Technical Advisor, CRVS At Vital Strategies

Job Purpose

Vital Strategies is an international public health organization. Our programs strengthen public health systems and address the world’s leading causes of illness, injury and death. We currently work in 73 countries, supporting data-driven decision making in government, advancing evidence-based public health policies and mounting strategic communication campaigns. Vital Strategies’ priorities are driven by the greatest potential to improve and save lives. They include non-communicable disease prevention, cardiovascular health promotion, tobacco control, road safety, obesity prevention, epidemic prevention, overdose prevention, environmental health, vital statistics systems building and multidrug-resistant tuberculosis treatment research. Our programs are primarily concentrated in low- and middle-income countries in Africa, Latin America, Asia and the Pacific; the Overdose Prevention Program is our first initiative in the U.S. Please visit our website at www.vitalstrategies.org to find out more about our work.

The Singapore based Asia Regional Office (ARO) of Vital Strategies drives regional business development and partnerships and serves as a regional management hub with functions such as administration, finance, and grants. The office also provides oversight support, engaging technical experts, while managing a diverse workforce spread throughout the region. The ARO helps ensure that programs and projects are coordinated, providing a shared knowledge base, and ensuring that best practices and lessons learned are disseminated between projects across the region.

The Position

This position supports the Bloomberg Philanthropies Data for Health Initiative, which aims to enhance public health data collection and use in low- and middle-income countries. The goal of the initiative is to ensure that a billion more people live in countries where data are used to steer public policy and program decisions. Under the Initiative, Vital Strategies, in partnership with other global public health organizations, is implementing a multi-year program to improve civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS) in numerous countries and municipalities in Africa, Latin America, Asia, and the Pacific. Vital Strategies has full responsibility for provision of technical assistance to several of these.

The CRVS Improvement Program involves interventions designed to improve the registration of births and deaths; improve the availability and quality of cause of death information for both facility- and home-based events and improve the timeliness of available vital statistics information and reports.

The Technical Advisor – CRVS Improvement Program will lead technical assistance provision in two countries in Asia, including planning and implementation of work plans, and managing Country Coordinators and Country Implementation Teams. The Technical Advisor will also be responsible for budgeting and expenditure reconciliation and may provide limited technical assistance to CRVS awardees of our Global Grants Program grants in the region or elsewhere. The TA will work under the supervision of the Regional Deputy Director – Singapore Office.

Duties and Responsibilities

Technical Advisor, Civil Registration and Vital Statistics (CRVS) Program
Reporting to Regional Deputy Director, CRVS, the Technical Advisor will provide technical assistance to national ministries of health and other key stakeholders in 2 priority or ‘focus’ countries participating in the CRVS arm Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Data for Health Initiative (Bangladesh and Cambodia).

• Country work planning
• Establish relationships and collaborate with senior government officials to develop country-owned work plans, based on government priorities
• Work with government counterparts to identify priority intervention areas and interventions; define scopes of work; and develop detailed budgeted work plans that identify priority activities and results needed to maximize local impact.
• Ensure technical rigor of work plans through consultation with Technical Director, Principal and Senior Technical Advisors, and Senior Country Advisors
• Develop a feasible implementation plan and budget schedule for work plan completion and determine deadline for key project milestones and deliverables
• Manage the identification and engagement of country coordinators and of a local fiscal agent
• Work with Data Impact colleagues to develop and sign Data for Health Initiative collaboration agreements or MOUs with government
• Managing Implementation and Progress Monitoring
• Support and manage in-country Country Coordinator consultants (CCs). CCs work closely with key government ministries or collaborators.
• Manage implementation of activities in a way that promotes country ownership and leadership, leads to the institutionalization of CRVS system improvements, meets high standards of technical rigor and strengthens local capacity
• Determine and manage the allocation of available resources (e.g., use of CC time, money, materials) to maximize country results
• With support from a Program Manager and Program Assistant, manage drafting and ensure execution of agreements with relevant in-country stakeholders and external consultants (e.g., Memorandum of Understanding, sub-grant agreements, and other contracts)
• Manage and coordinate the provision of all topic-specific technical assistance to the country by communicating with government officials and external consultants
• Work with a Program Manager and Program Assistants to coordinate operational, logistics, and financial support to the implementation of activities in the assigned country (e.g., checking on funds transfers, making logistical arrangements for in-country work, and ensuring correct allocation of expenses to activities)
• Regularly monitor progress of country implementation and track impact against key project milestones and deliverables and budgets
• Communicate daily with relevant team members to support execution of work plans according to schedule and budget
• o Identify, surface, and trouble-shoot bottlenecks and delays

Additional

• Present learning and experience at meetings and conferences and lead or contribute to written technical products including guidelines, communications pieces, presentations, journal articles, or other publications
• Perform other duties as assigned by the Director(s), Deputy Director.

Qualifications

Education and Experience required:

• Master’s degree in public health, public policy, public administration, or a relevant field of study or a Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field plus a minimum number of twelve years’ relevant work experience
• Minimum of 8 years of progressive professional experience in public policy, urban health or public health
• Demonstrated experience leading complex programs and/or projects in international public health
• Demonstrated project management skills including financial and technical oversight

Preferred:

Experienced in working collaboratively and remotely with internal and external team members to meet expectations and deliver the necessary assistance in a timely manner

Skills & abilities:**

• Detail-orientated self-starter with a positive attitude and willingness to learn;
• Comprehensive project management skills, with the ability to make sound, informed judgements
• Understanding of government structures and policymaking in South-East Asia region;
• Intermediate to advanced knowledge in Microsoft Office, including use of pivot tables, V-lookups, and formulas
• Outstanding written and spoken communication skills in English
• Ability to represent the organization at professional events, conferences, or in communications pieces (e.g., blogs)
• Ability to produce deliverables unaided and with minimal supervision

Working Conditions and Physical Requirements:

• Willingness to be based in Singapore
• Travel in-country as needed (up to 30%)