Department: Global Programs
Location: Kenya – Nairobi
Reports to: Senior Manager, Strategic Innovations
About Us
Living Goods (LG) is a leading non-profit organization innovatively transforming the health of vulnerable communities. Living Goods leverages a powerful combination of catalytic technology, high-impact training, and quality treatments that empower government community health workers (CHWs) to deliver quality care to their neighbours’ doorsteps. These CHWs also earn meaningful compensation and enhance their stature in the process, reinforcing a virtuous cycle of trust.
The organization prides itself on its agile and quick-footed approach and has embedded experimentation, innovation, and research into its DNA. Additionally, Living Goods pushes itself to account for quantifiable and aggressive targets designed to drive health impact. It is this high performance and innovative culture that has pushed LG to learn, adapt, and optimize its approaches in cases where targets aren’t achieved or when local circumstances change. Consequently, the organization and its impact on the lives of the most vulnerable and underprivileged groups has attracted incredible talent from a multiplicity of backgrounds, expertise, race, and cultures as it grows and expands its footprint.
Background and Team Function
The Innovation Team drives path breaking improvements and new solutions to accelerate impact and efficiency in delivering essential health services at the community level. Fueled by the smart use of data and analytics, adoption of new technologies and processes, and improved ways of working through partnership, our aim is to develop and scale evidence-based innovations through Living Goods operations, government and wider stakeholders to transform community health systems. Our experiments span quick testing of programmatic improvements to the core Community Health Worker (CHW) model through to more complex research study designs and evaluation of multi-layered or disruptive approaches.
The Role
The Digital Health Innovation Manager is responsible for developing and implementing an agile pipeline of digital innovations across Living Goods’ Learning Sites. The role focuses on driving the evolution of transformational next generation approaches to community health work and how we can unlock digital solutions and the smart use of data – for example from adopting virtual/ telemedicine models of service delivery through to use of predictive analytics for precision targeting of care – to increase efficiency of health systems and health outcomes in last mile communities.
The role requires a self-starter, collaborator, strong communicator and creative problem solver. The Digital Health Innovation Manager is responsible for leading their own portfolio of digital innovation pilots and coordinating cross-departmental teams to support implementation. They are expected to oversee the innovation cycle from end to end, including critical analysis of key problems to tackle, ideation and design, partnership management, prototyping, piloting, evaluation and supporting transition to scale across Living Goods and the public sector.
A high priority for this role will be the technical and project management leadership to a Children’s Investment Fund Foundation supported telemedicine project, which is expected to launch as a pilot in early 2023.
Key Responsibilities
Development of a digital and data innovation pipeline:
- Develop an ongoing funnel of digital innovation experiments through conducting ongoing external horizon scanning research, in-depth bottleneck analysis of Living Goods operations and early-stage solution design.
- Design fit-for purpose scalable digital solutions through the facilitation of stakeholder consultations (internal and external with government and partners) and ideation or Human Centered Design (HCD) workshops. Guide innovation designs and digital solutions through a rapid cycle of iterations for continual improvement.
Development of a digital and data innovation pipeline:
- Develop an ongoing funnel of digital innovation experiments through conducting ongoing external horizon scanning research, in-depth bottleneck analysis of Living Goods operations and early-stage solution design.
- Design fit-for purpose scalable digital solutions through the facilitation of stakeholder consultations (internal and external with government and partners) and ideation or Human Centered Design (HCD) workshops. Guide innovation designs and digital solutions through a rapid cycle of iterations for continual improvement.
Project management of the innovation pipeline:
- Implement a portfolio of prioritized digital innovations (max of 2-3 main experiments per year), including project management, ensuring adherence to innovations quality standards, providing technical leadership, developing workplans, key milestones, leading on internal communications and supporting successful innovations to transition to scale. Work closely with Country Team leadership and operational, technical and field teams to oversee day to day implementation of experiments.
- Working alongside the Digital Health Team, oversee the scoping, procurement, onboarding and management of partners directly involved in innovations experiments.
- Where applicable, provide support to LG leadership, the business development team and Senior Manager – Strategic innovations to the management of funders, and ensuring compliance to contracts, including development of reports and deliverables.
Documentation, supporting cross-learning and advocacy:
- Working alongside the Performance, Evidence and Insight Team, ensure experiments are underpinned with a learning agenda, clear results frameworks, and documentation of operational insights, including drivers of success, lessons from failure and the development of case studies and/or communication outputs for external dissemination of findings. Support organizational cross learning through facilitation of learning sessions and innovation review forums.
- Represent Living Goods as part of networks, exploratory learning sessions and conferences or innovation forums. Engage with a pro-active and strategic eye for leveraging sector best practice, advocating around our evidence, and identifying and growing opportunities for future innovations concepts, partnership and funding.
Support internal capacity building and processes:
- Work with the Senior Manager to develop revised tools, processes and additional capacity building activities aimed at building technical skills, strengthening the innovative capacity and culture of innovation across the organization.
Location & Travel
This position will be based in East Africa, Kenya. The successful candidate can expect to travel approximately 15-20% of time to conduct field research and oversee prototyping and piloting.
Essential Qualifications, Experience & Attributes
- Bachelor’s degree in a related field, or a combination of education and experience that yields the required competencies.
- At least 7 years+ of experience working in the digital health sector, with professional experience and track record in development and deployment of digital innovations within private or public sector, including end-to-end management of the innovation cycle.
- Excellent technical knowledge and hands on experience of virtual care, telemedicine, digital and data driven solutions within healthcare.
- Professional work experience in implementing or support public health programming, preferably primary care, reproductive and maternal, newborn and child health.
- Experience in project management of a pipeline of innovations, including managing funders and partners.
- Experience of leading and implementing with human centered design approaches and tools.
- Self-starter and ability to work autonomously combined with experience working remotely and with global staff.
- Strong formative research skills, including triangulation of data and critical analysis.
- Excellent project management, planning and coordination skills.
- Effective communication skills to communicate inside and outside the organization with impact and influence.
- Track record in supporting organizational learning, knowledge management and documentation of best practices.
- Effective as a collaborator in complex internal and external organizations.
- Proven ability to build, cultivate and manage strong relationships across internal teams, with partners and as part of funder management.
Application and deadline
To apply please submit your CV. The deadline for submissions is end of day 15th January, East Africa Time. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis, with the potential for interviews to be called before the end of the submission period.
More Information
- Job City Nairobi
