Evidence and Learning Manager Amref Health Africa

Under the leadership of the Programme Director, the Evidence and Learning Manager will provide technical leadership in the evidence generation, knowledge management and learning for Amref’s Learning for Life (L4L): Building a Resilient and Responsive Health Workforce in Africa programme which sits within the Institute of Capacity Development (ICD). This 4-year programme in partnership with the Mastercard Foundation, will be implemented in Kenya, Senegal and Zambia during this first phase. The estimated ratio of health workers per population in Africa is 11.2 workers per 10,000 people, far below the World Health Organisation (WHO) recommended ratio of 44.5. It is estimated that the global shortage of health workers will increase from 12 to 18 million by 2030, translating to a shortage of six million health workers. Africa also has the world’s fastest-growing population, which presents governments and policymakers with both opportunities and challenges to ensure sufficient livelihood opportunities for its young population. To address these challenges and accelerate the current Universal Health Coverage (UHC) gains, Amref is implementing this innovative, multi-country, multi-million dollar programme with the ultimate aim of contributing to increased and sustainable job creation within primary health care (PHC) sectors across Africa.

The Evidence and Learning Manager will work closely with the programme’s partners to capture and package robust evidence of the programme effectiveness, inform the programme’s learning and adaptation and contribute to Amref’s Information Management System (AIMS). The knowledge products produced thereof will be disseminated to the programme partners and external stakeholders to promote learning, programme adaptation, and inform practice. S/he will lead and support learning events, develop mechanisms for generating evidence, creating and sharing knowledge, produce resources and guidance, and facilitate ongoing content development and engagement of diverse audiences. The job holder will be a member of the Programme Implementation Team (PIT).

ABOUT YOU
You are a people person that understands the importance and power of working collaboratively with colleagues, programme partners, and external stakeholders across countries. You have a strong desire to learn from the various programme partners and understand new concepts, latest developments, and promising practices and use these insights to evaluate current programme strategies and interventions, identify potential issues, develop solutions, and lead the team in learning and adapting for optimal implementation and impact.

You are strategic and innovative and you can connect dots and communicate complex information effectively, both verbally and in writing, to diverse audiences across the region. You are a problem solver, looking at each challenge as an opportunity to find innovation in the way of doing things. You are highly organised and have great attention to detail. You are committed to achieving stellar results and success, and can delegate responsibility to an empowered team. However, you are not afraid to get your hands dirty and get involved when needed.

Stakeholder and partner engagement and management are skill sets that you pride yourself in. You thrive under pressure, can prioritise, are resilient and have a high level of EQ. You are a great communicator and a leader that can inspire a team. You are confident and can communicate directions and solutions clearly to both technical and non-technical staff. You’re a team player who’s pragmatic, driven, and passionate about delivering impact!

PRINCIPAL RESPONSIBILITIES
Programme Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E), Adapting and Learning (MEAL)
• Lead the design and implementation of the programme’s MEAL mechanism including M&E framework, tools, and programme indicators, aligned with the programme’s Theory of Change.

Provide MEAL technical support, guidance and enhance MEAL capacity for programme teams across the implementation countries and programme partners.
• Lead and coordinate the M&E of programme interventions across the partnership, document results, and provide feedback to stakeholders to guide decision-making.
• Ensure partner adherence to MEAL standards including managing the programme deliverable tracker, and good practice in data management and reporting in line with Amref and funding partner reporting requirements.

Promptly identify, communicate and escalate as necessary, programme performance gaps and potential risks for timely mitigation.
• In consultation with the programme partners, develop sound participatory research approaches and practices backed with necessary ethical approvals
• Attend team meetings and participate in support visits to programme implementation sites as appropriate for optimal implementation and achievement of programme deliverables.

Programme adapting and learning strategy
• Lead the development of the programme’s evidence and learning strategy, associated implementation plan, and data-sharing policy.
• Create evidence-capture mechanisms of promising approaches, insights, and interventions for packaging into knowledge products.
• Lead in capturing robust evidence to improve overall accountability to programme beneficiaries, partnership and donors, and to inform programme adaptation and learning.
• Provide thought leadership and vision for strengthening programme learning strategies and systems.
• Provide evidence-based input into strategic planning processes to guide learning, programme adaptation and decision-making.
• Develop materials and support the documentation and communication of best-practice guides, toolkits, stories of change, lessons learnt and impact assessments.
• Identify learning opportunities such as health days, conferences, webinars, and learning networks aligned with the programme’s goal and commission learning sessions by the programme partners.
• Keep tabs with the trends and developments in the health and related workforce and labour trends in Africa and package these insights to inform programme learning and adaptation.
• Support the development and maintenance of the programme webpage on the Amref website.
• Advise on the effective utilisation and visualisation of existing data sources and MEAL resources within Amref.

Knowledge management
• Develop, manage and implement the Knowledge Management (KM) Strategy for the programme to drive consistent, current and accurate content across all implementing partners and teams.
• Establish and implement a knowledge management structure and governance framework for content to ensure consistent KM practices are applied across the programme.
• Develop and implement KM procedures, processes and standards including conducting research and workshops and providing training, coaching and advice to programme partners and stakeholders on requirements and best practice to ensure the consistent application of KM practices.
• Facilitate and coordinate the exchange and dissemination of programme information within the partnership and externally through conferences, workshops, publications and other fora.
• Identify and curate technical website content, technical information products such as White Papers, position statements, power point presentations, policy guidelines etc. to contribute to knowledge and create visibility for programme outputs.

EDUCATION, SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE
Education and Experience
• Masters and professional qualifications in relevant areas such as MEAL, public health, knowledge management and/or international development.
• Data analytics knowledge and experience
• Bachelor’s degree required

Skills and Competencies:
• 8+ years’ experience developing and implementing MEAL systems for and building capacity in for complex multi-country programmes, preferably in the health and/or international development sector.
• Demonstrable strategic thinking skills with the ability to rally people and teams behind ambitious goals
• Strong proven partnership-building and networking skills
• Ability to inspire, motivate and guide a diverse and geographically dispersed team of technical and non-technical people who are direct or indirect reports.
• Experience using data and evidence to drive programme performance and sustainable impact.
• Demonstrable success in creating clear and compelling programme strategies that internal and external stakeholders
• Excellent communication and public speaking skills
• Candidates with both English and French language capabilities will have an added advantage.

NOTE: Please note that you must have legal authorization to work in any of the Amref Country Offices in Africa to be eligible for this position.