Senior Health Coordinator (Limited Term)

Background/IRC Summary:

The International Rescue Committee responds to the world’s worst humanitarian crises and helps people to survive and rebuild their lives. Founded in 1933 at the request of Albert Einstein, IRC offers life-saving care and life-changing assistance to refugees forced to flee from war or disaster. At work today in more than 40 countries and in 22 U.S. cities, IRC restores safety, dignity and hope to millions who are uprooted by conflict or disaster. IRC leads the way from harm to home.

The Syria crisis is often described as the worst humanitarian catastrophe since the end of the Cold War. Inside Syria, 7.6 million people are internally displaced and 12.2 million are in need of humanitarian assistance, with 4.8 million in hard-to-reach areas. There are 3.8 million Syrian refugees in neighboring countries. This is no short-term humanitarian episode. The devastating human consequences to huge numbers of people will endure for decades. The destruction of relationships, communities, livelihoods, homes and infrastructure will take years to repair.

IRC is offering a robust humanitarian response to the Syria crisis with an annual budget in excess of $140 million and a rapidly expanding portfolio, supported by more than 1,250 staff in the region. IRC is undertaking programs in Syria and the neighboring countries of Turkey, Iraq, Lebanon and Jordan in the fields of health, child protection, education, women’s protection and empowerment, NFI and food distribution, cash assistance, water and sanitation, and livelihood programming. Our work in these challenging settings gives rise to some of the most pressing issues facing contemporary humanitarian action, including questions of access, security, funding and coordination.

The IRC/Turkey team is currently providing health services to displaced Syrians across northern Syria in Idleb, Aleppo, Homs and Lattakia governorates. IRC implements a variety of health activities, both directly and through Syrian partners, including primary health care, reproductive health care, trauma centers, polyclinics, community health, etc. The current health portfolio is approximately $10.5 million.

Job Overview/Summary:

The Senior Health Coordinator is responsible for overseeing the implementation of all of the IRC’s health programming in northern Syria. S/he will provide technical and managerial leadership to the health program and ensure all activities are of high quality and respond to assessed needs. S/he will ensure program delivery is on time and on budget, ensure business development efforts maintain and expand health services based on needs, and ensure capacity building for national health staff is prioritized to take on more senior management responsibilities. The majority of the IRC’s health funding is implemented through Syrian partners, thus candidates should have strong backgrounds in partnership and sub-grant management.

The Senior Health Coordinator is part of a program team including Coordinators for economic recovery and development, NFIs, protection, women’s protection and empowerment, environmental health and education. S/he reports to the Deputy Director of Programs.

Major Responsibilities:

Program Management

• Provide strategic direction, leadership and overall technical and management support to health programs in northern Syria;
• Lead design processes that ensure new or adapted programming for the health sector focuses on maximizing efficiencies, impact and integrated approaches;
• Supervise and provide technical support to Health Manager(s) to implement the IRC health programs to a high quality standard;
• Coordinate closely and liaise regularly with the Deputy Director of Programs, Senior Field Coordinators and Grants Coordinator to ensure quality implementation and business development and to ensure quality management and compliance to donor requirements;
• In collaboration with the Health Manager(s), ensure smooth management and integration of project work plans and budgets (budget forecasting, development of spending plans and budget follow-up), timely recruitment, and accurate reporting in accordance with IRC and donor regulations;

• Ensure that the health department produces high quality inputs as part of the development and maintenance of program-specific budget management tools, including but not limited to, activity plans, Gantt charts, procurement plans,  financial forecasts, and budget vs. actuals;
• Actively and meaningfully participate in the Grant Management Meeting process;
• Provide training to program teams on IRC activities and health best practices;
• Liaise with Technical Advisors on a regular basis to ensure technical assistance is provided when needed;

• Work closely with the Health Cluster, and other relevant coordination structures, to ensure harmonized implementation approaches;
• Ensure the implementation of existing M&E systems, provide guidance where needed to improve the effectiveness of these systems and work to ensure output and impact data are captured and used to optimize program quality and identify efficiencies;
• Ensure that all internal and external reporting requirements are met, that reports are of a high quality and are submitted on time.

Technical Quality

• Ensure all IRC Health projects are implemented in a timely and professional manner, according to objectives, goals and indicators established by SPHERE and the IRC, in line with donor requirements and based on beneficiary needs;
• Identify, monitor and report unmet health needs and explore the potential of the IRC to address those needs. Conduct additional needs assessments, as required;
• Ensure procurement of medical supplies and materials, including drugs, is fully compliant with Donor and IRC rules and regulations;
• Provide technical assistance including supportive supervision to IRC’s staff working on all health projects;
• Adapt and develop where necessary functional primary healthcare systems and services that can include: reproductive health, child health, communicable diseases, con-communicable Diseases, health information, drug management, infection control, referral systems, etc.
• Analyze health data collected from the field, to obtain evidence based  trends in diseases and other healthcare-related issues identified;
• Support the development and maintenance of a coherent health strategy across IRC’s health interventions in Northern Syria in collaboration with the relevant sectors and departments under the IRC Turkey country office;
• Ensure all implementation plans employ a programmatic approach that integrates the needs of other sectors of work;
• Monitor and evaluate appropriate implementation of technical healthcare projects against program objectives and IRC’s Program Framework.

Partnership Management

• Manage the Syrian health partner relationships and oversee health partner program implementation, proposal design and technical quality standards;
• Review partner budgets, reports and other implementation/proposal inputs;
• Provide quarterly technical health trainings to partners;
• Actively pursue additional health partnerships as appropriate;
• Work closely with the Deputy Director of Accountability and Learning to identify partner capacity building needs.

HR & Staff Capacity Building

• Maintain open and professional relations with team members, promoting a strong team spirit and providing oversight and guidance to enable staff to successfully perform in their positions;
• Take responsibility for discussing job expectations, performance, and objectives on an informal, quarterly basis with all staff;
• Overall responsibility for staff timesheets, work plans, vacation schedules, and staff training/development activities;
• Adhere to and act in accordance with the IRC Global HR Policies and Procedures;
• Manage Health staff and volunteers and develop specific capacity building plans for the Health department and each individual staff in order for national staff to take on increasing levels of management responsibility;
• Develop and implement remote management capacity building approaches to build the capacity of the team in Syria.

Coordination

• Play an active role in the planning and execution of the country overall and sector strategies;
• Regularly attend technical cluster meetings and support Managers to attend the working group meetings in their respective sub-sectors and feed in IRC priorities at Antakya and Gaziantep level;
• Coordinate with the Deputy Director for Programs and Senior Field Coordinators to ensure field concerns and challenges are brought to relevant stakeholders for the development of improved standards and procedures.

Other

• Consistently and proactively monitor/assess the safety and security of the team; promptly reporting concerns or incidents to IRC management and liaising with community leaders and other external parties as required to maintain/enhance the security environment for IRC programs;
• Any other duties as assigned by the supervisor to enable and develop IRC programs.

Professional Standards

• All IRC staff are required to adhere to THE IRC Way Standards for Professional Conduct and the IRC country employment policies.

Job Requirements:

• Public health professional preferable with clinical health background; MD is a plus but not required;
• Minimum of 6 years professional experience in management of health emergencies, INGO experience required;
• Strong program/technical and budget management acumen as well as planning, reporting, monitoring and evaluation skills;
• Strong written and oral communication skills, effective in representation and liaison with external parties;  
• Proven technical writing skills;
• Proposal writing acumen and experience;
• Minimum budget management experience of  $1,000,000 USD+
• Must be capable of applying his/her skills and knowledge in a range of capacities, including direct implementation, advisory functions, training and the transfer of technical knowledge and management skills to others;
• Interpersonal qualities: Works well in and promotes teamwork, comfortable in a multi-cultural environment, flexible and able to handle pressure with professional grace;
• Fluent in spoken and written English;
• Functional Arabic strongly preferred.

Working Environment:  The position will be based either in Antakya or Gaziantep, Turkey with frequent travel between each city. The IRC’s security phase for Antakya is currently yellow. The Senior Health Coordinator will be provided individual housing.

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The IRC and IRC workers must adhere to the values and principles outlined in IRC Way - Standards for Professional Conduct.  These are Integrity, 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.