Position title: Senior Manager, COVAX Strategic Liaison (Temporary) - Multiple Positions
Location: Geneva
Purpose of the position: Support the Country Support team’s country engagement in relation to the preparedness, roll-out and accelerated uptake of COVID-19 vaccines.
Department: Country Programmes
Team: Country Support
Reports to:
N° of positions supervised (if applicable): 0
Career step level: 4
Duration: ASAP until December 2022
Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance is a public-private partnership committed to saving children’s lives and protecting people’s health by increasing equitable use of vaccines in lower-income countries. The Vaccine Alliance brings together implementing country and donor governments, the World Health Organisation, UNICEF, the World Bank, the vaccine industry, technical agencies, civil society, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and other private sector partners. Gavi uses innovative finance mechanisms, including co-financing by recipient countries, to secure sustainable funding and adequate supply of quality vaccines. Since 2000, Gavi has contributed to the immunisation of more than 888 million children and the prevention of more than 15 million future deaths.
The COVAX Facility (“COVAX”) provides a global solution to the equitable distribution of vaccines to the 190 participating countries and economies. The COVAX Advance Market Commitment (AMC) is an innovative financing instrument that supports the participation of the 92 low and lower-middle income economies in COVAX. Self-financing participants (SFPs) have entered COVAX either as Optional (having the possibility to opt-out of a particular vaccine) or Committed Purchasers. Guided by the WHO fair allocation framework, COVAX will equitably distribute doses to help protect the most at-risk groups. Gavi is working with Alliance partners UNICEF and WHO to ensure that the infrastructure is in place, and the technical support available, for COVID-19 vaccines to be safely delivered to all those who need them.
THE ROLE
Gavi is committed to securing a global response to COVID-19 that is effective and fair, using its unique expertise to help identify and rapidly accelerate development, production and delivery of COVID-19 vaccines under the principle that no one is safe unless everyone is safe. The Secretariat hosts the Office of the COVAX Facility (OCF), led by a Managing Director, Office of the COVAX Facility. The Country Programmes (CP) department, led by a Managing Director, Country Programmes is responsible for ensuring the right infrastructure, tools and processes are in place to successfully deliver COVID-19 vaccines funded by the COVAX Facility to COVAX AMC countries.
COVAX has now shipped 722M doses to 144 participants, including 77 LICs/LMICs. Of the 722M doses, 610M have been shipped to AMC92. However, there are still challenges to vaccine implementation including: a) Coordination/political commitment; b) Multiple products to manage; c) Limited number of HCWs/surge issues; d) Vaccine acceptance and vaccine preference; e) Lack of funding; f) Complex vaccine handling; and g) Stringent storage requirements.
As supply is ramping up, we are moving from a supply-constrained to a demand-driven environment that requires increased country engagement. To temporarily bolster the capacity of the Country Support team as it relates to its COVAX-facing work, we are looking to hire four experienced Senior Managers, COVAX Strategic Liaison.
MAIN DUTIES/RESPONSIBILITIES
• Expert project management and resource role on the implementation of COVAX-supported vaccine implementation in countries – and as such, provide advice and support to countries/SCMs, in coordination with Country Support Management Team. Escalation or feeding-back to COVAX Office on behalf of Country Support teams;
• Support regional or country teams, through the Director, Regional Head or Senior Country Manager, in relation to the preparation, delivery and accelerated roll-out of COVID-19 vaccines in Gavi eligible countries;
• Support decision-making process with SCMs/PMs; advise the SCMs/PMs and provide insights to countries on all COVAX processes focusing on dose sharing, JAT allocations, cost-sharing donations, reallocation, redeployment, monitoring agents, management surge support, funding streams, humanitarian buffer, etc;
• Provide up-to-date country intelligence to all COVAX coordination groups (JAT, SWAT/SCO, SWAT ad-hoc, dose sharing teams) to support allocation, donation, reallocation, and redeployment decision-making per country;
• Convey the information shared during the various regular COVAX meetings (Check-In, Q&A, country facing briefings, dose-sharing internal, OCT, brainstorming sessions, CRD IMR) and ad-hoc meetings to SCMs and PMs;
• Play a key role in close coordination with SCMs/PMs and countries, overseeing monitoring and undertaking analytical efforts - gathering country intelligence, with a focus on vaccine delivery and uptake related risk/wastage, to feed all workstreams/groups (JAT/SWAT/CRD IMR) and reporting to COVAX Partners. Ensure continuous updating of COVAX trackers, dashboard, and additional COVAX monitoring tool;
• Monitor in-country COVAX related workstreams (i.e., management surge support, risk assessment and funding envelopes) for AMC57 countries and provide solutions to SCMs/PMs on identified challenges and bottlenecks;
• Collaborate with UNICEF, WHO and Legal office to ensure preparedness and readiness on all logistics and legal documents per country and use of CPP for all vaccine types;
• Bring country perspective to global COVAX design discussions, including ensuring a coherent and consistent approach with country engagement for all AMC57 countries being directly overseen by the COVAX Facility;
• Facilitate communication between country teams and COVAX Facility PMO and CRD PMO to ensure seamless implementation support and good mutual understanding (two-way street) of country feedback/realities on the one hand and global strategy/approach/guidance towards COVAX delivery on the other;
• Support the COVAX Communications Manager(s) on specific country-related communications messages and topics; track and report on communications to countries on vaccine allocations, cost-sharing and donations, and related preparedness and readiness;
• Work with the COVAX Communications team to ensure that documents are provided in French, Russian and Spanish in good quality translation;
• Each of the Senior Managers will coordinate cross-cutting COVID-19 vaccine deployment workstreams, with separate responsibilities:
Note: The essential functions listed in this section are not exhaustive of the job responsibilities; other duties may be assigned consistent with the department needs.
QUALIFICATIONS
ACADEMIC
• Advanced university degree in Public Health, Social Sciences, Health Economics, Business Administration (with experience in International Development) or related fields.
WORK EXPERIENCE
• Minimum of 8 years of professional experience working in public health or international development;
• Experience in immunisation programmes or health systems is a solid asset;
• Extensive experience working in developing countries on technical issues required;
• Significant grant-, project- and/or programme-management experience required, including in situations of considerable complexity, challenging environments, and political sensitivity;
• Experience in bilateral and multilateral aid environments is a requirement (experience in both headquarters and in the field is an advantage).
SKILLS/COMPETENCIES
• Critical thinking, problem-solving and creative mindset;
• Proactive identification, reporting and resolution/mitigation of issues and risks;
• Political acumen and ability to drive change and improvements in challenging, inter-cultural and complex environments;
• Excellent interpersonal negotiation skills, including ability to problem solve and manage conflict, including with senior counterparts at government level and amongst Gavi partners;
• Flexible mindset and ability to adapt quickly, focusing on value creation;
• Effective consultations with and influencing counterparts at all levels;
• Effective communicator;
• Good knowledge of policies, systems, and procedures in global public health settings;
• Ability to work with wide range of stakeholders across the spectrum of government, donors, technical partners, civil society, humanitarian actors, and other expanded partners.
LANGUAGES
• Fluency in written and spoken English is essential;
• Fluency in written and spoken French and Spanish is mandatory to support francophone and hispanophone countries.
CONTACTS
• Gavi Secretariat;
• Gavi Alliance partners, including UNICEF, WHO, implementing country representatives, multilateral and bilateral donors, civil society organisations, and humanitarian actors;
• COVAX Facility teams.
If you wish to apply, please provide a cover letter and resume through our Careers webpage and apply by clicking on “Senior Manager, COVAX Strategic Liaison (Temporary) - Multiple Positions”. Deadline for applications is 31 January 2022
Please note that as a vaccine organisation and in order to provide duty of care towards its employees, Gavi is requiring its new employees to confirm that they are fully vaccinated against Covid-19 as a condition for pursuing employment with us. You can find out more by visiting this link.
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Gavi brings together the public and private sectors to save lives and protect people’s health by increasing equitable and sustainable use of vaccines against 18 infectious diseases. You will be joining an organisation at the centre of the international COVID-19 response, at the most critical time in global health in a lifetime. You will work in a culturally diverse environment with over 70 nationalities. You will collaborate with partners such as WHO, UNICEF, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the World Bank – and from business, civil society and government.
And you will work in the first global health organisation to receive equal gender salary certification. Your unique experience, skills and talents can help us achieve our vision of leaving no one behind without the life-saving power of vaccines.
In support of Gavi’s commitment to diversity, equality and inclusion, we hire globally and welcome applications regardless of age, disability, ethnicity, national origin, family status, sex, gender identity or expression, physical characteristics, race, religion, spirituality or sexual orientation.
This vacancy is archived.