCTIONS:
The RTA for Health will provide broad leadership around health and social services for the East Africa Region.

The RTA will provide technical assistance for the six countries in the East Africa Region: Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, South Sudan and Sudan, with remote support to Somalia as required. The RTA will create synergies and integration between on-going health, nutrition, water, agriculture, microfinance and Early Childhood Development/Vulnerable Children programs in the region. S/he will support country program in pre-positioning with potential current and new donors.

Current CRS programming is focused on orphans and vulnerable children, social systems strengthening (both public and private including faith-based health systems), early childhood development, maternal and child health, health system strengthening. The region is interested in further expanding into malaria programming.

SCOPE OF RESPONSIBILITIES

The RTA for Health will play a key role in the roll-out of EARO and the agency’s strategy through active engagement in the four strategic objective areas focused around: i) growth and strategy ; ii) provision of outstanding technical assistance; iii) increased learning and sharing and; iv) network and alliance building; v) provision of outstanding management quality and supervision.

Growth and Strategy

1. Participate in project reviews and support proposal development (logframes, detailed implementation plans, budgets, and narratives), acquisition of funding and monitoring and evaluation; including pre-positioning and donor engagement
2. When requested, provide leadership in developing large / strategic proposals by coordinating a design team, facilitating design workshops, writing relevant sections of the proposal, and contributing to the overall technical design
3. Ensure compliance with donor health related strategies; ensure country programs are oriented to and understand the implications of these strategies for their work.
4. Contribute to EARO’s strategy to communicate and market core areas in health.
5. Take an active role in promoting implementation of the agency’s strategy on Health and Social Services.
6. Promote the application of Agency Program Quality standards for health and social services in the programs in the region.
7. Provide guidance and support for gender-sensitive health programming.
8. Actively explore cross-sectoral linkages between health programming and micro-finance, conflict resolution, multiple uses of water, nutrition and agriculture.

Technical assistance, Training and Program Monitoring

1. Provide technical assistance to country programs to ensure program quality.; support country programs to apply quality improvement science to address implementation challenges
2. Participate in project start-up workshops, formative research, quarterly reviews, mid-term assessments, transition planning and evaluation
3. Make regular visits to ongoing projects and help troubleshoot, recommend changes as needed, identify areas of improvement and learning and recommend ideas for innovation and operations research, in line with agency and industry standards
4. Review project reports, and provide constructive feedback on those reports that will be disseminated to the donor or a larger audience
5. Participate actively in the recruitment of country program health and social service staff and serve as a mentor to them; provide capacity building for CRS and partner staff in the health arena.
6. Assist country programs in identifying challenges in the current programming and in developing solutions and recommendations to address them.
7. Assist country programs with their strategic plans for health and social service system strengthening, and assist in development of those plans.
8. Coordinate requests for external consultants and temporary duty assignments of other CRS staff.
9. Plan integrated team technical assistance visits to country programs to ensure integration across sectors.
10. Along with the STA for MEAL assist programs in the development of quantitative and qualitative assessments including baseline surveys, participatory rural assessments;, data analysis and interpretation of analysis of results; and in reviewing reports for publication.
11. Provide or source training as required on health, vulnerable children/social services, and behavior change, including training on CRS strategies.

Learning in Health and Social Services

1. Work closely with Country Program staff in documentation and dissemination of best/promising practices to enhance the EARO learning agenda and raise the profile of health and vulnerable children/social service programming in the region.
2. Disseminate best and practices in health and vulnerable children/social services programming around the region and in the agency
3. Support the EARO Health and Social Services Community of Practice; planning for exchanges and learning events across the region
4. Support the development of innovations in health and vulnerable children/social services programming in EARO; introduce and adapt innovations from elsewhere into EARO health and vulnerable children/social services programming
5. Strengthen monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning of health and vulnerable children/social services programs and projects.
6. Assist with the testing of new health, vulnerable children/social services programs tools developed by the field or headquarters.
7. Work to integrate health programming within the sector and with other sectors and approaches such as nutrition, WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene), agriculture, micro-finance, education, gender and peace-building.
8. Provide vision for health and vulnerable children/social services programming and supervise and mentor other members of the health team so as to achieve the vision.
9. Actively participate in Global Health and Social Services Technical Team remote and in-person meetings; contribute to annual planning processes and global working groups.
10. Support the implementation of and reporting on the agency strategy.
11. Contribute to the learning agenda set forth in the new EARO strategy

Networking and Alliance-Building

1. Network with appropriate organizations to build CRS’ profile in East Africa and to build alliances that further strategic objectives.
2. Develop and maintain strong linkages with international donors. Market CRS’ work and obtain external funding for regional and country program strategies.
3. Assist CPs in identifying, developing, and maintaining relationships with new partners.
4. Work closely with the business development team to develop and implement a communications and marketing strategy for health in collaboration with headquarters.
5. Support reviewing alignment with CRS policies related to our Catholic identity in health and social services programming in collaboration with headquarters.
6. Inform country programs of regional and global activities and opportunities.
7. Facilitate and attend workshop in core areas related to the health program organized by headquarters, consortia and country programs.
8. Share lessons learned and professional development opportunities with country programs.
9. Facilitate communication and learning between country programs and HQ departments in matters pertaining to health, vulnerable children/social services and nutrition.
10. Attend international health conferences, preferably as a presenter of CRS work. Prepare abstracts for conferences and assist country programs in preparing their abstracts.
11. Share lessons learned from CRS evaluations of health, vulnerable children/social services projects

Management Quality and Supervision

1. Ensure annual performance planning and reviews of staff performance in keeping with CRS’ performance management system. Mentor staff to ensure high levels of motivation, commitment, capacity and teamwork.
2. Provide regular informal and formal coaching to direct reports.
3. Assist team members in identifying training/professional development needs for their continued professional growth.
4. Oversee the budgeting, forecasting and monitoring of the activities (training, travel, community of practices) related to Health, Nutrition, and WASH

Agency-wide Competencies (for all CRS Staff)
These are rooted in the mission, values, and principles of CRS and used by each staff member to fulfil his or her responsibilities and to achieve the desired results.
• Serves with Integrity
• Models Stewardship
• Cultivates Constructive Relationships
• Promotes Learning

Supervisory Responsibilities: RTA Nutrition and RTA WASH

KEY WORKING RELATIONSHIPS

1. Collaborate with technical advisors at the regional and global level across the various sectors
2. Collaborate with the Country Representatives, the Heads of Programming, and the country Health Program Managers and other country staff.
3. Collaborate with members of the Global Health and Social Services Technical Team, in particular Technical Advisors based in the Program Impact and Quality Assurance Department.
4. Collaborate with church partners, donors, other NGOs, UN Agencies and local government on health matters.

SELECTION CRITERIA
Applicants must provide a statement of claims addressing the selection criteria below, which should detail suitability to perform the duties of the position including personal qualities, experience, skills and knowledge relative to the selection criteria:
• Sound knowledge of health and development, including an understanding of the main challenges of:
a. Vulnerable children and early childhood development programming (e.g., children infected/affected by HIV, children living outside of family care, disability)
b. Infectious and vaccine preventable diseases programming related to: HIV, TB, Malaria , immunization and water-related diseases.
c. Health and Social Service systems improvement in low-resource settings and the broad range of health development partners involved in this work.

QUALIFICATIONS
• Advanced degree(s) in public health, nutrition or health-related field; dual degree with social work a plus
• Minimum of 8 years of experience in international health development either as a technical advisor or health program manager, preferably in Africa.
• Experience in program design/management, program quality and performance assessment as part of ongoing efforts to improve aid effectiveness.
• Experience using quality improvement science preferred.
• Technical competency in: maternal newborn and child health; infectious diseases (HIV/AIDS, TB, malaria), vulnerable children, and health systems strengthening
• Experience in community participation in development projects. Experience with adult learning methods and tools.
• Interest and capacity to learn about new areas.
• Good Monitoring Evaluation Accountability and Learning (MEAL) skills.
• Strong analytical skills, sound judgment and the capacity to think and plan strategically, including the ability to produce high quality materials and advice for development implementation.
• High level English oral and written communication skills, including representation and liaison skills.
• Excellent communication, interpersonal, networking and negotiation skills, including in a cross-cultural context as a team player.
• Experience collaborating with local faith-based and civil society partners preferred.
• Excellent coordination skills.
• Knowledge of spreadsheets and budgeting.
• Willingness to travel up to 50% of the time.

Disclaimer Clause: This job description is not an exhaustive list of the skills, effort, duties, and responsibilities associated with the position.

CRS’ talent acquisition procedures reflect our commitment to protecting children and vulnerable adults from abuse and exploitation.

Equal Opportunity Employer

HOW TO APPLY:

Apply online: https://www5.apply2jobs.com/CRS/ProfExt/index.cfm?fuseaction=mExternal.s...