Health Cluster Co-Coordinator at International Rescue Committee (IRC)

The overall purpose of co-coordination is to improve the timeliness and impact of appropriate humanitarian health assistance for crisis-impacted communities and to strengthen the collective health outcomes of the response.

The Health Cluster Co-Coordinator (Co-HCC) will be expected to work with the Health Cluster Coordinator to support the implementation of, monitor and evaluate performance against the six core cluster functions and accountability to affected populations (refer to Annex 1). The Co-HCC will ensure that partners participate in and assume their minimum commitments to the Health Cluster (Annex 2 IASC Minimum Commitments for participation in clusters) by placing Affected Populations at the centre of decision-making and action.

Specifically, the Health Cluster Co-Coordinator will:

1. Strengthen pre-existing sectoral coordination by maintaining appropriate links and dialogue with national and local authorities, local civil society and other relevant actors, respecting their respective mandates and programme priorities. Taking reasonable measures to proactively engage with and support local NGOs to participate in cluster coordination and at each phase of the Humanitarian Programme Cycle. Ensuring that the health cluster position is informed by the NGO perspective.
2. Lead and/or co-lead, coordinate and conduct health needs assessments with the health partners and other sectors in particular, but not limited to, WASH Nutrition, Food Security and Protection.
3. Contribute effectively to inter-cluster coordination forums and cooperate with other clusters, Government counterparts, and relevant authorities (as appropriate) in planning, coordination, and operational activities, ensuring that the NGO community is contributing to and sharing responsibilities.
4. Ensure protection and early recovery are mainstreamed and awareness of the different needs and capacities of women, girls, boys and men of all ages, people with disabilities, and other diversity characteristics such as ethnicity and religion are informing what we do, how we do it and with whom to promote meaningful access, safety and dignity in all phases of the health sector response.
5. Participate actively in gap analysis, priority setting reinforcing the complementarity of partner actions by avoiding duplication and gaps.
6. Ensuring adequate reporting and effective information sharing, reflecting the agreed minimum standards are in place and that all parnters contribute on a regular basis to enable appropriate monitoring and evaluation and review the impact of the cluster activities and progress against the strategic Health Cluster objectives.
7. Participate in reviews of coordination mechanisms and their adaptation over time to reflect the evolving crisis and the capacities of local actors.
8. Convene and facilitate regular Health Cluster meetings, ensuring that discussions are participatory and results oriented. Ensure that the NGO members of the cluster are kept fully informed of the meetings and any decisions that may take place outside of regular Health Cluster meetings.
9. Promote the leadership roles of NGOs within the cluster and ensure that all Health Cluster working groups have active national and international NGO participation to help ensure that NGOs support and influence the clusters work.
10. Promote/support training and capacity building of health sector personnel, of partners and national authorities.
11. Represent the interests of the Health Cluster in discussions with stakeholders on priorities, resource mobilization and advocacy. Taking additional steps to ensure that the resource mobilization and advocacy efforts fairly represents and benefits NGOs as well as the UN agencies in support of the agreed health cluster strategy.
12. Ensure adequate contingency planning and preparedness for new emergencies and seasonal adaptation of responses that reflect the actual and potential to scale-up capacities of all partners (local and international).
13. The NGO Co-Coordinator should act as a focal point for receiving NGO concerns in order to raise these with the Health Cluster Coordinator and the Cluster Lead Agency to strengthen accountability and transparency of the cluster’s decisions and work.
14. Act as Health Cluster Coordinator Officer in Charge whenever needed.

Cluster core functions2:

Support service delivery by:

• Providing a platform that ensures that service delivery is driven by the identified needs of affected populations, as reflected by key humanitarian partners for the sector, respecting their respective mandates and programme priorities.
• Securing commitments from humanitarian partners in responding to needs and filling gaps, ensuring an appropriate distribution of responsibilities within the cluster group, with clearly designated focal points for specific issues where necessary.
• Developing protocols for information sharing and operational coordination which ensures confidentiality where needed; and
• Ensuring comprehensive joint analysis of needs, response, and gaps to support operational decision-making and advocacy.
• Inform the strategic decision-making by:
• Ensuring effective and harmonized joint needs assessment and analysis across the region, involving all relevant sectors and partners.
• Ensuring Health Cluster partners agree on assessment tools and approaches (i.e. core indicators, vulnerability criteria, compatible assessment processes and analysis) through consensus-building mechanisms following the Global Health Cluster Public Health Information Standards.
• Ensuring integration of agreed priority cross-cutting issues in sectoral and inter-sectoral needs assessments, analysis, planning, monitoring and response (e.g,. gender, age, diversity, environment, protection, and human rights); contributing to the development of appropriate strategies to address these issues; ensuring protection mainstreaming and gender-sensitive programming.
• Providing regular health situation analysis reports; and
• Representing the interests of Cluster and cluster partners in the discussions with the Humanitarian Coordinator and other stakeholders.

Plan and develop strategy by:

• Developing/updating agreed response strategies and work plans for the cluster and ensuring that these are adequately reflected in overall HCT country strategies.
• Ensuring that response plans are in line with existing policy guidance and technical standards.
• Ensuring the people centre approach for the development of the health cluster strategy by ;
• Ensuring effective links with the Inter-Cluster Coordination Team and in particular other cluster groups such as Food Security, Logistics, Nutrition, Protection, WASH to improve humanitarian integrated response through joint planning.
• Promoting emergency response actions while at the same time considering the need for early recovery/resilience planning as well as prevention and risk reduction concerns.
• Clarifying funding requirements, helping to set priorities, and agreeing cluster contributions to the overall humanitarian funding proposals.

Monitor and evaluate performance by:

• Ensuring adequate monitoring mechanisms are in place to review the impact of the cluster activities and progress against the strategic Health Cluster objectives.
• Ensuring adequate monitoring mechanisms are in place to review the impact of the cluster activities and progress against the strategic Health Cluster objectives.
• Periodically assessing the performance of the cluster through the utilization of the Cluster Performance Monitoring Tool and ensuring that the information generated is then shared with partners for further learning and knowledge management.
• Ensuring that cluster coordination mechanisms are adapted over time to reflect the capacities of local actors and the engagement of development partners.
• Ensuring adequate data sharing mechanisms are in place to review impact of the cluster and progress against implementation plans; and
• Ensuring adequate reporting and effective information sharing, reflecting the agreed minimum standards.

Build national capacity in preparedness and contingency planning by:

• Investing in the institutional capacities of local and national stakeholders and partners, including preparedness, response, and coordination capacities.
• Developing mechanisms to enhance capacity building through in-country trainings.
• Drawing lessons learned from past activities and revising strategies accordingly.
• Serving as a forum for strengthening operational coordination and problem solving within the various Health Cluster coordination groups in the region.
• Ensuring adequate contingency planning and preparedness for new emergencies and seasonal adaptation of responses.
• Providing contingency-planning scenarios for the Health Cluster response.

Undertake advocacy by:

• Identifying core advocacy concerns, including resource requirements, and contributing key messages to the broader advocacy initiatives of other actors.
• Advocating for donors to fund humanitarian actors to carry out priority activities in the areas concerned, while at the same time encouraging cluster participants to mobilize resources for their activities through their usual channels.
• Developing and implementing a communications and advocacy strategy on behalf of all Cluster partners to ensure that key decision-makers, including government and donors, are aware of the needs, priorities, geographic and programmatic gaps, and importance of the necessary support to the sector activities; and
• Representing the interests of the cluster groups in discussions with the national regional/global stakeholders on prioritization, resource mobilization and advocacy.

The IASC minimum commitments for participation in clusters4 include:

• Commitment to humanitarian principles, the Principles of Partnership5, cluster-specific guidance and internationally recognized programme standards, including the Secretary-General’s Bulletin on Special Measures for Protection from Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse6.
• Commitment to mainstream protection in programme delivery (including respect for principles of non-discrimination, do no harm, etc.).
• Readiness to participate in actions that specifically improve accountability to affected people, in line with the IASC Commitments to Accountability to Affected Populations7 and the related Operational Framework.
• A demonstrated understanding of the duties and responsibilities associated with membership of the cluster, as defined by IASC ToRs and guidance notes33, any cluster-specific guidance, and country cluster ToRs, where available.
• Active participation in the cluster and a commitment to consistently engage in the cluster’s collective work.
• Capacity and willingness to contribute to the cluster’s response plan and activities, which must include inter-cluster coordination.
• Commitment to mainstream key programmatic cross-cutting issues (including age, gender, environment, and HIV/AIDs).
• Commitment by a relevant senior staff member to work consistently with the cluster to fulfil its mission.
• Commitment to work cooperatively with other cluster partners to ensure an optimal and strategic use of available resources and share information on organizational resources.
• Willingness to take on leadership responsibilities in sub-national or working groups as needed, subject to capacity and mandate.
• Undertake advocacy, and disseminate advocacy messages to affected communities, the host Government, donors, the HCT, CLAs, the media and other audiences.
• Ensure that the cluster provides interpretation (in an appropriate language) so that all cluster partners are able to participate, including local organizations (and national and local authorities where appropriate).

Qualifications

• An advanced university degree (Master's level or above) in Public Health, Medicine or International Health or related fields.
• Ability to prioritize, organize, manage and adapt management style according to need.
• Demonstrated communication and negotiation skills and ability to convene stakeholders and facilitate a policy process among UN, national and international NGOs, national health authorities and donors.
• Relevant experience9 at national and/or international level, demonstrated engagement and knowledge of the of the health cluster.
• Substantive experience in developing and promoting collaborative partnerships in emergency and humanitarian relief operations, including experience in managing and coordinating health programs in chronic and acute, sudden-onset emergencies.
• Minimum of 5 years proven experience working on health issues in humanitarian environments, including provision of technical advice to field teams;
• Excellent understanding of health issues in emergency situations and detailed knowledge of humanitarian principles, guidelines and laws and the cluster system
• Experience leading, co-leading or participating in health cluster/sector meetings, with Health Cluster Coordinator training preferred;
• Strong experience with information management as related to the health sector, including maintaining standards of impartiality and confidentiality with data of a sensitive nature
• Excellent leadership, coordination, capacity building, planning and analytical skills;
•  Excellent representation skills including the development of strong interpersonal relationships to facilitate communication within the cluster.
• Previous experience of working within the cluster system preferred; this position includes travel throughout the region.