New Offers at Management Sciences for Health (MSH)

The Communication Manager will be responsible for ensuring the smooth operation of MSH’s communications to maximize visibility of MSH Nigeria in coordination with the Country Representative, COMU and Project Directors and the Corporate Office of Strategic Development and Communications and advocacy.

Under the direct supervision of the Country Representative, develop a comprehensive MSH Nigeria strategic external engagement plan and oversee its implementation in coordination with the corporate Communication office to bring out “cause-result relationships” in the work we do.

The Communication Manager will:

• Generate and share success stories/news nuggets, briefs, photographs/video recordings and related items of MSH Nigeria activities. Provide stories for quarterly, annual and semi-annual donor reports.
• Generate Communication quarterly reports and produce the MSH Nigeria Newsletter.
• Manage media relations for increased visibility - write press releases; organize press events/MSH public events; help set conference agendas and generate technical materials, IVs etc.
• Facilitate MSH participation in public events in-country, international conferences etc.
• Ensure the production of high-quality printed materials (such as Newsletter, project briefs, fact sheets, posters) in coordination with the corporate communication office.
• Ensure organization-wide donor branding compliance.
• Support management of MSH Nigeria Communication Teams, collating materials generated by technical teams and field offices and mentoring Communication staff.
• Oversee MSH Nigeria’s presence on the internet, including management of content for the MSH Nigeria country page on the MSH corporate website and the MSH Nigeria OLLIE page; archiving of Success Stories, abstracts and other communication products in hard and soft files.
• Manage MSH Nigeria Communications Folder on SharePoint and shared drive.
• Support timely submission of project reports, Integrated Country Presence reports and documents to the MSH Country Representative/NLT and MSH HQ as required.
• Track & report quarterly on communication plan implementation from analytic perspective.
• Edit and support production of technical abstracts and conference posters, in coordination with corporate SDC office.
• Provide communication advisory/mentoring to select MSH Nigeria partners.
• Serve as a resource to and operational liaison between projects (FCT and States) and the Communications Unit, documenting meetings as required; inputs into reports/Newsletters etc. Involves periodic strategic travel to supported States to capture stories of interest.

A draft national eHealth strategy for Nigeria has recently been prepared. Since the process began, a National Health Act 2014 has been enacted and there is ongoing work on its operationalizes action. The purpose of this consultancy is to provide advice and technical expertise to the FMOH to align this draft document with the provisions of the NHAct-2014 towards the preparation a finished product – an approved national eHealth strategy – that is fully aligned to the provisions of the NHAct-2014 and to fast track it's inclusion into the ongoing revision of the National Health Policy and the National Strategic Health Development Plan (NSHDP-2). The main objectives are to:

• Undertake a critical appraisal of the draft framework and align it's contents to the provisions of the National Health Act (NHAct-2014) in terms of the three critical dimensions of national eHealth strategy development, namely: stakeholder engagement, process and content;
• Prepare a report to the FMOH, with recommendations on how to improve all three dimensions; and
• Provide technical guidance to the FMOH in fast-tracking the inclusion of the provisions of the framework into the ongoing revision of the National Health Policy and the National Strategic Health Development Plan (NSHDP-2) towards a speedy roll out of an aligned and approved national eHealth strategy.
• The consultant should support the meeting with state teams to socialize the Framework, capture of feedback from the states and report on comments from the state level stakeholders.

Strategic alignment

This intervention on ICT for health should be fully aligned with Nigeria’s existing policies and strategies, including (add key policy dimensions).

The eHealth strategy should aim at mainstreaming critical cross-cutting issues: it undertakes, in particular, to mainstream capacity building, gender and environmental aspects.

Main Tasks and Responsibilities of the Consultants

Working under the guidance of the Directorate Health Planning, Research and Statistics, the consultants will:

• Provide technical assistance to the strategy development core group in aligning and navigating issues around approval processes by providing evidence of reviewing relevant FMOH documents and reports, such as:
• the FMOH Medium Term Strategy (MTS);
• Health Sector policy;
• national ICT policy, and
• relevant policies and strategies of the FMOH, and in particular those on the use of technology in the health sector in general, and those related to ICT in health in specifically
• Review and identify Health sector-specific opportunities and challenges in Nigeria that address ICT in health; and identify a few applications that have had significant impact in Africa or elsewhere and that have the potential of being scaled up.
• Support the collection and review existing eHealth strategies
• Provide assistance to the development of a strategy to support ICT for Health as well as actionable recommendations on how to include ICT in policy dialogue and planning with development counterparts on sectoral development goals and priorities; and
• Prepare a final report on alignment of the national eHealth strategy for Nigeria with the NHAct-2014
• Provide guidance and technical expertise for facilitating the finalization of the national eHealth strategy of Nigeria post management approval.

Deliverables

• Report on how to align and the existing draft eHealth Strategy with the NHAct-2014
• NHAct aligned draft National eHealth strategy for Nigeria ready for management approval processes.

Duration And Fees Of The Assignment

80 person-days distributed as follows: 

• 20 person-days of an International consultant
• 30 person-days of two national consultants

CONCLUSION OF ICT4SOML RESPONE

• We are cognizant of the fact that the ToR as developed by Dr. Azodoh seems focused on what we believe that are staff on this activity should have or be able to do
• We also think some of the activities described in the ToR run counter to the objectives and direction of the project and may not be justifiable/allowable expenses (e.g. Norad has funded us to support the development of the HICT-F, we find it difficult to justify paying a consultants – who have no idea of the history or process – to review the near end document)
• Consequently:
  • We cannot fund some parts of the ToR within the mandate and structure of our project
  • However, we can fund consultant(s) to support the presentation of the HICT-F to and capture of feedback from states; alignment of such feedback on the HICT-F with the NHAct & production of a detailed report on synergies / gaps between the HICT-F and the NHAct with appropriate recommendations
• So we would want the ToR tweaked to reflect that the consultant(s) will work before, during & after the state engagement meeting         
• Once we achieve concurrence by all on the ToR, we will put same out and go through the recruitment process as appropriate i.e. working in conjunction with the FMoH DPRS 

MSH is seeking to recruit a State Team Lead (STL) who will be responsible for providing coordination, technical and programmatic support to PLAN-Health’s work. This position will be based in Uyo, Akwa-Ibom state. To achieve this, she/he will work closely with the technical leads of the respective PLAN-Health teams in the country office Abuja. Additionally, the post holder will work under the supervision of the PLAN-Health Associate Director in the MSH country office.

• The STL will coordinate the MSH interventions in Akwa Ibom state and represent the MSH PLAN-Health project in the state. S/he will be responsible for monthly work plans for Akwa Ibom in coordination with the Abuja-based teams and with Akwa Ibom partners.
• Participate in key stakeholder meetings in Akwa ibom and represent MSH in forums with clients, donors and other key health sector stakeholders in the state
• Provide monthly written reports of the current state of programming
• The STL also serves as a resource for identifying best practices, lessons learned, and innovative approaches to institutional capacity building, and for disseminating this information both internally and externally.  
• Becomes conversant with PLAN-Health tools and approaches
• Establishes regular communications with the Abuja-based team
• The STL will exercise impeccable professional ethics, and will be aware of and adhere to MSH’s procurement integrity standards in all activities.