About the role: This is a 24 month replacement role based in Freetown with a salary of Band 4 (€35,981-€39,979). You will report to the Programme Director. Your direct line reports will currently be two Health Project Managers (Tonkolili) and one WASH Project Manager (Freetown).
You will liaise with Ministry of Health and Sanitation (MoHS), Ministry of Water Resources, National Secretariat for the Reduction of Teenage Pregnancy, Ministry of Social Welfare, Gender and Children’s Affairs, UN agencies involved in health care, bilateral donor agencies & other INGOs and LNGO’s, and other Sierra Leone and head office staff as necessary.
Your purpose: This is an exciting opportunity for the right candidate to lead the implementation of Concern’s growing health and equality related portfolio in Sierra Leone. Our work in the health sector currently includes Urban WASH, Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health and Health Systems Strengthening. You will support and develop an experienced and hardworking team. You will help to maintain and build excellent relationships with communities, donors, partners and the Sierra Leonean government. You will be based in Freetown, with frequent travel to Concern’s field office in Tonkolili where most of the current health portfolio is implemented. We offer an attractive and competitive salary package with benefits.
You will be responsible for:
Programme Development and Management
- Develop further and implement Concern’s Country Health Strategy in line with Concern Sierra Leone’s new country strategic plan for 2018 – 2021;
- Design, implement and manage overall Health Programme at the field and national level with high quality and participation of community and other stakeholders in line with the country strategy;
- Provide technical backstopping to the health teams, ensuring the development and utilisation of best practices for specific technical interventions;
- Ensure that the core principles and policies of Concern regarding equality, Programme Participants Protection Policy, HAP Standards, Community Based Complaint and Response Mechanisms are implemented across the health programme, monitored and reported;.
- With support of other relevant team members, ensure effective mainstreaming of HIV and AIDS, equality, disaster risk reduction, and application of a rights-based approacj across the health programme;.
Programme integration and partnership development
- Work closely with the Programmes Director and the Area Coordinator to ensure that the integrated programme in Tonkolili is successfully rolled out as one collaborative programme with the Food Income and Markets (FIM) and Education sectors;.
- Ensure that all research protocols are adhered to during project design and implementation where relevant;
- Build and maintain effective partnerships particularly with Ministry of Health and Sanitation at national level and district levels but also Ministry of Water Resources, National Secretariat for the Reduction of Teenage Pregnancy, Ministry of Social Welfare, Gender and Children’s Affairs;
- Initiate, develop and maintain relevant partnerships with local NGOs and CBOs;
Proposal Development, Grants and Financial Management
- Ensure effective management of all aspects of donor grants for the health programme. Prepare high quality donor reports as per the donor agreement and submit on time;
- In line with the country programme strategy analyse funding requirements and opportunities and develop funding proposals of high quality to appropriately expand the health programme;
- Prepare health sector annual budget and analyse the need to seek additional funding based on the health programme strategy;
- Review the budget three times a year in line with activity plan and with participation of all team members;
- Ensure all projects are on track in terms of implementation and quality of activities as well as budget expenditure through effective planning and monitoring and provide regular updates to the Programme Director;
- Ensure that monthly forecasts and monthly management accounts are prepared and tracked by Project Managers and adjust planning accordingly to ensure that budgets are spent effectively;
- Develop and monitor health programme budgets with project and finance staff, tracking programme expenditure through monthly management and quarterly financial review;
- Take the lead in starting up new projects and hand over appropriately to the respective Project Manager once in post;
- Ensure projects are closed out according to donor guidelines;
Human resource management and development
- Conduct training needs assessment of local partners and organize appropriate initial and ongoing support to ensure successful partnerships;
- Directly line manage two national staff and one international staff. Ensure each has clear objectives, provide regular feedback and conduct annual performance reviews;
- Provide appropriate and effective mentoring and coaching to health programme team at individual level to build their capacity;
- Develop clear job descriptions for any new/replacement direct line reports, new positions or new projects in the health team.
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Monitoring, evaluation and learning, Innovation**
- Conduct monitoring visits to the field regularly to monitor implementation and quality;
- Ensure that data for indicators for projects are being accurately collected and analysed
- Ensure that evaluation and learning from monitoring is regularly shared with teams for improved performance. Document learning to share with teams and stakeholders;
- Prepare annual report for the health sector with high quality;.
Your skills and experience will include:
- Master’s degree in Public health/Community Health /WASH/Reproductive Health or other equivalent experience.
- Minimum of 3 years management experience and experience of implementing and managing health programmes (including programmes relating to primary health care, WASH, Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health, maternal and child health) in developing country contexts
- Experience of implementing project cycle management – project planning, monitoring and review.
- Skills and experience in budget planning and management;
- Experience in the capacity building of national staff;
- Skills and experience of liaising, networking, advocating with and influencing senior Government officials and policy makers
- Experience of fund raising and donor grants management, monitoring of large programmes, proven ability to report on impact/result of the programme;
- Experience in training and application of adult facilitation, participatory methods and rights based approaches
We would also like:
- Experience in mainstreaming gender, equality and HIV into programming;
- Training of trainers & facilitation skills;
- Working with/managing partner organisations;
- Experience in strategic development of country level health programming especially in post conflict/fragile contexts
More Information
- Job City Freetown
