Job Description
The African Population and Health Research Center (APHRC) is a leading Africa-based, African-led, international research institution headquartered in Nairobi, Kenya. APHRC generates and supports the use of evidence for meaningful action to improve the lives of all Africans through:
• Research that emphasizes health and wellbeing;
• Capacity strengthening that deepens the skills of African researchers, scholars and institutions within the continent; and
• Policy engagement and communication that supports greater influence of evidence in policy – and decision-making across sub-Saharan Africa.
The APHRC seeks to recruit a Senior Program Officer within the Research Capacity Strengthening (RCS) Division, to work on a large scale initiative whose goals are to transform the Research and Development (R&D) ecosystem in Africa through:
• Designing and running a matching service between universities/research institutes based in all the regions of Africa and funding agencies for R&D.
• Configuring and running Africa-wide platform-based capacity-building for universities/research institutes based in all of Africa’s regions, to increase their capabilities to do more and perform better on a sustained basis along the spectrum of implementation research.
• Designing and developing prototypes in selected countries, to link country decision-making systems with national research systems for adoption/scale-up of R&D innovations.
• Strengthening the African innovation-research ecosystem by developing and deploying connectors – platforms that have cross-cutting benefits to researchers and decision makers.
The overall responsibility of the Senior Program Officer is to support the management of a large-scale capacity strengthening initiative by leading and coordinating specific components of the initiative and supporting the overall Program Manager in the day-to-day running of the initiative.
Responsibilities:
• Coordinate the implementation of specified activities from the overall work plan. This entails reporting and tracking project implementation and expenditure for the assigned activities;
• Participate in specific program activities including desk reviews, in depth analysis, partner mapping and capacity assessments;
• Coordinate submissions of proposals for support by potential grantees in academic/research institutes from all over Africa and organize high quality reviews of the submissions;
• Organize capacity strengthening activities in diverse areas and for diverse participants within the African R&D ecosystem;
• Work with grantees to ensure the execution of assigned research capacity strengthening and evaluation projects to ensure timely implementation of activities;
• Coordinate outreach activities to various stakeholders including funding agencies, academic/research institutes and national/regional/continental policy making bodies;
• Draft technical reports from the various activities;
• Participate in learning forums about the initiative, sharing lessons and findings with appropriate audiences;
• Represent the Center in high- level national and regional forums including relevant technical working groups and expert committees on implementation research and research capacity strengthening;
• Support recruitment efforts for consultants and other program staff;
• Contribute to grant writing and fundraising for the program; and
• Publicize the initiative to relevant audiences.
Qualifications and Experience:
• Master’s degree in a Developmental Research or Public Policy related professional area with a minimum of 7 years’ post-qualification experience.
• Experience managing large scale (multi-year, multi-team, multi-country) projects preferably in research, research capacity strengthening, or policy and advocacy.
• Good understanding of the Higher Education/ R&D/ Policy landscape in sub-Saharan Africa.
• Experience working in a research or academic institution or a policy making body in sub-Saharan Africa.
• Experience conducting implementation research will be an added advantage.
• Excellent written communication and presentation skills.
• Experience in grant writing.
• Excellent interpersonal and organizational skills and ability to work in a culturally diverse team.
• Bilingual language skills (French and English) will be an added advantage.
Interested candidates are encouraged to apply through our recruitment portal https://aphrc.org/vacancies/ by October 07, 2021. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis. Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted; shortlisted candidates will be required to have a Police Clearance Certificate. Cover letters should be addressed to:
The Human Resources Officer
African Population and Health Research Center, Inc
APHRC Campus, Manga Close, off Kirawa Road, Kitisuru
P.O Box 10787-GPO, Nairobi
Website: www.aphrc.org
APHRC is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to the protection of vulnerable persons.