Head, Equitable Immunisation Programmes

Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance is a public-private partnership committed to saving children’s lives and protecting people’s health by increasing equitable use of vaccines in lower-income countries. The Vaccine Alliance brings together implementing country and donor governments, the World Health Organisation, UNICEF, the World Bank, the vaccine industry, technical agencies, civil society, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and other private sector partners. Gavi uses innovative finance mechanisms, including co-financing by recipient countries, to secure sustainable funding and adequate supply of quality vaccines. Since 2000, Gavi has contributed to the immunisation of more than 981 million children and the prevention of more than 16 million future deaths.

THE ROLE

Every year, the Alliance provides hundreds of millions of dollars in health system strengthening (HSS) grants and technical support to help countries strengthen their health systems and immunisation programmes and achieve sustainable improvement in the coverage and equity of immunisation. The HSIS team works closely with other Secretariat teams, especially the Country Support team, and a diverse range of Alliance partners (especially WHO and UNICEF) to help countries design and implement this support. Within the Secretariat, the team leads work with partners to develop programmatic approaches in areas including equity, supply chain, data, demand, gender, community engagement, immunisation workforce and programme management; provides hands on support to help countries and Secretariat teams design Gavi’s grants; and to monitor performance and capture and disseminate lessons learned.

The Equitable Immunisation Programmes (EIP) sub-team within HSIS has a critical role in helping to shape the Alliance’s mission of ensuring equity in immunisation (both reaching zero-dose and under-immunised children in the first year of life, and new populations not traditionally served by immunisation such as adolescents) and enhancing programme performance. This includes working with partners and Secretariat teams on strategies to strengthen data-driven programme management at every level of the health system, develop and scale up innovative approaches to improve delivery of services that respond to the needs of communities, address gender-related barriers to immunisation, and generate sustained community demand for immunisation. The team is also responsible for leading efforts within the Secretariat and working with partners to assess how health systems need to be strengthened to deliver vaccines equitably along the life course outside the traditional infant schedule (e.g., HPV vaccine, malaria vaccine) and help to adapt Gavi support accordingly.

Key functions and deliverables:

• Lead development and roll-out of approaches to strengthen health systems’ capacity to provide equitable immunisation services and strengthen data-driven programme management, working closely with sub-team, Director and Secretariat leadership. This includes:
  • Ensuring coherence of programmatic approaches, innovations and guidance in areas of programme management, digital health information, equity, service delivery, health workforce, demand, community engagement, and gender;
  • A relentless focus on implementation by ensuring sub-team works effectively with country teams to mainstream this thinking into country programming.
• Lead thinking with sub-team, other Secretariat teams (e.g., Vaccine Programmes) and partners on how health systems will need to adapt to reach new populations effectively and efficiently and deliver vaccines outside infancy, and how Gavi’s financing, programming and operational approaches may need to adapt accordingly;
• Develop excellent and trust-based collaboration with senior Alliance counterparts in areas of responsibility and help the Alliance engage new partners with critical capacities in these areas;
• Manage EIP sub-team to ensure excellent performance, teamwork and staff wellbeing;
• Act as a core member of the HSIS management team to ensure integrated team-wide approach to strengthening health systems, ensure excellent cross-team collaboration including in supporting countries, and to monitor and communicate results.

MAIN DUTIES/RESPONSIBILITIES

• Provide Secretariat thought leadership on equity and the zero-dose agenda, working closely with colleagues across the Secretariat and Alliance;
• Lead thinking within Secretariat on systems implications of new life-course vaccines and how Gavi support may need to evolve, working closely with other Secretariat teams and partners;
• Lead development and implementation of strategic approach to health workforce and data-driven programme management, building on the existing leadership, management and coordination programme and early efforts to scale-up innovative healthworker learning and performance management approaches;
• Lead and manage the EIP sub-team, and ensure that, as a restructured and expanded team, there is clarity on the vision, roles and responsibilities and an excellent culture of collaboration and information sharing, both within the sub-team and with the rest of HSIS and Secretariat;
• Ensure team has a relentless focus on implementation and systematically mainstreaming new thinking into country programming including by building capacity and expertise across the Secretariat and Alliance, and providing hands on support to countries and country teams as agreed;
• Work with team to ensure excellent Secretariat coordination with Alliance partners and engage new partners in both inside and beyond immunisation community;
• Identify, prioritise and scale relevant innovations across Gavi-supported countries, working closely with the resource mobilisation and private sector partnerships team and other colleagues and partners;
• Provide regular and systematic analysis of the design, performance and impact of Gavi’s investments in equity and related areas and strategic communication materials for internal and external stakeholders;
• Ensure rigorous approach to capturing lessons learned in relevant areas, disseminating across partners and countries, and adjusting programmatic approaches as required;
• Act as a member of the HSIS management team to help set strategic direction, ensure excellent performance and build team culture and health;
• Other duties and activities as required.

Note: The essential functions listed in this section are not exhaustive of the job responsibilities; other duties may be assigned consistently with the department needs.

QUALIFICATIONS

ACADEMIC

• Advanced university degree in Public Health or Health Systems;
• Academic background in management science or related field highly desirable.

WORK EXPERIENCE

• Minimum 12 years of professional experience managing programmes at national / international levels to deliver equitable, high-quality services in health or related fields;
• Minimum 8-10 years of experience of managing and leading complex teams with both a strategic and operational focus;
• Minimum 5 years of experience in improving organisational performance and strengthening management systems;
• Minimum 5 years of direct experience strengthening delivery of immunisation or other health services;
• Track record of systematically developing and implementing new programmes and strategies at scale in low-resource settings.

SKILLS/COMPETENCIES

• Excellent understanding of health systems and service delivery across the life course. Demonstrated understanding of immunisation programmes;
• Deep understanding of multiple dimensions of equity and interventions to overcome barriers to equitable service provision including how to engage communities, generate demand. design high-quality services and gender responsive and gender transformative programming;
• Demonstrated capacity to help organisations and individuals improve their performance including through innovative, data-driven management approaches;
• Strategic thought leadership with demonstrated capacity to systematically shape organisational agendas and scale-up transformative thinking;
• Excellent quantitative and qualitative analytic skills and proven ability to help teams and organisations translate data and insights into action;
• Excellent planning, organisation and coordination including demonstrated ability to prioritise;
• Demonstrated track record of building high-performing, motivated, supportive and collaborative teams with excellent execution bias;
• Excellent collaboration skills and demonstrated ability to work across multiple, multicultural teams and organisations in pursuit of a common goal;
• Proven ability to work under pressure and meet tight deadlines;
• Excellent oral and written communications, including ability to synthesise complex information and clearly explain technical issues;
• Adaptability and flexibility to changing organisational needs.

LANGUAGES

• Written and spoken fluency in English;
• Fluency in French strongly desired;
• Fluency in Portuguese and other languages of Gavi-supported countries an asset.

CONTACTS

• All Gavi Secretariat teams;
• Gavi Alliance partners, including UNICEF, WHO, World Bank, Gates Foundation and civil society;
• Other partners and investors in supply chain such as the Global Fund;
• Implementing country governments;
• Gavi donors;
• Gavi governance bodies.