Director for Monitoring, Evaluation, Research and Learning, USAID/Nigeria Health Project at Management Sciences For Health - MSH

The MERL Director reports to the Chief of Party (COP), participates in the project leadership team, collaborate with the Technical Directors and provides direct supervision to other technical staff.   

SPECIFIC RESPONSIBILITIES:  

• Provide in-country technical leadership, and support for monitoring, evaluation, and knowledge management. These tasks include, among others: 
• Ensure the integration of M&E activities into all project components.  
• Collect, report and analyze information on project activities.  
• Ensure timely and complete reporting from in-country executing partners by approved USAID and MOH reporting formats.  
• Monitor and evaluate progress towards annual work plans, expected outputs, including selecting and monitoring progress in meeting indicators.  
• Support the development and regularly update detailed annual work plans and selection of indicators and annual implementation plans with a view toward the project’s M&E requirements.  
• Coordinate the preparation of all quarterly progress reports, annual project reports, inception reports, ad-hoc technical reports, and success stories for USAID funding in line with the required formats.  
• Collect data for the annual M&E plan and use those data to improve project performance.  
• Adapt and implement tools and techniques to improve the quality and use of data for decision making.  
• Compile information on lessons learned and expertise within and outside the project.  
• Provide capacity-building activities on M&E to selected stakeholders and sub-contractors participating in project activities, including Federal and State Governments, Local Government Authorities, Ward Development Council, and local NGOs, faith-based organizations, and civil society: 
• Provide capacity building, including reporting and management use of periodically collected health information, Data Quality Assurance, DHIS2, and LQAS through monthly seminars, hands-on training, mentoring, and coaching.  
• Lead the design and implementation of operational research. 

QUALIFICATIONS: 

• Master’s degree in management, M&E, health sciences, public health, or related subject with at least 8+ years of relevant work experience in M&E donor-funded public health programs in Nigeria or West Africa: USAID experience required,   andM&E training and capacity-building experience required;  
• Proven experience establishing data quality assurance systems with software applications related to project planning and monitoring. 
• Experience designing and conducting operations research. 
• Demonstrated ability to lead M&E staff and consultants within a consortium of international and local sub-contractors to achieve measurable results within an integrated health program.   
• Proven experience in engaging M&E staff of the host country government, civil society organizations, international development organizations, and NGOs to support project implementation and/or to provide complementary resources.  
• High levels of diplomacy, conflict management, team building, written and oral communication, and negotiation skills.  
• Fluency in written and spoken English, and demonstrated capacity to effectively communicate and document, including the writing of quality reports and detailed analysis of strategic information. Fluency in a local language is a distinct advantage.