Overview
The Clinton Health Access Initiative, Inc. (CHAI) is a global health organization committed to saving lives and reducing the burden of disease in low-and middle-income countries, while strengthening the capabilities of governments and the private sector in those countries to create and sustain high-quality health systems that can succeed without our assistance. For more information, please visit: http://www.clintonhealthaccess.org
CHAI’s global malaria program provides direct technical and operational support to countries around the globe to strengthen their malaria programs and reduce the burden of this preventable, treatable disease. We support governments to scale up effective interventions for prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and surveillance, with the goals of sustainably reducing the number of malaria-related illnesses and deaths worldwide in the short-term and accelerating progress towards malaria elimination in the long term.
Overview of Role
Vector control interventions (including bed nets and indoor residual spraying) reduce human contact with disease-carrying mosquitoes and are responsible for dramatic reductions in malaria burden across Africa. Vector control programs can consume up to 70% of a malaria program’s budget. Thus, ensuring that these interventions are appropriately designed, targeted, and monitored is becoming increasingly important against a backdrop of rising commodity costs and declining financial resources. Alongside in-country teams, CHAI’s malaria vector control technical team aims to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of vector control interventions in malaria endemic settings.
West, Central, and East Africa disproportionately bears the global malaria burden according to cases and deaths. This region also faces complex challenges with fighting the disease, including insecticide resistance, which threatens the effectiveness of vector control interventions. In parts of this region, CHAI provides technical and managerial assistance to national malaria programs in order to accelerate policy changes, ensure sufficient supply commodities, generate demand among health providers and patients, and ensure adequate monitoring and troubleshooting mechanisms are in place to track progress. In addition, CHAI is also supporting national malaria programs in other parts of Africa, Central America, and Southeast Asia on multiple strategic, operational, and technical areas pertaining to vector control, including intervention choice, planning, targeting, monitoring and evaluation, and using data for decision-making. In 2019, a scoping assessment was conducted to understand major vector control gaps and priorities in the West/Central/East Africa region. Building on these existing workstreams and the identified priorities from the scoping assessment, CHAI is now seeking a highly-motivated individual to oversee, coordinate, and drive forward the organization’s malaria vector control work in in Uganda, DRC, Nigeria, Benin, and Burkina Faso.
The Regional Vector Control Associate will provide technical assistance in support of malaria vector control programs in CHAI focus countries in the West/Central/East Africa region. The position requires a highly motivated individual with outstanding analytical, problem-solving, organizational, and communication skills. S/he must exhibit a passion for results and commitment to excellence. The candidate must have excellent communications skills, patience, and cultural sensitivity, as s/he will be working on complex topics with global and country partners as well as multiple teams at CHAI. The successful Associate will have strong project management skills, and will be capable of conducting rapid quantitative analysis and communicating such analysis in a clear and concise manner to colleagues and partners. The successful candidate will be able to function efficiently in a semi-independent setting, and thus will be a self-motivated individual capable of managing multiple tasks at once and driving multiple work flows forward. CHAI places great value on the following qualities in its staff: resourcefulness, responsibility, patience, tenacity, humility, independence, energy, and work ethic.
The candidate must have demonstrable ability to engage with diverse stakeholders, conduct assessments, and work independently and in ambiguous situations. In addition, the candidate must be able to work with in-country stakeholders to drive implementation and have deep personal commitment to producing results. This position will report to the Global Malaria Vector Control Manager.
This position has flexibility to be based in certain CHAI program countries (Rwanda, Nigeria, Senegal, and some other countries in the region) pending country leadership and CHAI leadership approval. This position will require travel up to 60% of the time.
Responsibilities
- Establish/advance malaria vector control workstream in Nigeria, Uganda, Benin, Burkina Faso, and Democratic Republic of Congo based on recommendations from a vector control landscaping and capacity assessment that identified barriers to efficient and effective deployment of vector control interventions across the region
- Serve as a trusted adviser to CHAI country teams and national malaria programs on issues related to vector control operations
- Provide technical and operational support with implementing vector control interventions, including long-lasting insecticidal nets, larval source management, and indoor residual spraying. This includes ensuring that vector control campaigns are planned and executed well, and identifying and disseminating lessons learned after intervention roll-outs
- Support country teams and national programs to translate evidence, current research, and normative guidelines on vector control and entomological investigation, monitoring, and surveillance into practical programmatic and field operations. This includes updating and reviewing for vector control technical content national strategic plans, guidelines, and policies to align with global elimination recommendations
- Work in close coordination with internal analytics team to facilitate implementation of operational research projects, including conducting background research, designing surveys, writing and editing protocols, conducting data analysis, and writing reports
- Support CHAI country teams with translating results of analyses to national and sub-national government partners to support evidence-based decision making, and disseminating findings through high-quality and clear presentations, reports, and publications
- Support country teams to identify and develop solutions to key vector control challenges
Proactively develop and maintain strong working relationships with key stakeholders across government and non-governmental organizations at the regional level - Support country teams with developing detailed operational plans, operating procedures, and associated training materials related to vector control, in order to build government capacity and support effective execution of malaria program
- Other responsibilities as needed
Qualifications
- Bachelor or Master’s degree in biology, public health, entomology, business, or a related field
- 3-5 years of experience in a demanding private sector environment, such as strategy consulting, or in a public sector advisory position
- Able to travel frequently (~60% time) and extensively across sub-Saharan Africa, and to other trans-continental meetings
- Strong quantitative, presentation, and writing skills, including fluency in MS Excel, PowerPoint, and Word
- Excellent written and oral communications skills, including report-writing skills
- Exceptional attention to detail
- Excellent organization and management skills, including time management and project management
- Demonstrated ability to work independently in unstructured settings and to adapt to new environments and challenges
- Ability to handle multiple tasks simultaneously and set priorities in remote settings
- Ability to be effective, patient, and thoughtful in high-pressure situations
- Ability to work in a fast-paced and multicultural environment
- Demonstrated ability to quickly learn and act upon technical information
- Demonstrated ability to translate scientific knowledge into actionable insights for decision-making
- Comfort and flexibility to work independently with a diverse set of counterparts
Advantages
- MPH or MS in public health, or experience working in public health, particularly international health/health policy and management
- Written and verbal fluency in French
- Experience working in developing countries, particularly on health related issues
- Experience working remotely with a decentralized team
- Experience working with governments and institutions, especially from Sub-Saharan Africa
How to Apply
Interested candidates are required to Click Here to Apply