Advisor Health & Nutrition – Sudan 293 views

You will report to the Programme Director. You will also liaise closely with the Area Coordinators, Area Managers, MEAL Advisor, other Technical Advisors, and Concern Head Office H&N Technical Advisors.

We would like you to start immediately.

Your purpose: The Health & Nutrition Advisor will provide technical leadership and quality control in design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of health and nutrition interventions in Concern Sudan’s programme, in line with Concern’s country and organisational strategic priorities. Within Concern Sudan’s Health & Nutrition portfolio, you will ensure technical compliance with donor-approved project documents and requirements, and work alongside Area Coordinators to ensure accountable use of project/programme resources (financial, human and logistical).

The role is wide-ranging and hands-on, requiring the post-holder to operationally work on the ground in developing Concern’s H&N programmes and strategically advocate at State and National level to influence national policy and practice. Community Management of Acute Malnutrition (CMAM) and behaviour change on Infant and Young Child Feeding practices is a significant part of the health and nutrition programming.

Whilst the role holder will be responsible for driving forward the strategic implementation and ensuring technical quality of all of Concern’s H&N programmes in Sudan; particular focus will be around the management of the EU-funded Health Systems Strengthening programme in West Darfur. The jobholder will be responsible for coordinating closely with the programme team in West Darfur and the West Darfur State Ministry of Health and partners.

You will be responsible for:

• Lead in developing Concern’s health and nutrition strategy in line with global and Concern Sudan 2018-2021 strategic plan.

• Take lead in designing and writing quality health and nutrition proposals that will enable Concern Sudan to attract more funding to deliver adequate services in the sector

• Play active role in health nutrition sector clusters representing Concern as credible partner for donors in sector

• Provide necessary technical support for National NGO partners and line departments

• Advising on the implementation of project interventions to achieve project outputs and objectives, including data management, regular monitoring, mid-term reviews and final evaluations in accordance with Concern and donor requirements.

• Supporting the national health and nutrition Advisers, ensuring that the programmes are in line with international and national standards, and that Health and Nutrition interventions are integrated.

• Develop, design and produce appropriate and contextualized methodologies and resource materials for use by the project team.

• Ensure that the quality and coverage of the CMAM and Primary Health Care (PHC) programmes meet international and national standards and internal and external recommendations.

• Co-ordinate, streamline and systematise Concern’s health and nutrition programme in all locations with appropriate protocols and best practice.

• Work with national counterparts and actively train/coach them on the health and nutrition advisory role.

• Identify training needs of health and nutrition national staff and build their capacity by providing formal and informal training sessions to improve awareness and skills with respect to implementation of health and nutrition activities and provide on-going mentoring.

• Provide support and advice to Area Coordinators and field health and nutrition programme staff in effectively managing their programme budgets, procurement of nutrition supplies and other resources in line with Concern policies and procedures to ensure efficiency, accountability and transparency.

• Regular supervision and provide on-the-job training for MoH and Concern staff at all health facilities which are supported by Concern.

• Provide technical assistance and lead on project design and proposal and budget preparation for institutional and private donors to meet identified needs and strengthen local capacities within the sector.

• Provide support and, as necessary, lead on ensuring the timely compilation of situation updates, monthly and other narrative and statistical reports for head office and donors.

• Represent Concern and actively participate at state/national technical forum to advance national policy and practice.

• Assist the health and nutrition teams and relevant counterparts across the programme in preparing, conducting and analysing nutrition surveys and facilitating coverage and KAP surveys as required.

• Continually monitor the health & nutrition situation in the target and neighbouring areas and provide advice to the health and nutrition teams on additional actions that need to be taken to respond to the situation as part of our emergency response

• Work in coordination with Livelihoods and WASH Advisors and others to ensure health and nutrition needs are integrated with other programme components for outcomes of improved Resilience.

• Within this role, contribute to the achievement of Concern’s accountability commitments, implementation of emergency (PEER) plan and help to ensure key approaches are mainstreamed (equality, HIV&AIDS, DRR etc.).

• Compile monthly, quarterly and other reports.

Your skills and experience will include:

Essential:

• Masters Degree in Public Health, Nutrition or equivalent qualification.

• At least three years’ experience in a nutrition and/or health sector setting.

• Experience in strategic development and support of nutrition and health programmes, including mainstreaming of cross-cutting themes such as HIV and AIDS, gender, equality.

• Experience working in nutrition interventions, including CMAM

• Experience working with Primary Health Care (PHC) and Maternal & Child Health projects.

• Knowledge and experience in the most common assessment and survey methodologies such as SMART, SQEAC and related software.

• Experience in working with and capacity building of national staff and partner organisations.

• Good representational skills and able to undertake advocacy at a high level to further the programme goals.

• Experience in community mobilization / behavioural change strategies.

• Demonstrable understanding of multi-sector Resilience programming

• Excellent written and spoken English.

Desirable:

• A complementary additional professional qualification in health or nutrition relevant to the job description.

• Managing/working on complex programming in a resilience-building and/or (post-) emergency context.

• Experience/understanding of Health Systems Strengthening approaches.

• Training of trainers and facilitation skills.

• Experience in developing and rolling out monitoring and evaluation tools for Health & Nutrition programming.

• Experience of work in Sudan / Horn of Africa region

• Familiarity with Sphere guidelines and knowledge of the Core Humanitarian Standard

• Familiarity with humanitarian law and principles of humanitarian action (international code of conduct and humanitarian charter)

• Spoken and written Arabic would be a distinct advantage

We would also like:

• Cross cultural awareness and sensitivity

• Empathy with Concern’s goals & commitment to capacity building, protection and participation

• Good communication and training / capacity building skills

• Proven organisation, planning and management skills

• Ability to work on own initiative and lead diverse teams

• Flexible and adaptable to a changing environment

• Ability to work under pressure often to strict deadlines

• Knowledge of computer applications i.e. Microsoft word, Excel, communications systems.

• Ability to live and work in a close team environment