Merlin Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting Coordinator Job Vacancy in Monrovia, Liberia

Contract Duration: One Year with possibility of extension
Location: Monrovia Liberia with frequent travel to project sites
Start date: 10 October 2012
Salary: £26,420 – £27,170 per annum dependent on relevant experience, insurance cover, accommodation and return flights
Benefits: Insurance cover, accommodation, annual leave entitlement of 24 days per annum rising to 30 days at the completion of 12 months of continuous employment with Merlin.

Only short-listed applicants will be contacted. Due to the urgency of this position, applications will be short listed on a regular basis and we may offer this post before the closing date.

Please note that this is an unaccompanied position

Merlin
Merlin is an international health charity, saving lives in the world’s toughest places. Merlin responds with healthcare, when people are overwhelmed by natural disaster, conflict or disease and in need of immediate help. We focus on treating those who are beyond the reach of existing health services. After the immediate crisis, Merlin stays on to assist recovery. Using our expertise, we support health workers and strengthen existing health services. We build resilience by helping those at risk of future health disasters, to be better prepared. We think everyone should have access to lasting healthcare. We believe good health is fundamental to transforming people’s lives, that’s why Merlin is A Force for Health

Context and Background
Merlin will contribute to increasing the capacity of governments and communities in fragile contexts to address priority health issues through operational involvement and sharing expertise and evidence. We will increase our target population from 9.5 million to directly reach at least 15 million people by the end of 2015.
Merlin has set global outcomes in order to enable us to monitor and identify progress against the above. They fall across the following areas of our work: access to primary health care, reproductive and child health services, disease control, nutrition and health system strengthening. Collecting evidence that demonstrates achievement of these global outcomes requires all areas of operations to be systematically collecting relevant data. To do this, Merlin has developed a Results Framework to describe what evidence countries will collect and an Evidence and Impact (E&I) policy to describe the processes that will facilitate this. Merlin in Liberia Merlin has been operational in various counties throughout Liberia since 1997 and has developed a good reputation as a key partner of the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare (MOH&SW) in Liberia. The main focus of Merlin’s programme in Liberia at present is supporting the MoH&SW with the provision of quality primary and secondary level health care services and influencing policy at the national level. In the course of implementing its activities in Liberia, Merlin supports over 800 MoH&SW workers through incentive payments. Merlin actively collaborates with the MoH&SW, UN Agencies, local partner NGOs, and other INGOs and agencies such as Mentor Initiative and International Committee of the Red Cross.

Merlin’s activities include technical, capacity building and logistical support to the County Health and Social Welfare Teams (CH&SWTs) as well as capacity building health facility staff through training, mentoring and/or supervision to ensure improved quality of care in the supported facilities. In 2012 Merlin is supporting 66 primary health care facilities in Maryland, Grand Bassa, Sinoe, Grand Kru and Grand Gedeh counties, and 5 hospitals in Grand Gedeh, Greenville, Barclayville and Harper. Merlin also has a Reproductive Health/Sexual Gender Based Violence (SGBV) team to mainstream maternal health promotion and HIV/AIDS prevention into all Merlin projects as a cross-cutting theme. Merlin is also carrying out a project to provide solar lighting to clinics nation-wide.

Merlin Liberia is working with the MoH&SW and CH&SWTs in each supported county to create a more coordinated strategy in line with the MoH&SW lead partner approach.

Main purpose of the role
To coordinate and lead the development and implementation of standardised M&E systems across the Liberia Programme. The MERC will help to review current system and design, effectively monitor project outputs to assist in project management, and also identify and monitor quality indicators to determine the impact of the projects on the targeted populations in Liberia as they move into a transition and development contexts.

The MERC will provide independent expert opinion on M&E activities in various counties and provide necessary recommendations to Country Management Team (CMT).

Overall Objectives
Under the umbrella of Merlin’s global strategy and Merlin Liberia’s country strategy, the main objective of the MERC will be to:
• Assess and ensure programme quality by ensuring that M&E activities are carried out and results are disseminated and utilised.
• Design and implement standard M&E systems in coordination with Merlin’s programme teams and stakeholders in the programme districts
• Provide guidance on approaches and methods for monitoring and evaluation of outcome and impacts of services delivered by Merlin, using Merlin’s Global E&I Policy as a guiding document.
• Support programme teams in effective analysis of the evidence emerging from programme monitoring and evaluation
• Strengthen the quality and efficacy of the Merlin health programmes by documenting the impacts of the programmes on the quality of health care provided in government health centres and effects on morbidity and mortality of beneficiaries in the target areas, taking into account Merlin Health Policy
• Review and strengthen existing health data collection tools and systems analysis in the timely manner for internal and donor reports
• Supervise and performance manage M&E/HIS Officer and build their capacity on M&E function

Specific Responsibilities
Programme
• Oversee design and implementation of regular assessments including baseline surveys of new projects being developed within the country programme
• Review key grant proposals to ensure adequate inclusion of M&E and Accountability activities, in line with the E&I Policy.
• Ensure M&E activities are consistently included throughout the Programme Management Cycle, including inputting into programme budgets to ensure M&E costs are considered
• Contextualise and implement Merlin’s standard E&I systems in coordination with Merlin’s Programme teams and partners, where appropriate.

Reporting and Quality Assurance:
• Ultimately responsible for ensuring HMIS reporting is up to date and accurate for Merlin run facilities
• Give regular feedback to the Country Management Team on M&E activities in all areas of the PMC and feedback on the findings of any assessments, providing recommendations for quality improvement
• Work with the Country Health director and Health teams to ensure the integration of Merlin’s Health Information System into the approach to evidence-based programming (as set out in the E&I Policy).
• Promote a culture of M&E throughout Merlin Liberia ensuring staff understand the role of M&E and their responsibilities with it and that relevant staff can use M&E tools and
• Develop a Country Monitoring Plan for Liberia, in collaboration with field staff and Merlin HQ.
• Act as focal point for accountability in Merlin Liberia, ensuring Accountability Action Plans are maintained and implemented, reporting progress both to CMT and London.
• Act as focal point for the demonstration of impact within Merlin Liberia as it relates to the Merlin’s Strategy 2012-2015 and the Merlin Results Framework
• Collaborate closely with Merlin’s London M&E team to ensure M&E in Merlin Liberia is aligned with Merlins Global M&E priorities/need.

Management:
• Supervise M&E and Accountability focussed staff and build their capacity on M&E and accountability activities.
• Build staff capacity (Merlin, CHT, partners) in M&E through identifying needs, providing supervision and training, or identifying external training where necessary.

Others
• Undertake any other assignment as required by CD and CHD within the scope of organizational priority
Person Specification Essential Qualifications, experience and competences
• Masters degree in Humanitarian or Development studies. Epidemiology and/or Bio Statistics or other equivalent qualification
• Practical experience of public health programme, preferably in monitoring and evaluation
• Proven knowledge and experience of using qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis methods, including knowledge of statistical packages
• Strong experience in development, design and implementation of monitoring and evaluation systems (guidelines, methodologies including tools) at organizational and field settings
• Excellent skills in information management, including recording, analysis, reporting and review methods, gained in an international organisation.
• Understanding of health programming and issues of organisational accountability towards various stakeholders, in particular, end users of (health) services.
• Successful experience of collating and writing reports to donors
• Proven leadership, coordination and collaborative skills
• Strong strategic planning and organizational skills, ability of think and operate innovatively and strategically
• Excellent interpretational, influencing and diplomatic skills including awareness of constraints while working in a complex and challenging environment
• Willingness to conduct frequent travel and live in remote rural sites
• Self starting attitudes, dynamic and full of initiative
• Strong communication skills, with excellent written and spoken English
• Confident and proficient in the use of MS office and data management
• Experience of establishing strong working relationships with colleagues from different functions and cultures
• Experience of a flexible approach to managing and prioritizing high workload and multiple tasks in a least paced environment with tight deadlines
• Experience of proactively identifying and addressing issues
• An understanding of and commitment to Merlin’s mission and values

Desirable Qualifications, experience and competences
• Masters’ Degree in Public Health, or Medical background with qualifications/expertise in bio statistics and/or epidemiology.
• Proven understanding of health programming and issues of organizational accountability to wards various stakeholders
• Excellent facilitation skills and successful experience in the use of participatory methodologies
• Excellent skills in information management, including recording, analysis, reporting and review methods, gained in an international organisation
• Successful proven ability to contribute to and develop organizational learning objectives
• Experience of team working and demonstrate experience of working collaboratively
• Knowledge and work experience in West Africa will be an added advantage

How to apply:

To apply for this job, please go to www.merlin.org.uk/jobs and apply using our online recruitment system. In order to apply for a job with Merlin online you will need to complete a short registration process and create an account – the online recruitment system explains how to do this. Once your account has been created, you will be able to save the information that you have entered in your application and re-visit it at any time before you submit it.

If you are unable to apply online for any technical reason, please contact applications@merlin.org.uk.

Please note that we do not accept CVs. Unfortunately due to the number of applications we receive, only shortlisted applicants will be contacted.

Closing Date: Tuesday, 18 September 2012