Senior Health Researcher & Policy Advisor

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IRC - The International Rescue Committee

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Job Description

Job Overview****:

The IRC’s Airbel Impact Lab designs, tests, and scales life-changing, cost-effective solutions for people affected by conflict and disaster. By applying the IRC’s deep technical expertise and field experience with a range of skills from the behavioral sciences, human-centered design, rigorous research, and multi-disciplinary problem-solving in humanitarian contexts, we work to develop breakthrough solutions that combine creativity and rigor, openness and expertise, and a desire to think afresh with the experience of a large-scale implementing organization.

Health is the IRC’s largest program, serving over 16 million people in over 30 countries in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, Europe and South America. Sitting within IRC’s Crisis Response, Recovery & Development (CRRD) Unit, the Health Technical Unit takes a public health approach, which includes a focus on primary health care, sexual & reproductive health, environmental health (including WASH), and nutrition.

The Senior Health Researcher and Policy Advisor will advance high priority research, learning, policy, advocacy, resource mobilization and scaling initiatives across the IRC in relation to global health. They will lead projects and ensure alignment across units including Research and Innovation, the President’s Office, the Health Unit, Policy & Advocacy and Communications on strategic health areas including nutrition treatment, Covid-19 response, pandemic preparedness policy and vaccine delivery. This position will also ensure research and learning meets the highest standards of excellence in demography, epidemiology, statistics, qualitative inquiry, data analytics and ethical compliance, and develop, implement, and inform policy and advocacy that promotes ambitious global reforms at the highest levels of government and international institutions.

Major Responsibilities

Nutrition Research, Innovation, Policy and Scale:

· Serve as Senior/HQ Principal Investigator on a large RCT in Mali testing a simplified treatment protocol for vulnerable children (with low weight for age) who are not covered by current treatment programs.

· Ensure methodological rigor, quality implementation, efficiency and ethical compliance for the study.

· Create systems and procedures for strategic management and for inclusive collaboration with local stakeholders from national government to local academia to client communities.

· Develop and lead the GRIP Research Roadmap (prioritized learning agenda) and evidence dissemination strategies.

· Advise on innovative finance work particularly in relation to market failures related to Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF).

· Advise on overall GRIP strategy, and backstop on all GRIP research and analytic methods.

GiveWell/CMAM Avancé Project:

· Serve as senior research evaluation and learning lead with focus on demographic, epidemiological, statistical and qualitative methods

· Ensure methodological rigor, quality implementation, efficiency and ethical compliance for 15-30 annual population-based coverage surveys.

· Oversee and QA development and implementation of quantitative methods for IRC’s innovative population-level approach to coverage estimation including sampling design, field procedures, supervision strategies, implementation monitoring, analytic methods and outputs including weighting for population level inference and variance estimation.

· Oversee and QA development and implementation of qualitative methods to shed light on barriers and opportunities to treatment access and expanding treatment coverage. This includes identifying a theoretical framework, research objectives, sampling approach, data collection tools, data analysis and outputs.

· Lead technical conversations with the Center for Disease Control epidemiologists and statisticians to refine methods in line with state-of-the-art global standards and disseminate methodological innovations more widely in the sector.

· Supervise the Coverage Survey Specialist, and additional positions as hired.

· Engage with donors on research-related conversations particularly in relation to coverage surveys and interpretation of results.

· Advise on data systems, analysis, interpretation and adaptive learning procedures related to program data.

Nutrition Policy & Advocacy

· Advise on framing, aims, recommendations and strategies for a significantly more ambitious P&A strategy to improve the coverage and scale of treatment of acute malnutrition.

· Draw on lessons and experiences from other areas of health (especially HIV response) that have gone to scale.

· Drawing lessons from Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response (IPPPR), support the health unit on the development and implementation of organization preparedness and response to pandemics.

Covid-19 and Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy and Advocacy

· Drive the President/CEO’s Policy and Advocacy agenda on pandemics, advancing and building on the proposals of the Independent Panel on Pandemic Preparedness and Response (IPPPR) especially in relation to finance and governance.

· Draft op-eds, speeches and correspondence with cabinet and head of government level policy leaders; staff president/CEO for high level meetings.

· Identify and implement ongoing advocacy strategy including recommendations, angles, targets, partners.

· Represent the President/CEO in meetings, task forces and substantive discussions as requested.

· Ensure alignment between the President/CEOs pandemic agenda and organization-wide policy, advocacy and comms, serve as link with Health Unit, Policy & Advocacy, and Communications teams.

· Review, advise, shape and help draft IRC communications, press releases, talking points, policy papers and advocacy products on Covid-19 and health security.

Lead IRC’s Learning Agenda on Vaccine Delivery

· Lead the development and design of potential learning agendas, strategies and activities for proposals.

· Develop partnerships to strategically move IRC into the vaccine delivery programmatic area.

· Provide bridge leadership of vaccine learning agenda and identify vaccine learning lead.

· Provide ongoing high level technical, organization and strategic oversight of newly engaged vaccine learning teams and partners.

Key Working Relationships:

● Position Reports to: Chief Research and Innovation Officer and Senior Technical Director, Health

● Position Directly Supervises: Coverage Survey Specialist

● Other Internal and/or external contacts:

○ President and CEO

○ Senior Director, Policy and Planning, President’s Office

○ Vice President, Emergencies

○ Health Technical Project staff and field research teams

Job Requirements:

Education: PhD in Public Health, Nutrition or related field preferred.

Minimum Requirements

● Minimum 10 years’ experience­­ developing and delivering high impact projects, including overseeing and conducting health research projects and studies.

● Demonstrated experience using, and a strong technical understanding of, randomized impact evaluations, program implementation research (including qualitative and quantitative approaches), and measure development, adaptation, and validation.

● Demonstrated skills and competencies in managing research teams in low resource environments.

● High degree of external recognition as an expert in public health, with strong track record of shaping policy and advocacy for a global institution.

● Strong leadership and management competencies including the ability to bring people along with a stated vision and strategy, and capacity to communicate effectively with IRC field leadership, technical peers, and colleagues in fundraising, communications and advocacy

● An understanding and commitment to impact, value and growth as key components of program design and delivery;

● Demonstrated experience with business development and donor/partner management

● Excellent interpersonal and communication skills: the ability to successfully and effectively liaise with a variety of people in a multicultural environment and work on a virtual team;

● Flexible work attitude, proactive and demonstrated creativity: the ability to work productively in a team environment and the ability to problem solve creatively with minimal guidance;

● Excellent organizational skills: the ability to be flexible and work well under pressure, dealing with competing priorities in a fast-paced team environment;

● Experience in scaling is a plus.

Working Environment:

● Standard office work environment

● Up to 20% travel

The IRC and IRC workers must adhere to the values and principles outlined in IRC Way - Standards for Professional Conduct. These are Integrity, Equality, Service, and Accountability. In accordance with these values, the IRC operates and enforces policies on Beneficiary Protection from Exploitation and Abuse, Child Safeguarding, Anti Workplace Harassment, Fiscal Integrity, and Anti-Retaliation.

IRC et les employés de IRC doivent adhérer aux valeurs et principes contenus dans le IRC WAY (normes de conduite professionnelle). Ce sont l’Intégrité, Egalite, le Service, et la Responsabilité. En conformité avec ces valeurs, IRC opère et fait respecter les politiques sur la protection des bénéficiaires contre l’exploitation et les abus, la protection de l’enfant, le harcèlement sur les lieux de travail, l’intégrité financière, et les représailles.

We offer a comprehensive and highly competitive set of benefits. In the US, these include: 10 sick days, 10 US holidays, 20-25 paid time off days depending on role and tenure, medical insurance starting at $120 per month, dental starting at $7 per month, and vision starting at $5 per month, FSA for healthcare and commuter costs, a 403b retirement savings plans with immediately vested matching, disability & life insurance, and an Employee Assistance Program which is available to our staff and their families to support counseling and care in times of crisis and mental health struggles.

#LI-GR1 #LI-REMOTE

Qualifications

Added 2 years ago - Updated 11 months ago - Source: rescue.org