Project Overview:

FHI 360 is the lead organization for a consortium that implements USAID’s Act to End Neglected Tropical Diseases | West (Act | West) program. The program supports disease-endemic countries to control and/or eliminate Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) with proven, cost-effective public health interventions. Over the next three years (2024–2026), the Act | West program will work to eliminate Lymphatic Filariasis (LF), trachoma, and where feasible, onchocerciasis (OV) in West Africa. It will ensure sustainability of National NTD Programs and strengthen country capacity to implement and maintain ongoing MDA and disease surveillance for Soil Transmitted Helminths (STH), Schistosomiasis (SCH) and, in some cases, OV. The FHI 360-led consortium will use its NTD expertise and implementation experience in Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, Niger, Mali, Senegal, Sierra Leone, and Togo to help these countries eliminate and/or control five NTDs: LF, trachoma, OV, SCH, and STH.

Job Summary:

Join the Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) team, which supports the NTD program Act | West program. This position will report to the Learning Lead, under the overall direction of the MEL Director, and maintain a good working relationship with the Act | West MEL team and other program staff, other advisors in the regional Act | West team, with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), subgrantees, and national NTD Programs in the Act | West portfolio.

Provides technical guidance on where needed to the Technical Assistant/Statistician who also works with the Learning Lead to managing and execute disease-specific and cross-cutting scientific research studies on the NTDs targeted with preventive chemotherapy (PC-NTDs). Provides technical support for proposals, based on the design and direction set by technical leadership. The incumbent will apply a wide variety of scientific principles and concepts such as sample size calculations and survey designs for protocol development, verification of the accuracy and completeness of data, complex data analyses and data modelling, disease-specific geospatial risk analysis, and data summaries from surveys. This role is critical to ensure that valid and reliable data will be used for programmatic decision making. May manage other professional staff members. Leads project activities and sub activities and assists with project implementation. Ensures project activities are on track with

work plans, with technical expertise informing project implementation. Assists in the development of donor reports and presentations. Provides significant input to business development. Successfully leads new business development initiatives including project design, budgeting, and recruitment efforts (success is measured in terms of establishment of partnerships and overall quality of resulting proposals initiatives). Develop indicators for use by supervisor.

The position will be fully remote but US-based, with a preference for EST.

Accountabilities:

Technical Requirements:

• Provide technical oversight of complex scope that requires evaluation of variable factors, develops data analysis plans independently to conduct statistical analysis of disease-specific surveys conducted under Act | West. Surveys include SCH and STH impact assessments, Transmission Assessment Surveys (TAS) for LF, Trachoma Impact Surveys (TIS), and OV elimination mapping.

• Provides statistically appropriate approaches to answer key questions in NTD control and elimination, helping to address knowledge gaps in the NTD community. Advanced knowledge of statistics, study design and power calculations to strengthen NTD program implementation and provide technical assistance to countries and partners within Act | West and beyond. Provides both simple data summaries and complex data analyses of both mass drug administration (MDA) reported data and DSA survey data implemented by technical advisors within Act | West, under the supervision of the Learning Lead, ensuring that data is in-line with the survey protocol.

• Demonstrates good judgment in selecting methods, techniques, and evaluation criteria for obtaining solutions, with some supervision.

• Networks with key internal personnel (particularly the Technical Assistant and Learning Lead) in undertaking simple and complex data analyses using SAS, SPSS, or Stata in support of research questions that further the learning agenda.
• Critically analyses and interprets data, identifies, and corrects errors and raises queries based on these issues and communicates issues with the Learning Lead, MEL focal points and Disease Focal Points where required.
• Keeps up to date on the latest scientific literature and developments related to the PC-NTDs. Contributes to strategic scientific decisions of the Act | West program.
• Performs other duties as assigned by the Learning Lead and the MEL Director.

Project Design Implementation:

• With technical oversight, provide technical leadership in design, development, planning, implementation; and capacity- building of specific technical components of projects.
• Leads the day to day technical and operational activities of assigned projects.
• Track delivery of project outputs

• Maintains a constructive dialogue and technical exchange with field counterparts and technical staff members of implementing partners.
• Develops tools for the design and implementation of specific technical components.
• Ensures technical implementation is consistent with best practices in the subject and meet funder contractual obligations.

• May supervise junior technical staff members, sub-contractors, and others implementing technical project work.
• Functions at the advisor capacity with oversight of technical deliverables, and team management. Assists with the development of tools for the design and implementation of specific technical components.
• Leads the day-to-day technical activities of assigned projects.
• Track delivery of project outputs

Business Development and Client/Funder Support:

• Maintains collaborative relationships with donor/client organizations, relevant government agencies, bilateral and other NGOs (non-governmental organizations) and consistently maintained and viewed as a knowledgeable resource in their technical area.
• Maintains technical exchange with field counterparts and technical staff members of implementing partners.
• Responds and/or manages responses to ad hoc data requests from donor and program colleagues (e.g., in support of presentations at meetings and/or conferences), which includes working with technical staff to define their data needs and to fulfil them, as well as interpreting data verbally and in writing.

Capacity Building, Training and Supervision:

• Develops and implements technical training and capacity building interventions.
• Identifies strategies to address training gaps.
• May supervise or provide technical guidance to staff members locally and in the region.

Project/Program Reporting:

• Drafts technical reports.
• Collates and uploads output and deliverables data to data systems.
• Works with the Learning Lead in publishing and disseminating Act | West program successes and lessons learned in draft reports, presentations and contributes to the publication of peer-reviewed manuscripts.
• Represents the organization and / or Institute to external entities at key international NTD meetings, conferences, technical working groups, and advisory committees.
• Develops publications, web pages, and presentations in documenting program successes, best practices and lessons learned in peer-reviewed journals.

• Gathers and aggregates data to provide a summary / high level overview.

Quality Assurance:

• Ensures technical deliverables are consistent with best practices in the subject and meet funder contractual obligations.
• Identifies areas for improved efficiency or effectiveness within prescribed parameters, and institutes enhancements to procedures.

Applied Knowledge & Skills:

• Ensures appropriate and timely technical support for field projects.
• Ensures the quality of implemented technical activities and systems at all levels.
• Strong knowledge and skills in a specific technical area and general understanding of concepts and principles of related technical areas.

• Solid knowledge of standards for the technical area/field, operational processes and procedures, work, and task flow.
• Proficient writing and verbal communication skills.
• Relevant computer software skills (including, at a minimum, the standard applications in MS Office).

• Ability to manage their own work to job and performance standards.
• Must be able to read, write and speak fluent English fluent in host country language.

Problem Solving & Impact:

Demonstrates the ability to assess needs within agreed upon duties and considers course of action best to meet those needs.

Effectively applies knowledge of technical area to solve a range of problems.

Demonstrates the ability to develop solutions to problems that cannot be solved using existing methods or approaches.

Faulty decisions/ recommendations /failures to complete assignments will normally result in serious delays to assigned projects resulting in considerable expenditure of additional time, resources, and funds.

Decisions and actions impact primarily workflow, project processes and timeframes.

Problems encountered are varied, requiring review of practices and precedents to resolve.

Problem solving involves evaluating and resolving discrepancies with data, analyses, processes, etc. within prescribed guidelines.

Policies or guidelines exist for most problems; others must be referred to by a supervisor or more senior professional.

Supervision Given/Received:

May supervise junior staff members.

Coordinates own workflow and sets individual priorities.

Works under general guidelines for completion and accuracy as determined by the

supervisor.

Accomplishes results through lower-level staff managers or through experienced staff who exercise independence in their assignments.

May manage a centralized functional area of activity.

Serves as mentor to more inexperienced technical staff.

Reports to the Learning Lead.

Education: ** **

Master’s Degree (mandatory) and PhD (preferred) in biostatistics, statistics, public health, data science, epidemiology, or Related Field.

Project Management (PM) Certification preferred.

Experience: ** **

• Typically requires 8+ years of relevant experience working in M&E in health sector data systems applied research, quantitative and qualitative analysis, team collaboration, stakeholder engagement, and data analysis activities for infectious diseases program in Africa – may manage activities of lower-level staff, however, main function is individual contributor.

• Experience working on NTD projects and/or programs (or a related infectious disease field such as malaria or HIV) strongly preferred, with experience as a lead project design including epidemiological data analysis using large data sets and data from multiple sources.
• Proficiency in data visualization tools such as PowerBi or Tableau would be desirable. Very strong proficiency in Microsoft Excel (e.g., abilities with pivot tables, conditional formatting, etc.) and experience developing Excel templates required.
• Peer-reviewed publications in public health journals required – as first author or co-author.
• Comprehensive knowledge of scientific theories, concepts and practices, and their application to research studies.
• Knows, or can quickly learn, the preventive chemotherapy – neglected tropical disease (PC-NTD) field to be able to conceptualize and realize meaningful research activities related to the control and elimination of the PC-NTDs and disease-specific assessments.
• Excellent written and verbal presentation skills
• Scientifically creative; able to collaborate with other; thinks independently.
• Proficiency in the remaining MS Office Suite (Word, Power point and Access) required.
• Experience in writing advanced SAS code (e.g., abilities in SAS macros, arrays, and do-loops), and experience in interpreting advanced SAS code with minimal documentation or context an asset.
• Experience in processing large datasets from multiple sources.
• Excellent interpersonal skills and ability to work in a complex international program/ multicultural setting.
• Strong ability to plan, organize, prioritize work, and multi-task to meet tight deadlines.
• Fluency in English required; fluency in French is an asset.

Typical Physical Demands:

Typical office environment.

Ability to spend long hours looking at a computer screen and doing repetitive work on a keyboard.

Ability to sit and stand for extended periods of time.

Ability to lift 5 lbs.

Technology to be Used:

• Excellent quantitative analytical skills, with knowledge, experience, and proficiency with a statistical analysis package such as SAS, SPSS, STATA, R, or ArcGIS. Facility with one of these statistical packages is a must.

• Personal Computer, Microsoft Office 365 (i.e., Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Skype/TEAMS, email), office telephone, cell phone and printer/copier.

Travel Requirements:

10% – 25%

The expected hiring salary range for this role is listed below. FHI 360 pay ranges represent national averages that vary by geographic location. When determining an offer amount, FHI 360 factors in multiple considerations, including but not limited to: relevant years of experience and education possessed by the applicant, internal equity, business sector, and budget.

Base salary is only one component of our offer. FHI 360 contributes 12% of monthly base pay to a money purchase pension plan account. Additionally, all US based staff working full-time, which is calculated at 40 hours/week, receive 18 days of paid vacation per year, 12 sick days per year, and 11 holidays per year. Paid time off is reduced pro rata for employees working less than a full-time schedule.

Hiring Salary Range: $85,000 – $135,000

This job posting summarizes the main duties of the job. It neither prescribes nor restricts the exact tasks that may be assigned to carry out these duties. This document should not be construed in any way to represent a contract of employment. Management reserves the right to review and revise this document at any time.

FHI 360 is an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer whereby we do not engage in practices that discriminate against any person employed or seeking employment based on race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national or ethnic origin, age, marital status, physical or mental disability, protected Veteran status, or any other characteristic protected under applicable law.

Our values and commitments to safeguarding: FHI 360 is committed to preventing any type of abuse, exploitation and harassment in our work environments and programs, including sexual abuse, exploitation and harassment. FHI 360 takes steps to safeguard the welfare of everyone who engages with our organization and programs and requires that all personnel, including staff members and volunteers, share this commitment and sign our code of conduct. All offers of employment will be subject to appropriate screening checks, including reference, criminal record and terrorism finance checks. FHI 360 also participates in the Inter-Agency Misconduct Disclosure Scheme (MDS), facilitated by the Steering Committee for Humanitarian Response. In line with the MDS, we will request information from job applicants’ previous employers about any substantiated findings of sexual abuse, exploitation and/or harassment during the applicant’s tenure with previous employers. By applying, job applicants confirm their understanding of these recruitment procedures and consent to these screening checks.

FHI 360 will consider for employment all qualified applicants, including those with criminal histories, in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable state and local laws.

FHI 360 fosters the strength and health of its workforce through a competitive benefits package, professional development and policies and programs that support a healthy work/life balance. Join our global workforce to make a positive difference for others — and yourself.

Please click here to continue searching FHI 360’s Career Portal.